Many times, the real problem that studying does not bear fruit has its origin in poor planning of the study. There are many study techniques and strategies to study, but there are a number of guidelines that should always be taken into account. Whether you want to learn to study in elementary school, or if you want to learn to study in college, the study techniques we propose below will serve as tools to achieve the best results. Discover how to learn to study with the best tips and tricks.
It is essential to dedicate the time to study and have an adequate environment. However, you should also consider a series of factors that will decisively influence your ability to study smartly, something that you will later see reflected in the results of your exams and projects.
How to learn to study?
The first thing you must keep in mind is that learning to study does not mean memorizing all the data, but selecting some of the most important data and understanding them within the context of them.
To develop comprehensive reading, you should follow the advice and strategies to study that we propose below:
Read a lot and pay attention to what you are reading.
Extract the main ideas of a text (add them, write them down on paper, etc.)
Do not make a summary. Insist on writing short sentences that refer you to the most fundamental ideas of the text.
During the first reading of the text, point out the most important phrases. Then, make successive readings with the listing on the side to help you better understand the essence of what you have written.
Use mnemonic rules
Mnemonic rules are tricks or tools that allow you to memorize things very easily. This study technique can help you to memorize long lists of concepts with the characteristics of each of them.
Let’s see an example:
You must remember the provinces of Andalusia (Almería, Cádiz, Córdoba, Granada, Huelva, Jaén, Málaga and Seville). On the one hand, and as you will see, they are names that you know and with which you are probably familiar … however, being eight names, it is possible that trying to remember them all you end up leaving some along the way.
Learn to study in primary
In addition to learning to study with the study techniques that we have proposed in the previous section, if you want to know how to study in primary school, you must be very clear about one fundamental thing: knowing how to distribute the work well is the key to passing. Do you know what this means?
Flat and plain, it means that it is better to study little but daily than to study hard the day before the exam. Although it is a bad habit very common among children around the world, the best way to study is to do it little by little but on a daily basis. If you try to memorize and understand a lot of information in a very limited period, chances are you will not remember everything. On the other hand, if you dedicate 25-30 minutes a day to the study, your capacity will be greater and better, so the results will be as desired.
The most important thing, for this study technique, is to establish a daily routine as you do to go to the gym: what would happen if you were only once a week to the gym and performed exercises beyond your capabilities? Most likely, in addition to being stiff the next day, you would not notice any major physical changes. On the contrary, if you go every day but little time, the physical changes will begin to be noticed in a matter of weeks and you will achieve the expected results. With the study the same thing happens, the correct way is to do it routinely.
How to learn to study at university
Once again, if you are in college and want to discover new strategies and study techniques, you can make use of the tricks we have given you in the previous sections. However, university students tend to have a higher level of pressure and, therefore, the task of learning to study can be more complicated. If you want to discover how to learn to study in the university, follow the advice that we present below:
Distribute the work well: As we said in the previous section, you must learn to work a little each day. In college, the volume of work you will find will be much greater than you have ever known, so do not leave everything to the last day.
Create a plan: In addition to the agenda that you use in your day-to-day life, creating a study plan can be very beneficial for you to lead an organization. In this plan, you can write down the hours that you dedicate to each subject and you can discover, also, in which subjects you fail more.
Make your own exams: This strategy can be done alone or with your friends. If you have an exam and you have started reading everything that comes in, do a fake exam with some questions that you think may be important. Try to answer them without looking at the notes or the book. To apply this study technique, you can also stay with your friends and do exams for each other. Not only will this be great for comparing ideas and answers, but it will encourage you to do better.
Rest: Maybe it sounds paradoxical, but to pass an exam, you must rest. Once you have many hours of reading and study followed, you will have to make a break to assimilate the concepts calmly and to recover energy.
In short: You must understand what you are reading to assimilate it better and that you can memorize it easily.