EPT
How to study smart?
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Thegreatbeyond
United States287 Posts
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Fen
Australia1848 Posts
The only thing that I can help with when it comes to study techniques, is make it interactive as possible. Dont just watch lectures or read books. Answering questions (even if they are ones you made up yourself) works much better as your forced to find out the information, and then as you use the information, it sticks in your brain better. | ||
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FanaBatHero
Angola70 Posts
^ Very true. My suggestion is that you don't study too hard, in a sense. Don't cram it all in the day before the test. Also, don't study so much in a row - do it in bits and pieces. My favorite method is to not fuck around all semester in a class and then hope to do good based on the book - take notes actively in class and off the material, and it will go right into your brain. In the week before the test, read a few pages of your notes a day and maybe take notes on your notes, shortening them down to key points. Then the day before the test or anything look at those keypoints. Improvement in general comes from comprehension AND retension, I think. Understanding the material and remembering it. The notes help remember it, practice helps to understand and master it. If you don't understand something, ask, because a lot of subjects like math and some sciences are cumulative, so a small misunderstanding early on could lead to a huge gap in your knowledge of the subject. | ||
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Thegreatbeyond
United States287 Posts
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indecision
Germany818 Posts
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Purind
Canada3562 Posts
I've taken engineering and math courses, and they're actually quite different and I can't use the same approach for both. For engineering, I'll just do a bunch of problems (if I haven't already, I'll read the book and familiarize myself with all the equations). I find that if I know how to do all the homework problems, the tests are not going to be any harder. I guess studying harder in this case just means doing more problems. For my math courses, it's a lot trickier (maybe it's just that I suck at math). Although it's useful to go through all the homework problems, it's a lot more useful to go through your class notes and go through all the proofs and understand the logic behind all of them. Some of the steps are really hard and unintuitive to arrive at, so if you can remember the tricks that the prof used to do a certain proof, you'll be in better shape. I'm not really sure how one goes about "working their ass off" in math, maybe I just suck too much. | ||
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FanaBatHero
Angola70 Posts
On October 14 2007 23:35 Thegreatbeyond wrote: Well how do you exactly discover what kind of studying works best for you? You should have tried various methods by high school because of the way most school curriculums run - flash cards, note taking, group work, projects, the different kinds of assignments you do. The way to discover it fastest (and with the most effort I guess) is to test your self - take the next chapter of math or whatever you are learning, read the information which is usually at the beginning of the chapter, and start your study method - note taking, bullet form notes, or flashcards. Then when you finish reading it, practice with the flash cards or whatever you have until you think you have it down. Then on the NEXT day give yourself a few minutes of review and then start doing the problems in the book. Do every other odd problem (1,5,9,13...) so you get a wide span of difficulty and problem type. If you do well, consider trying this for your next test. If not, go to the next chapter and try the note method for example. This method will test your comprehension and a bit of your retension. To practice retension you should wait a week without studying and look at your notes and see how much you still understand. If you did well with your method, chances are you retained 100% of the knowledge. | ||
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fusionsdf
Canada15390 Posts
It just takes work. | ||
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Physician
United States4146 Posts
1) reading: a lot of formal learning will involve reading, so the faster and more accurately you read and understand what you are reading, the better - so work on that first. --> http://www.eyeq.tv/?page=index Also the more you read, the better - just make sure you put some effort in deciding what to read (pointer 3). 2) active learning - reading and a lot of other forms of learning are passive, i.e. you sit and assimilate data, facts, knowledge, understanding etc.. and passive learning will get you really far, but mastery of anything can only be achieved with active learning, i.e. the application of what you have learned. e.g. if you learn how to make a go cart, follow it up by making one or thinking of ways of improving it or both. 3) find a guide - no matter what you want to learn, in all likelihood someone has already trodden that path - find a mentor, whether it be a book or a person to guide you i.e a guide that has already successfully trodden the path you are about to embark. There is nothing like a good mentor to save you hours of wasted time (which is how you have started your own path - props to you, hope you find some of the advice left in this thread useful). | ||
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toiletmaster77
China7 Posts
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defenestrate
United States579 Posts
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Wizard
Poland5055 Posts
On October 15 2007 02:23 toiletmaster77 wrote: dont play too much starcraft if u wanna study better lol QFT | ||
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Navane
Netherlands2763 Posts
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micronesia
United States24805 Posts
You are: * slightly expressed introvert * moderately expressed intuitive personality * distinctively expressed thinking personality * slightly expressed judging personality I guess that means I should solve a metric assload of problems or explain the stuff to someone else. Although, since I have my main degree already, it probably won't be of much consequence anymore haha. + Show Spoiler + zxcvvcxz Keirsey exam | ||
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OverTheUnder
United States2929 Posts
On October 15 2007 05:30 micronesia wrote: Hm... You are: * slightly expressed introvert * moderately expressed intuitive personality * distinctively expressed thinking personality * slightly expressed judging personality I guess that means I should solve a metric assload of problems or explain the stuff to someone else. Although, since I have my main degree already, it probably won't be of much consequence anymore haha. + Show Spoiler + zxcvvcxz Keirsey exam I always get INTP...."architect" :o | ||
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fight_or_flight
United States3988 Posts
If you are learning a specific thing, like for a certain class, then just make sure you know that thing. If you are learning math make sure you can do all the problems and understand everything. This may mean asking questions, reading the book, working problems. Just make sure that you know everything and can explain it to someone. Basically, in whatever you learn, get to the point to where you could teach the subject to someone else. (I know this doesn't really answer your question, but if you know what goal you are trying to achieve, then it will be easier to find your way there.) | ||
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Thegreatbeyond
United States287 Posts
On the test, my second letter was a "N". | ||
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skyglow1
New Zealand3962 Posts
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