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hey guys i just got a quick question so expect nothing special here
im currently studying business administration at an average university in germany and in january are going to be my first exams
how do or did you prepare for your exams? just some basic information about your routine and when you did start learning, how much time you spend, did you still attend a lot of courses at university while excercising ?
im learning now since the beginning of december but i've already seen while browsing here that this community has a ton of very intelligent people, especially from very good and well known colleges and universities around the world
and also if you attend such a college, how is your routine if you have to prepare for exams and is it much more time compared to people you know who are studying at a "normal" college?
thanks for your time and once again really nice community!
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What?
You read your material, take practice exams / answer the questions in your book, go over lecture notes.
If you don't have prac questions and stuff, just make outlines of the things that you've read, and make sure you know them.
Or just go into the first test blind, and figure out from there if you need to study more or don't bother studying for that class ever
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Honestly?
I was very lazy with my exams. For some classes I studied in advance, but for most I really just a) made sure I did most, if not all of the course work b) made sure I did most, if not all of the reading c) attended most, if not all of the lectures d) read through my notes once the night before.
I got high honours. But that was what worked for me.
One piece of advice I could give you is to write down the most important things while you're reading through your notes to create a sort of study sheet of the biggest points or the ones you have trouble remembering. I would make those and read them over and over right before the test. If you can memorize something like a mantra then when you get into the room you can just immediately write it down on some scrap paper or something and use it later.
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I did a business information systems degree and got quite good results in University.
I usually get as many practice exams as I can find (10+) and then do one or two of them with no time limit, researching questions I don't know as I do them.
Once I'm comfortable with that I'll do 5 or so exams timed, then mark myself (or if they're more verbose answers that are hard to mark you can ask a friend/lecturer/university study resources to mark it for you) and research the answers to what I got wrong etc.
I'll just cram out practice exams until I'm comfortable.
I always found reading my textbook and going over my lecture notes a complete waste of time unless it was in doing research for a specific question that I couldn't answer on my own.
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If you want the maximum grade possible you study every minute you can, you make notes off of the material of the stuff that is most difficult and you sit down and go over them until you know them by heart (aka you can recall them not just recognize them).
If you don't care that much just keep up with the material and in the day or so before the test go over the more pertinent stuff and make sure you've read everything you're supposed to.
If you're talking about getting motivated to study, that's a different can of worms 
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Adam Robinson's book "What Smart Students Know" is very good, in my opinion.
He developed a note taking system where you ask yourself key questions pertaining to what you are learning in order to get the big picture. When taking notes in class, he teaches you a unique yet organized manner of taking notes that forces you to make connections between the material taught in class. This will enhance your understanding and therefore retention of the material. After class you will reform and rewrite your notes until you can condense them to a single page for each chapter. When exam time comes around you will take all of your final chapter notes (Lets say the exam is on Chapters 1-5...you would take your final page of notes from Chapters 1-5) and condense all of them into one sheet of notes. You will repeat the process for all of your exams and eventually the final exam. Meaning, you will have only one sheet of notes to study off of on the final exam.
I have also implemented other forms of note taking strategies into my studies. For instance, I apply some concepts I got from Derren Brown, Arthur Benjamin, etc... Basically I also take the material from all of my classes and correlate the information with as many subject topics as humanely possible. For instance, I can make connections between a Sociology class and a Calculus class. Or make connections from Starcraft to an Engineering class, etc...the theory is the more 'highways' you have to connect the information, the higher likelihood you will retain the information on the exam.
Basically, I don't believe rote memorization is a good way to study. I think mnemonic devises can be helpful if you have to memorize a large amount of information over a short period of time. However, I would advocate to using a study and note taking system that centers around understanding the material. Also, I don't think practice exams will really help you understand the material. I think they are excellent for measuring generally where your understanding is, but I think focusing on making information highways between subjects is the best way to memorize information. But what do I know, I am majoring in Physics so I don't have to memorize large amounts of sometimes uninteresting material. Also, the process I described seems time consuming, but its really not that bad. Scott Young also has a good book called "Learn More, Study Less." He is currently doing a mock computer science degree from MIT in 12 months where he takes an entire college class over a period of four days.
"People who remember forget, people who understand remember."
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Rewrite your notes or the textbook's important parts as succinctly as possible and use this to study.
Need to memorize something exactly like a math definition? write it down repeatedly.
Need to remember the broad details of a bunch of certain concepts? Read about them right before you go to bed and try to keep the information churning in your mind as you fall asleep. (you'll be surprised at how powerful a memorization tool this is)
Don't keep going over stuff you can already easily remember.
