The best study habits for students

Although I’ve talked about bad study habits on my blog before, I haven’t really talked about good study habits. Logically, if you’re removing something bad from your life, you’ll want to replace it with something better and more efficient. Therefore, I’ve created a long-overdue list of the best study habits you can have, as prompted by a question someone asked me on my tumblr. 🙂

Blocking distractions

One of the best things to do when studying is to block your distractions. I was reading Chris Bailey’s Hyperfocus, and he cited a statistic that your chances of getting distracted decrease significantly once the distraction is more than 20 seconds away. You need to take advantage of this! Set your phone on silent, do not disturb, or airplane mode (whatever you feel comfortable with), then put it in another room. This means that to mindlessly scroll through Pinterest (oops) you need to walk to the other room, turn off airplane mode, then start scrolling – all this creates “friction” between you and your distraction.

If you get distracted while working on your laptop, then you can add extensions to your browser that block distracting websites. With any distraction, try to make accessing it as difficult as possible – it should be at least 20 seconds away. This way, you’ll be more focused and on-task while studying.

Taking breaks and mindfulness

Surprisingly, taking breaks is beneficial for your productivity. It might seem counter-intuitive since you’re not doing anything, but breaks are really important for you to rest and regain energy for the next task. For every hour you work, take a 10 minute break. If you want to be even more productive during your breaks, then do something you productive enjoy, like reading a book or reading the news. Personally, I like to plan the next day, but that’s because I’m a massive calendar nerd. 🙂

Another important productivity-booster is meditation. It helps you organise your thoughts and stay on task longer. You don’t have to be like a monk and meditate for hours on end, just a few minutes are enough. I’ve recently started to use the app Balance to meditate for a few minutes every morning, and I feel like my productivity has improved. Whether that’s because of the placebo effect or because meditation has actually helped me, I don’t know. What I do know is that I’ve almost finished revising for economics, and that’s super productive!

Planning ahead

I cannot stress enough how important it is to have a schedule. It’ll help you avoid procrastination, as you’ll have a set time to complete your revision. As well as this, set a goal before each study session. Don’t make it vague, like “prepare for English”. Be specific about what you want to achieve before each session – “memorise 5 quotes with analysis and context” is a great goal, since you’ll know exactly when you’ve achieved it. This helps you make your revision more focused, so instead of re-reading your textbook and notes a bunch of times, you’ll know exactly what to do.

Learning at school

Asking questions is the most important thing to do while in lessons. Teachers are there to help you learn. If you don’t understand something, ask a question during class. If you’re too anxious, you can ask them after class or email them. You really don’t want to be stuck in a situation where you have to teach yourself a topic before a test because you didn’t understand it in class. It’s not embarrasing to not understand something – everyone has their weak spots. Ask the question now so you don’t have to study even more later.

Also, consider how you take notes in class. It’s better to focus on taking notes as the concepts are being explained. It might be tempting to try and understand what the teacher is explaining first, but it’s better to have the information down before you try and wrap your head around it. That way, if you don’t understand the concept at first, you’ll still have something to try to revise from. You can always use your textbook, your friends’ notes, or online resources to supplement your notes.

Revision methods

When it comes to revision, active recall is king! There are countless methods of active recall, and it’s easily the most effective way to learn. Although you might want to make your pretty look nice and aesthetic, it’s more functional to do past papers or practice questions. Don’t worry though – you can still make these look nice! Just use nice headers, highlighters, and neat handwriting 🙂

If you do have to make notes, make them brief! No-one needs 3 paragraphs explaining each of the states of matter – they’re called notes for a reason. If you want to incorporate active recall into your note-taking, read your classnotes and your textbook, then make notes. This forces you to recall information, just like you would in an exam.

I hope all of these tips helped. I know being a student can be incredibly stressful at times, but remember that you can make learning enjoyable for yourself. The next time you sit down to study, try incorporate some of these tips into your routine. Good luck!