As My School Year Finished, I Figured Out I Could Share A Few Study Tips On How You Can Learn And Memorize

As my school year finished, I figured out I could share a few study tips on how you can learn and memorize information, like history dates, names or vocabulary, more quickly and efficiently !! I was in two years in a class where I was supposed to learn a lot in very little time so I developped tricks to be able to remember things more easily. These tips will probably be common but they really worked for me, and they can be especially useful to french students in high school or in college (but it can be useful to everybody too!!)

i. understand what you have to learn.

Trying to remember a lot of dates isn’t easy, especially when there’s a lot in a small time. You need to know what happened on the date and the details on how history goes, and you also need to understand why it happens. When you have understood how it goes from date A to date B, you will more easily remember the dates, and you will be able to make your history essay better. Learning history by reading history books specifically on the subject can be helpful too. The same applies to vocabulary as knowing the etymology of words can be a good way to learn vocabulary, especially when it is in latin or in ancient greek.

ii. rewrite your notes.

Not necessarily in an aesthetic way, but you can write the essential informations on paper in order to have the most important aspects of what you need to learn in something you can reread quickly. You can also do it on a computer if you had paper notes. As I usually wrote in class on paper, I rewrote nearly everything (as I usually need to know the details to understand everything) on my computer, then printed these notes and read it first with highlighters (yellow for informations and green for quotes/important names) and then with a pencil to underline the most important aspects or the conclusions. Reading multiple times, but always remaining active during your reading, can be all the more efficient if you do it everyday, not in one time ; if you read your notes everytime you have a break, you will learn it better than if you read it again and again on one night because you will slowly memorize how the things work and fit together. The same can be done to extracts of books or texts you need to learn, especially in history.

iii. talk.

If you repeat your notes to yourself it might work, but I usually held small classes in my group of friends to make them learn, for example, history or philosophy lessons. When you need to explain something, with or without your notes, you will be able to memorize the bigger picture and what happens in the detail at the same time. Doing it a day or two before the test is also an efficient way of seeing what you know and what you don’t know yet. This is especially useful when you have an essay to write : you will be able to see directly what you need to say.

iv. use apps.

This is especially useful for vocabulary (I don’t use apps for other things, and the app I use the most for vocabulary is called PONS) : vocabulary apps have a lot of “games” that can help you learn vocabulary quicker as you will be active when learning and not passive ; learning vocabulary by reading again and again a list is not really going to help you.

v. have breaks.

Reading again and again your notes intensively for a long period of time won’t help you have a clear mind : do a break every 30 minutes or every hour with something that doesn’t require much your brain, like going on social networks, but always for a small amount of time. Moreover, studying all day the day before the test will only confuse you. Start learning sooner (one week before?) and do something else the day before, especially on the afternoon (like having a walk, listening to music, ..) and read everything again on the evening, before going to bed. You can also wake up earlier and read your notes directly after waking up, as your head will be empty and informations will come more easily.

→ Studying is not only about notes and learning, but also about your lifestyle. Go to bed early, do other things beside school, take afternoons to do something else, start learning and doing your homework way before the due date. This will help you have a healthier body and mind. Don’t neglect your mental and physical health as it can be also essential on the day of a test !

i always have a hard time finding good stuff to listen to while i’m studying so i’m here to hopefully help some people with the same problem and share some of my faves! i’ll divide this post into instrumental and non-instrumental albums/playlists in order to make it even easier for you guys to navigate :-) 

happy studying!

instrumental albums and playlists

signs and wonders by elisha david 

interstellar soundtrack 

studio ghibli movies soundtrack 

theory of everything soundtrack

the immitation game soundtrack

the crown season 2 soundtrack

lofi/jazzhop playlist

lofi/jazzhop playlist 2

new feelings by elijah who

don’t make me cry by elijah who

complete harry potter movies soundtrack

peaceful piano

pride and prejudice soundtrack

le petit prince soundtrack

classical music for studying

disney score to study to

non-instrumental (with singing) albums and playlists

reading, studying, and rainy days

acoustic covers

kpop study music

calm indie songs playlist

your favorite coffeehouse

study zone

paradise by slow club

the lumineers by the lumineers

fridays spent in the company of celtic mythology and thousands of books

Oxford, Oxfordshire by Alixe Lay

Just saw this comment on instagram and again I’m so thankful for the positive studyblr community. Just because you struggle doesn’t mean you are lazy or not working hard enough. Sometimes it isn’t easy and the small thing keep adding up. At those points it’s normal to feel overwhelmed and nobody should feel guilty for that.

Handwritten Note-Taking Methods

The appearance and organization of my notes plays a huge role in the amount of time that I dedicate to studying and my overall performance on tests.  Therefore, I’ve spent the past several years experimenting with various methods, and these are a few of the techniques that I’ve found to be most beneficial.

Cornell Method

The Cornell Method emphasizes identifying the key points of a textbook passage or lecture and consolidating information as much as possible.  

I’ve found that this style works best for literature and science courses that require extensive, dense reading and note-taking.  It allows me to easily and quickly identify what I understand versus what I still need to work on.

Adapted Cornell Method

I’ve created my own adaptation of the Cornell Method by eliminating the summary section at the bottom of the page and incorporating Post-It notes throughout the body of the page to highlight lists and key points.  And, of course, I had to add some color!

Outline

This is, by far, my favorite method due to its flexibility and clean, minimalist appearance.  While the image above doesn’t depict a true series of bullets at varying levels of indentation, you can experiment with different types of bullet points as well as varying spacing.  

I prefer using this method for maths because it allows sufficient space for me to draw graphs, record examples, and solve problems.  

Mind-Maps

Mind-maps are extremely helpful for organizing complex or extremely confusing topics.  There’s no right or wrong way to go about drawing one, and much of the final appearance will be related to the material that you’re diagramming.  Keep in mind that certain topics and information will more readily lend itself to this sort of portrayal.

For those of us who aren’t artistically talented 🙋🏼, these can be rather challenging to construct, especially when working with unfamiliar material.  In the past, I’ve used mind-maps for history when looking at isolated events or individuals.