If you are in a class that has no practice problems, try to anticipate/make up all the questions you might be asked and answer them.
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I pushed myself, with a reward system.
As much as i hate studying, I know that deep down I need to do something about it or else I'll fail. So I just play Starcraft or relax for a couple of hours, then focus on studying for a couple of hours. then repeat. However this is going to take up a lot of time. So you have to plan ahead. Finals on Friday, got plans on tuesday and thursday, You got 4 chapters to cover. No problem 2 chapters a day. Monday, 2 chapters on the 2 hour relax and 2 hour play interval. You must go in depth with the chapters and understand fully before claiming that you're finished. When you are done, you'll feel very accomplished and reward yourself with some starcraft. Rinse and repeat, that's how I do it with my classes.
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I try to not read teamliquid as much as possible.
Aim for a goal, then study with that goal in mind. Relax more studying for easy/unimportant things, buckle down for the hard/important ones.
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On December 17 2011 12:03 ThaZenith wrote:
I try to not read teamliquid as much as possible.
Meaning of impossible.
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Something that always helped me was to study multiple things at once, at least during my freshman year. Now I can focus enough. It works very well on homework still though too.
Basically, you switch on and off each subject every so often, say 20 minutes or whatever you are comfortable with that is still a solid block (I personally wouldn't go lower than 15). Work on a math problem for 20 minutes, then switch over to psychology, then back, then maybe to biology. I found this idea our through my psychology professor, who said that he found studies that validated this, along with anecdotal evidence from grad students.
Basically he said that the brain can be terrible at focusing on one single thing at a time (Unless you train it, I suppose. Or maybe I just find the stuff I am studying interesting now). We see this in every day life, and I'm sure you have a plethora of examples that you can use. For example, you may be reading this, switching over to facebook, then back to some other site, then to this again. It keeps the mind alert instead of drudging on. Ever been reading something and not remember it? This more or less prevents that.
Last year my GPA was something like a 3.9 or 3.8. I achieved a 4.0 during winter quarter as well. I was a psychology major.
This year my GPA was a 3.1. Chemistrry caught me by surprise and I got a solid C in that four credit hour class, so it brought my grade down. The rest of them were A's or B's. Chem lab I even got an A in. Damn Lecture
So take it for what you will.
Also, it is much better to understand how things relate to each other and how they work together. I don't know if you can use this in your field, but I do this in anatomy all the time. It made learning how the muscle contracted incredibly easy.
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When it comes to exam time here is a system I've developed (still needs to be refined):
1) Know your topics - basic, but it forms the basis of understanding your subject and how the puzzle completes.
2) Go through past papers - read em, do em, whatever, this forms the understanding of what key questions they will ask. Such as (your doing business admin), the SWOT analysis maybe in there. Internal control as well, management hierarchy.
These 2 points above cover the 'scope' of your exam, in which sets out your 'nature' and 'extent' of your study.
The actual study:
1) Set yourself a time of day to study - key is to enhance your psychological mindset by creating a pattern of when your brain absorbs information. Note: it doesn't need to be long hours. 2 hours IMO is sufficient.
2) Create an environment of what your comfortable with - if you like studying with people or if you like studying by yourself. It helps.
3) Note taking - biggest problem is people who write out whole paragraphs then complain that their wrists/arm are sore. Try to use 1-5 words that best defines a term (eg: Integrity = honesty) in which you can then expand upon in your exam, it's amazing how so few words can be expanded to a paragraph. This then creates understanding if you know how to explain it in your own words. A full page of notes in my study book only contains about 50 words.
4) Use diagrams - psychologically it's been proven easier to remember a diagram than a whole page of text (picture tells a thousand words?)
5) Form links with real life stuff (been mentioned above) - such as expanding a business could be correlated to a fast-expansion in starcraft, there are risks and rewards etc..
6) If your feeling burnt out. Take a break. Play some starcraft.
I just finished my accounting degree at uni.
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I don't study per say. I have trouble focusing on stuff like that because whenever I read about it, I suddenly remember what it is, so I naturally just skip over. However, I find it really useful to make associations with real life examples or play on words as you're learning it.. But that might just be me.
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Just study and pace it well.
My motto is, if its time to study, its study
if play, then play
if time to fool around, then do it.
Just make sure that a day before the exam you have already finished and learned completely everything there is to know about your exams.
