How To Study
When I was in school I thought I had figured out how to study. In fact I wasn’t studying at all. The amount of information to remember was quite small and if there was something to practice we would have done it in class so many times already that in preparation for the exam I didn’t need to anymore.
Then I started studying biology in university.
The amount of information to remember can be crushing when you look at your folder full of notes or the presentations of your professor three days before the exam. And practicing a thousand different calculations or mechanisms is hardly possible at this point.
1. Set your own classes
What was different in school (except the range of knowledge expected from you in the exams)? The learning pace.
While in school every little topic got a detailed explanation, repetition and ten worksheets the same topic in university will get two slides on a presentation and will still be gone through way more in depth.
And that’s because you are expected to do everything else yourself. You have to go through the topics yourself. You have to be your own teacher.
Take your schedule and set specific times for all your subjects to revise the lectures, rewrite your notes (if you want to), read some additional literature (and take notes on them) and start to memorise the important information weekly.
Personally I try to set a period of three hours for studying one subject. I have some periods with a set subject and some that are buffer periods for when I didn’t have time during another. I also use them to do some stuff ahead of my schedule for weeks I know I won’t have a lot of time or to do some additional reading.
This is my personal schedule. I currently attend six lectures (the coloured boxes are the actual lectures) and I write three additional exams at the end of this semester. Some subjects require more time and effort which is why I gave them two periods. Personally I like to have my buffer periods on Sundays.
2. Do you need to rewrite notes?
I feel like the studyblr community is full of notes that look less like real notes and more like art. And that’s fine. I enjoy looking at pictures of perfectly drawn diagrams, handwriting that looks like Times New Roman and calligraphy headlines. But it’s not realistic to make all your notes that perfect without wasting a lot of time.
I still rewrite my notes.
Many of my professors just use power point presentations and I take some notes during the lecture that explain some of the slides better. After the lecture I rewrite the power point notes and my personal notes together in a way I understand them.
In other lectures we have to write down a lot of stuff in a really short amount of time and also maybe draw some diagrams. I feel like it’s helpful to rewrite those notes because it makes me actually think about the information and I can also use some colours to make the diagrams better comprehensible.
But I don’t try to make every page a piece of art! I think some people need to rewrite notes and some can use their original notes to study. It depends on the amount of notes you have to take and of course personal preference.
3. Colour code
For my notes I use a colour code system. I use highlighters in different colours for different kinds of sub-headers and for the main topic I use a coloured felt pen (each subject has it’s own colour). On top of each page I write down the subject, the date, the name of professor and the number of the lecture (so in the end I can tell if one is missing).
I use purple for the first sub-header, green for sub-sub-headers, blue for sub-sub-sub-headers and pink for highlighting important words.
For example:
I use the stabilo pastel highlighters and also the stabilo pens (thick for headers and thin for diagrams).
4. Additional literature
This one is the easiest. Grab a book about a subject. Set a goal: How many weeks/days/months until you want to have it finished? Chose one or two days per week on which you want to read that book and calculate how many pages you have to read on these days to meet your goal. If some topics aren’t important (or of any personal interest for you) you can skip them but I recommend reading as much as you can: Even if you don’t take notes, it does make a difference. You will understand the lectures way better, you will get the mechanisms instead of just learning dry facts and you will find some interesting stuff along the way that might be important later on or will simply make you learn something new.
Also: Papers. This one is important for science majors. Be well informed about what’s going on in science and read a paper once a week. Even if it doesn’t directly benefit your exam grades, it does benefit your overall knowledge and shows you interesting fields of research.
5. Set a study schedule
When it comes to the actual exams, planning on enough time is important. Plan on as much time as possible for each topic and: Repetition is key. Also keep the day before the exam free for repetition only. That way you have a little buffer and don’t panic as easily.
When I study I try to use roughly one day for two lectures (depending on how many lectures I’ve had and the amount of content per lecture). I get up early and try to memorise all new information before noon, so I can spend the afternoon on revising the lectures I’ve memorised the days before. In the evening I revise the stuff from the morning (I feel like this works best right before going to sleep). Personally I say everything out loud but that’s up to you.
Between each revision cycle I have a reading break and look up some of the topics in my books. Even if I’ve read the book during the semester, rereading it before the exam can freshen up the knowledge. Also looking up the same topic in another book might be helpful.
Breaks are important! Sometimes I have a longer break and I watch an episode of a show I like or watch a YouTube video or something like that. But when your head feels like it’s exploding or you feel like there is no way you can get new information in without the old information dripping out of your brain again you need a real break: Set a timer for ten minutes, lay down, close your eyes and think about nothing. Whatever comes to your mind just push it gently away again. For me after the ten minutes the pressure in my head is gone and I can continue studying.
I don’t think summaries really work for me. In biology you don’t really get to sum stuff up, I basically have to study everything. The summary wouldn’t be that much shorter than my actual notes I guess and since I like to keep my notes tidy and organised, they wouldn’t even look neater or be better understandable. I feel like it uses up a lot of time you could use to actually study but maybe for other subjects summaries are more suitable. Whatever works best for you.
These are my personal absolute basics I learned in university. Maybe some of it is helpful.
English isn’t my first language so I apologise for any grammar/spelling mistakes. You’re very welcome to point out my mistakes so I can get better! (I never learned anything about English comma placement so please be gentle with me.)
Have a nice day and a successful semester!
