Make a Study Plan
Study Actively
Distribute Your Studying
Additional Study Resources
Anyone can be a successful student. All it takes is planning, practice, and persistence.
One way to take more control over your studying is to actively engage both in the process and with the material. Active learning strategies include:
- Planning and managing your time
- Taking notes effectively
- Reading with purpose
- Rehearsing material in your own words
- Making summary sheets, mind maps, etc.
- Studying in groups
- Anticipating possible questions and self-testing
- Analyzing returned tests
By being more strategic about how and when you study, you can go from "sort of knowing" the material to understanding it well.
Make a Study Plan
First, realistically assess the situation: What exactly needs to be done and by when should each step be completed? Are there important tests to study for? Are there chapters from several different textbooks to outline? Are there outside readings to do and take notes on? Are there class notes to be reviewed and synthesized with class readings? Which of these should you do first and how should you prioritize?
Then, take a deep breath—and a calendar—sit down and set about making a plan. The mantra of a famous American sales seminar applies just as well to studying: "Plan your work and work your plan." Be realistic and goal-oriented in your planning, then be disciplined in the execution.
 Be Strategic with Your Time (PDF)
Setting Priorities (PDF)
Weekly Schedule (PDF)
Monthly Calendar (PDF)
Study Actively
Establishing a consistent individual study regimen can be helpful and can alleviate anxiety when you have so much information to process, learn, recall, integrate, and apply. Then, repeated step-by-step practice within that system will hopefully make it second nature to you. Consider these suggestions as you plan to study:
- Break reading assignments into more manageable units. Breaking a long reading assignment into smaller, more manageable units helps to identify key ideas, enhances concentration, increases recall, and reduces fatigue.
- Review newly learned material often, starting as soon as possible after it is acquired, and then space several review sessions and a final review before an exam or important discussion. Brief intermediate reviews refresh your memory for details and give you the opportunity to see emerging patterns, connections, and relationships among ideas and concepts.
- Rehearse material often… and even aloud. "Practice makes perfect" – this is as true in studying as in other endeavors. Frequent effective rehearsing not only helps to reinforce your recall of important concepts, but also highlights areas where your comprehension and recall may be faulty.
- Determine when, why, how, and what about this information is important. Asking yourself questions of this nature to guide your study will help both in seeing the overall purpose as well as in developing a sense of the kinds of questions that could appear on a test.
- Apply what you've learned to your own interests or connect it to prior knowledge.
Distribute Your Studying
You've probably heard that you should study two hours for every hour in class. This is a rough guide at best. The time required varies from student to student and from subject to subject.
- Start out by allowing two hours of study for every hour in class, and adjust the hours according to your experience, as you find out how long you need to master each assignment. To that end, monitor your study and reading time conscientiously.
- Allow more time for learning new material.
- Use the free time between classes effectively. Also, make use of small blocks of time, particularly for review.
- Remember that distributed study (distributing the work over a period of days) is far more effective than massed study (cramming). One problem with cramming is that there's too little time to seek clarification about difficult concepts. Cramming also can increase anxiety and lessen your ability to concentrate. Consider this: in a nine- or ten-hour study marathon, the percentage of time actually spent on task can be very small due to fatigue or burnout; a few shorter sessions will likely yield much better results and in less time.
Additional Study Resources
Study smarter, not harder (PDF)
Specific advice for studying in quantitative courses (e.g., accounting, math, chemistry, physics, computer science)
For more information on how to create your own study plan, come in and talk to a learning specialist
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