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Go to the library. There is not much distraction there. Well, at least that is what I've heard from most people
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Well for me it was usually 6 exams per semester. I tried to learn 3 of those, let's say the more interactive ones like SQL, programming or CAD during the semester. The other 3, I planned 1 week for each 8-10 hours learning per day.
During the actual studying I once read through the whole script and tried to compress it 50 foliages to one DIN A4 paper. After that I started doing old exams, if your uni doesn't make them available you should ask around. The first semester I just read scripts and didn't even know about the old exams and it was 10 times harder. If you go through the exams and don't know how to answer something read up on that chapter.
I didn't even buy one book so far, I used mostly scripts and the internet.
If you have some subject which you know will be very hard you should think about learning one day each week. I did this after I failed one math exam with 80% failrate on the first try -.-
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what you should realize is that some methods of what other people not necessarily works for you.
while some people are able to study everyday and study earlier into semester (this takes a lot of discipline), often many people find that its very hard to study productively 1 week before the exam, as opposed to 1-2 days before the exam. unproductive people like me find it hard to be motivated and since i dont have the habit of studying i dont study until the end.
my advice is to look at your past results, courses, classes in highschool w/e, and look at your best result and then your worst result; then just study the same way you studied for your best class, and avoid habits from your worst.
personally, if im behind in 2 months of classes and the day after tomorrow is the exam, i would just look at the course outline, pick up the most important points/equations because that is where you will pick up most partial marks (at least for an engineer). try to find past exams with the same professor (likely, they will format the questions the same way, and you can anticipate which questions will most likely not be on the exam), and solutions are great (if you can understand them).
this is simply my method of passing comfortably. if you want to achieve amazing grades u have to mindcontrol yourself to become more disciplined. another idea is to do the labs and assignments completely without copying others. more than often these force you to use your disciplinary knowledge, boost your term marks and it will be easier to study some of the material. review is always easier than first time learning.
of course, no harm in sharing methods of study, but my personal advice is to do what works for you in the past. if you are getting less than optimal results, you should find out during quizzes, tests and midterms and should have time to tweak it accordingly
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Repetition is important. Expose yourself to the material a little bit each day well in advance of the exam. Don't cram at the last minute.
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I can't say much everyone else hasn't.
Your main priority should be to get a study group. Do not think they are an unproductive waste of time like most first years do.
When you have breadth first courses (most artsy sciency courses) you can study with flash cards and you'll be fine.
Depth first courses are harder and when past exams aren't reused, your only chance is to understand the material.
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If I'm feeling tired or lazy about studying for an exam, I will force myself to rewrite my notes.
Although I find that its not the most effective study method, it is relatively easy (mentally) and gets me to realize what areas I'm strong in and what areas I'm weak in. If I come across a section where I'm not understanding what I'm copying, I'll make note of it and come back to it later.
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I read all the material the test is on the night before the test. It works for me.
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I wish i knew how to study. I coasted through school until i hit college, and all of a sudden i fall behind when i teach myself content. Missing a class hurts me so much more than others T.T
I usually force myself to 'do' stuff over and over again in different applications until I'm sure i completely 'understand' what I'm studying, and not that just i memorized the steps.
In my case, program like a dozen iterations of brickbreaker to learn XNA coding etc
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Get a small white board (I like one that is about 40cm by 20cm or so). Go through your text and write down big topics you need to cover (Example: In a basic algebra class "rearranging for x with x as a exponent"). Use one color (green) and try to work through an example problem without looking at your reference. Treat it like a test and answer as completely as you can. Look at your reference and correct in another color (red). Look at what you got wrong and reason out why. Move on and cross it off if you were (mostly) correct. Erase and try again if you didn't know it. If after the second attempt you're still having problems highlight that item as one you need to look at more closely. Move on and come back to it later.
I'm a nuclear operator in the US Navy. I was top 10% of my Power School class http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Power_School#Curriculum and put in only 5-10 extra hours a week when most of my class mates had to put in 25 to 35. This technique was the most valuable learning tool I found.
I taught this to my wife before a her chemistry final this last semester, she'd gotten a C on her mid term. She used this and earned an A on her final.
I can't speak highly enough of the technique.
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In general, studying for a class is a continual process rather than something you do over a few nights before an exam. Here are my suggestions:
1) When you are given a reading to read, you should almost always read it. The exceptions being when the reading is almost exactly the same as the lecture material or when the reading is not related to your course material and will not show up on your exams (this is rare, but possible). When you are doing your readings, make sure you really understand them. Don't get distracted while you're studying (e.g. don't study while trying to watch tv or something.) If you come across something in the reading that you don't understand, take the time to re-read the passage and look it up online (if necessary). Remember, if you don't understand your readings, you will have a hard time on your exams.
