4 Recommendations To Study Better And Strengthen Your Learning

How did we learn to ride a bike? Someone probably gave us some advice and then we practiced alone. We can learn to study better in much the same way. Nobody is born knowing how to study or at least everyone can improve “the way of studying they are born with.” We need to learn a number of study skills and then put them into practice to develop good learning habits. To learn better, yes, to optimize time as well.

Study techniques are essential tools when it comes to achieving meaningful learning, as they help us understand, retain and assimilate the content. However, few students master them. Many opt for last-minute memorization, which means that the results are not always as expected and forgetting what they have learned does not take long to appear.

Studying by heart does not assure us very promising results. Fortunately, there are many  other more fun and dynamic study techniques  that will help us study better and can also improve our results and performance.

Some techniques to study better

Taking notes is one of the most widespread study techniques. It is about summarizing the highlights in our own words to make it easier to remember them. In most cases, the key is to be able to summarize the content as much as possible, but without leaving out any key data. The other key to a good summary is that the relationship between the main concepts is well indicated.

Sometimes it is difficult to assimilate the theory of some subjects of study. However, doing exercises and practical cases can help us to visualize the theory and to assimilate the knowledge more easily. This is especially useful in subjects such as Mathematics, Physics, Law and in general in all those that involve problems and / or numbers.

Therefore, it may be a good idea to  do practical cases while studying the theory. In this way we can better understand its application and what all those letters are really transmitting to us.

Another of the techniques to study better that we can do, in this case in a group, is brainstorming. It consists of a meeting of a group of people who brainstorm on a certain topic. Brainstorming can be especially helpful when doing group work to consider different ideas and perspectives. However, it can also be useful to study for an exam to solve doubts and get to the bottom of the matter.

Many of these study techniques are not new, but are well known to students. However, what is new is the way in which we can put them into practice to study better. For this reason, we recommend that you read this article if you are studying a Bachelor’s degree, a Master’s degree, if you are immersed in a competitive examination process or if you want to improve your learning processes.

Strategies to strengthen our learning

The intellectual capacities that we need to strengthen depend on the demands of the task. Training actions such as remembering, transforming, retaining and transferring information activates the thought processes towards solving problems.

To better study and strengthen our learning, the taxonomy developed by Palincsar and Brown (1984) offers us the following suggestions:

• Paraphrase : put in our words the information contained in the text.
• Infer : draw conclusions from what is explicit.
• Summarize : select the essentials, extract fundamental ideas.
• Predict : anticipate, suppose, anticipate, foresee, forecast, draw inferences.
• Clarify : clarify, specify and explain aspects of the text.
• Ask : allows you to generate thought processes and activate previous knowledge.

According to a 2012 study from Brigham Young University, published in The Eastern Economic Journal, the two most significant strategies to strengthen our learning are sleeping hours and constantly testing what we are learning. The hours of sleep and rest directly affect our performance.

Researchers say that we need around 7 hours of sleep to obtain better results in our learning. Sleep favors the consolidation of memory and learning. On the other hand, lack of sleep can cause damage to the neural networks of the prefrontal cortex, which would make it difficult for us to assimilate, retain and consolidate information.

2011 research published in the  journal Science  looked at 3 commonly chosen methods of studying: memorizing and repeating, drawing diagrams and schematics, and taking assessments and tests to see if you’ve learned.

To verify the effectiveness, they followed 200 students, which they divided into 3 groups, each one with a different study method. The researchers found that  the most effective method is to make assessments of what we have learned,  improving the volume of our learning by up to 50%.

How to improve our study techniques?

The classical method of study techniques includes 5 phases:

• Quick reading,  to get a global idea of ​​the main ideas.
• Comprehensive reading and underlining  of the most important ideas.
• Summary or outline. It is about summarizing the most remarkable in our own words in order to remember it more easily.
• Study and memorization. For this, readings aloud of the summaries are recommended.
• Review  with classmates. The fact of “counting” what has been learned helps to internalize better.

To improve these study techniques we must follow a series of steps until we can convert them into habits:

Create a study routine

Setting up a study schedule and sticking to it has significant effects on study performance. Approaching learning in a disorganized way is a way to end up studying late at night, when sleep and tiredness take a toll on our ability to concentrate. In addition, getting used to a schedule will make it easier for us not to skip study time and will allow us to dedicate the time they deserve.

Manage distractions away

It may seem obvious, but it never hurts to remember . Distractions can take the most unexpected forms and it is good to know how to identify them. On the black list of distractors are Facebook, Instagram, mobile phone and television, but we can include other elements that we must keep away in our study time.

Run away from literal memorization

We have to make the information contained in the texts our own. Relate it to episodes in our life, rephrase it in our own words and use familiar examples . In this way, we will achieve the meaningful learning we need: more resistant to the passage of time than that based on memorizing data that does not make much sense.

Practice constantly

If we have the possibility,  evaluate ourselves with exams or questionnaires about the subject we are studying. This may seem like a waste of time if you think that the time well invested can only be dedicated to “soaking up” the information to be studied, but it is not at all, since it will help us to detect faults and it will help us to measure our progress.

If you put into practice the strategies that we have listed to study better, you will not only optimize the time you dedicate to assimilate knowledge, of whatever type, but the learning you achieve will be much more resistant to forgetting. It’s worth it!

Bibliographic references

Aguirre, JF, Viano, HJ, & García, B. (2015). An experience to strengthen programming teaching processes through the use of virtual learning environments .

Editorial Vértice. (2008). Study techniques . Editorial Vértice.

Palinscar, AS, & Brown, AL (1984). Reciprocal teaching of comprehension-fostering and comprehension-monitoring activities. Cognition and instruction , 1 (2), 117-175.

Ramírez, M. (2001). Learning strategies . Euphoros, 3, 113-132.

Salas Parrilla, M. (1990). Study techniques for high school and university . Madrid: Alliance.

Weinstein, JD, Mayer, SM, & Beale, SI (1986). Stimulation of δ-aminolevulinic acid formation in algal extracts by heterologous RNA. Plant physiology ,  82 (4), 1096-1101.