Study is a Verb - Do Something

My kids are taking chapter tests today, so I thought I would take this opportunity to share some study habits that I have gleaned from 17 years of being a pretty good student and 17 years of teaching all kinds of students.  I just read that sentence and realized that I have been teaching for the same number of years I was a students.  That makes me feel really old.  Yikes.

1.  Study is a verb - I have watched students "study" and wondered what benefit they could possibly be getting from it.  Here's how it works.  They take out their notes.  They stare at the page.  Their eyes get blurry, and they can't see any more.  This changes nothing.  To study effectively means you have to DO something.  Highlighting, flashcards, asking yourself questions - These are ways of interacting with the material.  Staring at it is not.  All my other advice comes from this.

2.  Organize Your Time and Space - Some people are natural organizers.  They love folders and tabs and calendars.  Office Depot is their happy place and color coded is their favorite phrase in the English language.  Others are a hot mess when it comes to organization.  They have to turn their backpack upside down and shake it to find a pencil.  Then, there are the ADHD kids, who tell me that  they shouldn't have to be organized.  "Oh, no," I tell them.  "It's far more important that you be organized than anyone else."  The natural organizers are already there in their minds.  If your mind isn't naturally organized, you really need to organize your environment to compensate for that.  If your homework is always in the same spot, you won't have to remember where you put it.

It is also important to organize your time.  This is harder for students than organizing their space.  You can see the space, and it is always in the same place.  Time is so fluid and so easily filled with whatever comes along that organizing it can be difficult.  I suggest having an ideal plan at the beginning of each week but to leave in a little flex time.  Things are going to come up that mess with the ideal.  This is only a problem if there is nowhere to put the new activity.  It may also require reorganizing as time goes on.

3.  Study in Blocks - Remember when your teachers told you not to wait to study until the night before the test.  You ignored them; everyone does.  It turns out that they knew what they were talking about.  Research shows that you remember best the things you study at the beginning and the end of a study session.  Studying in one long block means there is only one beginning and end.  Breaking that up over several nights makes multiple beginnings and endings.  If it is too late for that and you only have one night.  Take a 2 minute break every 30 minutes.  It is enough time for your brain to think you have begun a new session.  The strange result of one study showed that studying in different places might help as well (although no one is sure why), so studying one night in the kitchen and another in the living room may actually help.

4.  Take a Moment to Acknowledge Anxiety - Being nervous about tests is normal, but does it affect your performance on the test.  It does if you just try to pretend it isn't there.  An experiment was done in which two similar classes took tests.  In one classroom, students were given three minutes before the test started to write about how they felt going into the tests.  The other just began taking it as normal.  The group that was given a chance to share their frustrations and fears scored an average of 5% higher on the test than the others did.  The thinking is that putting it on paper frees your mind from focusing on it during the test, allowing you to shut off the internal dialogue.

5.  Allow Minimal Distraction - The world is filled with distractions.  We cannot eliminate them entirely - and we shouldn't.  The mind actually needs some stimulation, or it will create its own.  However, distractions that interfere with your ability to focus should be reduced as much as possible. That might mean muting the computer, so it doesn't beep every time a message is sent.  My students believe it is rude not to respond immediately to a chat message.  I tell them to make their google chat status "I'm studying for the next hour."  Then, it is rude for someone to chat them but not rude for them to wait to reply.  The phone can be put in another room.

A note about music.  Some people do benefit from playing music while they are studying.  It helps block out the little sounds, like buzzing lights and ticking clocks.  Before you says, "See, mom!  I told you music helps," be aware that not all types of music helps.  It is unlikely that your favorite song is helping you focus.  Be aware of when it is helping and when it is hurting.  If you are singing along, you are not studying.  If you are dancing around, you are probably not studying (Some people do need to move in order to think, so you will be aware if that is you).  I keep a TV on with the volume low, but I make sure it is a rerun of something I've seen before.  That keeps my brain from attending to it.

6.  Teach to Learn - If you are explaining something to someone else, you will know whether or not you understand it.  If you are an auditory learner, hearing yourself say it out loud will be like sitting in class again.  If you are verbal processor, saying it out loud will make it more real to you.  You can teach another person, but if one is not available, you can teach a stuffed animal, a doll, or a chair.  The key is to do it out loud.  It forces focus in a way silent studying doesn't.

7.  MAKE Flashcards - We are a one to one school.  We do a lot of things with technology, and I know there are online flashcard sites.  Those are great and should be used, but I want to make a plea for the good old fashioned flashcard.  Your senses are the pathways by which information enters your brain.  Using an online card site uses only one - sight.  When you hand make a flash card and then use it properly, you use sight (to get the information), muscle memory (from writing), sight again (from look at the card), speech (by saying it out loud), and hearing (by saying it out loud).  You also get a little bit of tactile because holding the card is different from not holding one.  I've got my doubts that scented markers would help, but they certainly could not hurt.  The more pathways the information has to get into your brain, the better you will remember it.

8.  Pray - I asked my students a few weeks ago if they prayed before a test.  Many of them said yes (or at least that they prayed during the test if it was getting hard).  When I asked if they prayed before they studied, no one said yes.  God cares about your learning and talks much of wisdom and knowledge in scripture.  He even says in James, "If anyone lacks wisdom, he should ask."  Why wouldn't we ask for help in making our study time efficient and effective?