2) Take the time to do your homework well. Even though homework is worth a lot less than exams, it is crucial to help your understanding of the material. In many instances, exam questions will be modified homework questions. Also, use the grades you get on your homework as a barometer of how well you understand the material in a class. Low homework scores are an indication that you need to put more work into the class.
3) When studying for the exams, prioritize things in this order: Lecture notes, homework, readings, outside materials. Lecture notes are by far the most important thing you should consider. Your professor probably did not write your textbook, and may have not written your homework (and he/she probably doesn't grade it), but your professor has full input into the lectures that you receive in class. Therefore, you should really pay attention in lectures.
4) Show up to class (this almost goes without saying). This helps the studying process immensely.
5) When you go home (or to your dorm) after classes, take the time to pull out your notes and go over them. You don't have to do anything crazy. Just skim through them and try to see if you did not understand something that was presented in lecture. If you run across something that you just don't get, try to look in your course textbook(s) or Wikipedia for guidance. I guarantee that if you do this every day after your classes, you will have a much much MUCH easier time studying for exams.
6) Get sleep before an exam. Yes, there are instances where we have to study late into the night for a particularly difficult exam. But sleep is essential for consolidating memories/information. Proper amounts of sleep can help you recall information more quickly and completely.
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Studying is different for everyone, and can really depend on your courses.
I've always found that flash cards and flow charts really drive the info home in a big way.
Flash cards help because you first have to pick what's important, then record two aspects of it (front side and back side) which divides the initial idea into two parts (i.e. makes you deconstruct it). Then you have two ways to essentially memorize the data.
Couple that with a flow chart which is less memorizing and more about critically linking ideas. You have to recall them, recall an order and find associations between them. Then you're left with a very visual method of interpreting what you know (or don't know).
Then there's always the old reviewing of notes, asking and answering questions, etc. etc.
Oh, and ultimately, I hope like hell that you enjoy your subjects or else studying is boring; bit if you like what you take, it's a breeze.
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South Africa4316 Posts
For each subject I study, I use the following process:
1. Read through the work and highlight. (1 week)
2. Use the highlights to make comprehensive summaries. (4-7 days)
3. Read the summaries and highlight key words. (1-2 days)
4. Study the summaries and quiz myself on them until I can pretty much recite them from memory. (3-4 days)
5. Do exercises/past exams/mock tests until you get close to full marks. (1-2 days)
It's not really an "exam studying" technique as it is a "university studying technique." All in all, it takes roughly 3 weeks of dedicated studying per subject, so for my business administration degree we have 5 courses a semester, which means you basically start "studying" for the exams 4 months before the exam. What actually happens is you spend the first month reading all the prescribed readings and highlighting, then you loaf around for a week or two, and then you spend 2-2.5 months preparing 4-5 hours for exams.
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There's already a lot of good help written here, but I want to emphasize one thing: Study with your classmates, it always helps. When studying with others you or one of the others will almost certainly be forced to explain something to someone else, meaning that he/she will have to understand it themselves first. Look over lecture notes, past exams, lectures and so on and so forth together (and start at the very least two weeks before the actual exam) and you'll be fine. I have an exam in 2½ hours, I did what I just wrote before today, and I feel like this test will be ezpz.
Oh, and if your class/course/program isn't very well-organized or you just don't hang with the others you're studying with - start a facebook group. It depends on what kind of people you're dealing with, but for me and my class it was easily the best thing we could do. We're almost 70 people in the same fb-group trying to study for the same exam, asking eachother questions and tips whenever we need it. Also a good way to keep track of other school/uni-related events and such.
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ive found that studying with friends is much more productive (assuming ur friends are willing to study aswell and not fk around) u seem to push each other and create a lil friendly competition.... this really helps if ur one of those guys who are like "meh.. 1 more hour of sc2 then study....maybe 1 more... tomorow ill study for sure =.="
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wow thanks a lot for all the great posts. the general ideas, learning techniques and routines you guys posted are really well thought out. guess a good preparation makes learning much, much easier and comfortable.
my biggest problem is for sure to sum up all the stuff i need for one exam/course, its quite hard for me to get all the information out of a lecture and turn it into a page with only the important and needed infos without forgetting anything. but just reading a lecture which has 500 pages from where i dont even need half of it is just a waste of time
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Just to add a couple of general things some of my professors told me in college:
1) Like someone mentioned before, you should break up what you're studying into chunks. For example, my professor suggested to study say, math problems for 20 minutes and then take a 5 minute break and do /anything/ else followed by another 20 minute chunk. Essentially, you still need to put in a lot of time to study and learn the material but if you just sit down and go for 4 hours straight and study, will it work? probably, but you aren't being very efficient with how you're studying. If I remember right it, it has something to do with how the synapses in the brain work or something... sorry it's been several years now.
