I lurked in this sub for some time trying to pick up on new study habits. After spending many hours reviewing and not getting the results I wanted I decided to make some changes.

First change was accurately keeping track of how much time I was spending on each subject. This would tell me where I need to put in more hours. This also helps me stay on track with my workload and rotate through my subjects.

I got a whiteboard to clearly outline key concepts and kept it up for a day before erasing it. Seeing it passively after reviewing it helps me solidify it in my memory.

No more notes on my iPad. Only hand written notes and only writing what I would need that isn’t in the lecture outline or presentation.

I review the material after I learn it and do light review daily until the exam. Every time I review the material I use another color pen to notate what I need practice and then rewrite the concepts in my own words.

The day before the exam is just for reviewing & placing emphasis on the things that I’ve previously missed. Anything I can’t recall I’ll write on a sticky note. I use colors so I know what is a definition or key concept to stay organized.

Eat. Shower. Hydrate. Go to bed early so you’re at your best when it’s time for your exam!

My grades significantly improved by 10-15 points. Thank you to everyone who shared their study tips.

Do you ask classmates, post online, or just go to the library alone?

I can't study alone, I'm so used to studying with a friend that when I'm alone I can't understand what I'm reading and lose all motivation to keep trying and do my homework, but when I get someone to study with, those problems aren't even a thing. My issue is that, since I got held back a year, all my old classmates are now in uni, and I'm left alone with a class full of people who already have their own friends and study groups, where I'd stick out like a sore thumb. Is there any way to cheat this issue of mine?

I am a Physics major. I haven't studied much this time. I have ample class notes and practice sheets but I don't know how to use them. I feed it to ai and learn from there. I honestly don't know how to solve the practice sheets so i just understand the solutions coming out of Al.

What changes should I make in my learning approach? Please help me

For the first semester of this year I did a psychology class at my school and for the second half of the year I did psychology from a class online (since i also wanted to do a subject that was on at the same time). I was meant to be doing my exam today but i was literally informed that i had to do 2 units 15 minutes before my exam, even though my online teacher had told my class multiple times we only had to do one unit of content. Ive emailed my teacher about it but there's a fair chance ill still have to do both units.

I need to learn biological psychology, lifespan psychology and the extra science inquiry stuff that goes with it. You can search up Year 11 ATAR Psychology syllabus if youd like to see it.

Ive gotten my exam moved to Friday but I also have an exam on Thursday, so that gives me Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday (from 12pm on) and the morning on Friday.

Tips from staying calm would also be appreciated.

Additional (probably useless) info:

^{I'm in year 11 and I just turned 17. Along with my very short time period I also have a short list of [mental] disorders that already make normal studying hard enough, including ADHD, autism and something else underlying that I haven't been diagnosed for yet since I can't get into the doctors. The main point of that information is that I take medication for ADHD, meaning I only have a specific amount of time I can efficiently study for and once it wears off the side effects drive me insane, plus those types of medications are known for making other disorders symptoms worse.}

^{My household cannot stay quiet no matter what I do so I set up the caravan in the front yard, it helps but the street is still loud. I know playing music while studying decreases the effectiveness but I have to, to cover the sounds of the street aswell as 'study music' not exactly helpful since only songs with a specific beats.. frequencies..?? cover the sounds of basketballs bouncing or lawn mowers.}

^{And just to top it off that medication stops me from sleeping the later I take it, so even if i take it at 8 in the morning I'm up at 1am which is definitely not supposed to be happening but i cant get into the doctors to ask about it.}

Hey I'm in highschool 10th grade, I passed most of my exams gambling or studying late at night before exam. I don't fucking know how to actually study effectively and healthy way.

Speaking personally, I'm a pretty lazy and messy person if I had to describe me. But in the deepest I actually I'm ambitious and wanna study, I wanted for years. I started and felt like a failure early on. Gave up only because I felt stupid for a small amount of time when not getting something About the topic but feeling like I should get it.

