One college study tip prevails over all the rest: You already have all the skills you need. Use them!
“Oh my God!” a freshman exclaims as if her puppy just died. “The professor actually expected me to read the whole book!” Most college students already have developed effective study skills—somewhere, somehow; but they have developed lots of bad habits, too. Although “how-to” books offer all kinds of ingenious strategies for studying and “acing” exams, they generally fast-forward right past common sense. Bruce Keitel, a retired San Diego State University professor who worked exclusively with freshmen, says the most successful students simply go back to basics. Specifically, Keitel says…
• Go to class. The first thing you learned as a freshman: You can ditch class and no one cares—especially in ginormous lecture classes. When you miss class, however, you lose the thread in the conversation, and you become increasingly alienated from the subject matter and its presentation. When you finally return to class, you have absolutely no idea what is going on, so that you feel even more inclined to stay away, and you begin descent down a vicious spiral. A few professors record their lectures and post them as podcasts. If you can recover what you lost, go for it. Otherwise, just get your butt to class.
• Begin studying for finals on the first day of class. Yes, the cram session and the all-nighter are college traditions; that does not automatically mean they work. In fact, studies show that students who study at the last minute usually land at the bottom of the bell curve. Begin studying each subject regularly after the very first class session. If you aren’t sure what you should study or review, e-mail your professor. The initiative alone buys you the benefit of the doubt, and it may be worth one-third of a grade at semester’s end.
• Study alone in a quiet place. Your favorite places double as the very worst places to study: Your dorm room? Forget it? The library? A constant, moving fashion show. The coffee house? Not a chance. Find a quiet, distraction-free place with good light and a general feeling of safety and security. Study there.
• Study your professors. Whether or not your professors develop study guides, offer review sessions, or generally help you prepare for the rough stuff, they constantly give clues about what will appear on their tests. When a professor takes time to write it on the chalkboard or show it on a PowerPoint, you know it will become a test question. If a professor repeats an idea with emphasis, it will become a test question; and if he shakes his index finger at you while he introduces a concept, you know for certain it will become a BIG test question. Visit your professor in office hours, and ask questions in class to get even more inside information. Periodically look for information of “Rate my Professor” and other college networks.
• Resist the urge to cheat. Every year, more than two-thirds of graduating seniors confess they cheated or plagiarized during college, and they suggest professors always are one step behind the latest cheating technology. Cheating appears easy and seems overwhelming tempting, but 90% of admitted cheaters also report they got caught and suffered serious consequences. Not surprisingly, cheating is most common among freshmen, who feel overwhelmed and terrified. Experts suggest, instead of conspiring to cheat, conspire to learn.
• Scrips are not okay. During midterms and finals, many students take popular medications for ADHD to boost concentration and keep them awake for long periods of time. They rationalize, imagining, “Hey, if it is a prescription drug, it cannot be dangerous.” Doctors admit that abuse of ADD drugs may work in the short term, but the drugs act on short-term memory, so that users do not retain the information they pack into their brains for tests. More importantly, the drugs often induce a sense of euphoria that has nothing to do with how well you are learning. Most of all, you risk fatal heart problems or seizure. In fact, doctors say the best way to cram for a test is to get some exercise, eat well, and sleep regularly so that your brain actually can absorb new information.
• Actually use your textbooks. You paid a magillion dollars for them; they must be good for something. Especially if your professor wrote the textbook, refer to it all the time, checking to see what he repeated in class, because the repeated material provides the substance of test questions. If the textbook has quizzes and reviews, use them. If you discover the textbook really is irrelevant to the material the professor covers, go to see him in office hours and ask him how to manage the discrepancy.
Keitel explains, “Among students who flunk-out, nearly 90% of them leave college for reasons that have absolutely nothing to do with their intellectual ability.” He says that everything about college except college itself gets in the way of students’ success. Smiling, Keitel clarifies the cryptic remark, “If you simply go to class and do the work, you will do really well.”
Photo credits: reading politics by visual.dichotomy/flickr; Agnes Scott College Library Reading Room by James Diedrick/flickr
Peter Harrington is a career counselor and content contributor for Top Online Colleges, a great source for tons of information on expanding your education, from top online colleges for nursing to School Counseling degrees.