2) Pretty sure this has to do with how the brain works as well, but in general you are far more likely to remember what you read at the beginning and what you read at the end. You will likely still remember stuff from the middle but not as clearly. So basically, whether you're reading notes, flashcards, or whatever mix them up so the order you read things changes.
Couple things that worked for me:
1) If I was trying to memorize something, like a definition of a term, it helped me a lot to say it out loud about a dozen or so times.
2) By far the biggest thing that helped for me was to study with someone and essentially "teach" the material to them.
3) Math problems and anything involving formulas.. simply do several practice problems and it should be immediately apparent if you understand how to do them or not.
As an aside to the guys posting your gpas, I know when you're writing your resume you're supposed to write it as say 3.9/4.0 rather than a simple 3.9 because some places use different systems. A 3.9 looks a lot less impressive when the reader assumes it's out of 5 :p
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Pretty much if you do the readings/problems (depending on the class) attend the lecture and actually pay attention you shouldn't really need to very much studying. I would look over the topics for the exam if they are given and do the practice exam if their was one and usually only a few topics I might not fully grasp then go over those chapters or sections in more detail a few days before hand. I generally have to do minimal studying immediately before the exam, because I found that if I needed to I was pretty much fucked anyways. So basically stay attentive in lecture and do all the work suggested by your professor.
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On December 18 2011 02:03 Auren wrote:
Just to add a couple of general things some of my professors told me in college:
1) Like someone mentioned before, you should break up what you're studying into chunks. For example, my professor suggested to study say, math problems for 20 minutes and then take a 5 minute break and do /anything/ else followed by another 20 minute chunk. Essentially, you still need to put in a lot of time to study and learn the material but if you just sit down and go for 4 hours straight and study, will it work? probably, but you aren't being very efficient with how you're studying. If I remember right it, it has something to do with how the synapses in the brain work or something... sorry it's been several years now.
2) Pretty sure this has to do with how the brain works as well, but in general you are far more likely to remember what you read at the beginning and what you read at the end. You will likely still remember stuff from the middle but not as clearly. So basically, whether you're reading notes, flashcards, or whatever mix them up so the order you read things changes.
Couple things that worked for me:
1) If I was trying to memorize something, like a definition of a term, it helped me a lot to say it out loud about a dozen or so times.
2) By far the biggest thing that helped for me was to study with someone and essentially "teach" the material to them.
3) Math problems and anything involving formulas.. simply do several practice problems and it should be immediately apparent if you understand how to do them or not.
As an aside to the guys posting your gpas, I know when you're writing your resume you're supposed to write it as say 3.9/4.0 rather than a simple 3.9 because some places use different systems. A 3.9 looks a lot less impressive when the reader assumes it's out of 5 :p
the part you've written with the time invested into learning is very interesting. i got a script right here from my professor for international law. he created one with general infos about being a student. one part is about time management while learning.
the script says that your attention is going to decrease after 50 minutes and then it continues even faster so you should stop learning after this time and just do something else for about 20 minutes. i dont know if thats true or if that is the most efficient way but i'd just like to know if any of you guys have ever heard about that.
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I did an engineering major so not sure how much help I would be, but this is how I prepared for my exams.
Go through the lecture notes once, go through your homework, then go through your lecture notes again. Do not solve any additional problems / questions (you already solved them anyway) and ask your professor for clarification on any fuzzy topics.
With this method I never had to study for more than 90 minutes for any given test.
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I've tutored quite a few people in the past for uni courses, and the most important thing is to make sure you actually LEARN the material. And all of it if you want to do really really well, as it's all testable. So many people are like oh I read over the notes 10 times but I still only got a B wah wah.
The way that's always worked for me is just turn all the material into questions, like OH GOD WHAT CAN THEY ASK ME ON THIS. And then turn the questions into a test/flash cards and learn it both ways (read the question know the answer, read the answer know the question)
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what subjects or courses have you tutored?
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EPT
