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By Ruxandra Brătășanu
As summer days fade and autumn settles in, so does a new afternoon activity: studying. It may be met with procrastination or dread, but every so often, the stars align, and you can step into a Rory Gilmore study routine.
While aesthetic Pinterest boards have led us girls to believe that all we need to have a productive study session is a quaint little café and a great playlist, in reality, there’s much more to it. So, I began looking for more effective strategies and discovered them in the fascinating world of neuroscience. This inspired me to create an evidence-based study guide to help you ace this upcoming academic year!
First, we need to talk about sleeping habits. Sleep is an essential component to learning. In fact, neuroplasticity doesn't happen while studying, but actually during sleep. Simply put, sleeping is like hitting the save button for the material you’ve just studied. But that’s not the only thing, it also primes your brain for receiving new information. Think of your short-term memory as a USB stick. It’s great at storing new data, but there’s only so much it can take before reaching its limit. Sleep is when information is transferred from the hippocampus (short-term) to the cortex (long-term). During that time, data is organised so that you can gain a deeper understanding and use it creatively, leaving a clean slate for the next day. Therefore, quality sleep is essential both before and after learning for optimal retention.
Now, you might be wondering: “What does quality sleep even look like?” Contrary to popular belief, it’s not a one size fits all recipe of sleeping for eight hours, from 10 pm to 6 am. It’s so much more complex than that, as it is unique to everyone. Luckily, there are some guidelines, perfectly encapsulated by the acronym QQRT: quality, quantity, regularity and timing. Let’s expand on those! Quality refers to continuity of your sleep, the more uninterrupted sleep the better. The quantity should be between 7 to 9 hours. Regularity is about maintaining a schedule of a constant bed and wake up time. Timing consists of aligning your sleep to whether you are an early bird, a night owl or somewhere in between.
It may be complicated to figure out at first what’s your perfect sleep recipe, especially since our wake-up time is usually out of our control. So, here’s my tip for you: set a to-bed alarm! This way, you’ll prioritize sleep and organise your day accordingly.
If you still need an incentive to invest time in quality sleep, how about I tell you it’s intertwined with your grades. A study by Hartmann & Prichard surveyed over 55000 college students and discovered that for every night of poor sleep, their GPA dropped on average by 0.02 points. Unfortunately, the consequences of poor sleep don’t end there. Sleep also has a huge impact on our well-being.
On a more positive note, let’s now dive into the habits of successful students! This may seem like a no brainer: they set aside time to study with no distractions (meaning they put their phones away).
Now, this might give rise to a common issue: the lack of focus. You sit down at your desk and your mind starts racing. You replay conversations, get hungry or have a sudden urge to organise everything, completely disregarding the task at hand. Does it sound familiar? I am guilty of this as well. If you’re in need of a tool to tame your mind, look no further than mediation. Meditating is basically bringing your attention back to something. It can be your breath or any visual target. It's not about keeping your mind still. It’s all about refocusing and beginning again. Just 10 minutes a day can make a huge difference!
When it comes to learning techniques, the best students have two tricks up their sleeves. First, they use testing as a learning tool. Let me explain! So, an often-used study method is rereading and highlighting facts. But, as it turns out, it’s not very effective.
Here’s the science to back it up: a 1917 study had children read biographies. They were divided into two groups. The first just reread the material again and again, while the second only read it once and tested themselves by asking questions about it and answering them in their minds. So, who remembered it better? The second group. The act of retrieving information from their memory was the key to their success. But why? Because it allowed them to filter it through their minds, bookmarking important details.
Now, this technique is more effortful. It takes a lot of focus and getting answers wrong might be frustrating at first, but it’s all part of the journey.
The secret to getting the most out of this practice is to test yourself on the material very soon after learning it. This will offset the natural process of forgetting because you are consolidating the knowledge faster.
The second trick great students use is teaching what they’ve learnt to their peers. I have to say this is my favourite, as I have been doing it since I was in fourth grade. The reason why it’s so effective is because in order to teach someone, you need to have understood the material firstly on your own. Then, you need to engage with it in a creative manner, such as creating metaphors, so that they can learn it too.
We’ve all wished at some point, studying would be easier. And now with the help of neuroscience, it can! I truly hope that this study guide will make this academic year the best you’ve ever had. Good luck!
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