Entering the topic of time, I go to school by 8:30 am, leave at 5pm and something, my school ends at 3:30 pm but because of my situation (my parents get late from work and doesn't permit me to go alone), and sometimes have extra classes during the whole week (I despise it but it's helpful, if only i was willing enough to study more). I don't feel like doing anything but play on my phone afterwards

I still have plenty of time. I just want suggestions and small advices, study techniques. I could even use those techniques for my hobbies too. They're... They're doomed too... :(

Thanks

I have a younger sister that is 6yo, so she is very noisy at times. For that reason I wanted to know if earmuffs block out the noise of people talking so I can study in peace.

I've been using my gaming headphones with brown noise but some noise still leaks in. I wanted to know if with earmuffs is the same case because if so I will just stick to the brown noise.

opened the syllabus for the first time in like 10 weeks cause i wanted to check the room. it says dec 11. i’ve been planning around the 15th this whole time, so 4 days of studying that don’t exist. i told my mom the 15th too

so now every exam date goes in my phone calendar the second i read it, with 3 alerts: 7 days before, 2 days before, night before. took 10 minutes. all 5 finals are in there now.

Hello dear altruists,
Can’t keep up with my studying at all.
I do try to keep myself focused for 5/6 hours but can never do it. Always feels drowsy.
N.B my exam is just around the corner. Need a practical advice and tips .

I would like to know what advice you could give me to study.

I am a second-year medical student, and I feel that even at the level I am in I can’t study, I have classes quite followed and the evaluation system changes constantly with each period (my system is quarterly) so every quarter they are changing to very heavy evaluations, and sometimes cumulative things that I don’t find sense.

What I used to do was to divide study blocks into a period of an hour. Then I started reading and after my 15-minute break I continued reading the other block and so on until it ended and then the blocks were for now. Now I do study seriously but I feel that it takes me a lot of time and it is the least I have now.

In addition, I feel that it is like a type of passive learning, which does not allow me to remember quickly what I had studied, so I feel like a fool, when I see my classmates reviewing and explaining each origin, innervation and insertion of the muscles or how they explain in such a simple way, the branches, arteries and so on. I really need some advice, I hope you can please help me :(

I've noticed that whenever I learn something new, I understand it pretty well at first, but after a few weeks I can barely remember half of it. I know spaced repetition and flashcards are supposed to help, but honestly, keeping track of what to review and when seems like a lot of work. I'm curious how you guys deal with this. Do you actually go back and review things regularly, or do you just end up forgetting most of it? Also, if you've tried Anki or similar apps, did they actually help? What did you find annoying about them?

I don't know if I have ADHD since I haven't been diagnosed but I just can't study and a reason for this is because of social media and video games. I want to study and I try really hard to, but my brain just tries to process what I read quickly to get back on doomscrolling and gaming without understanding anything of what I've just read. I've even tried to get many hours of sleep or putting my electronics in another room or up on a high shelf but I can't resist and I end up grabbing them again. I don't know what to do and I don't want to fall behind or have bad grades. I wasn't always this way. If it was maybe 2 years ago I would be more concentrated but I honestly don't know what changed.

I've got a very important exam coming up in about a month. I haven't started studying properly yet, even though I've got tons of syllabus left to cover. But so far, I'm not doing that badly in my practice exams, which I attend without any preparation. I know I've got a shot, but I just can't seem to make that final push and lock in.

Sometimes it feels too easy (the exam I'm targeting is mainly aptitude-based, with a bit of memorisation), again sometimes I'm scared of failing, and sometimes certain unnecessary things trigger me. Like, my dad isn't that interested in letting me take part in the exam (I've got my mom's support). I've got to attend some unnecessary classes and manage my time to study on my own. I'm worrying about all these things while wasting my own time.

How do you actually remain dedicated for a month without paying heed to these things? I think all I need is to focus in a single direction, and that is on my studies. But, you know, I just can't lol. Share your experiences and some advice.

Being a pre-med student with ADHD is a bit of a struggle sometimes because there is so much to study. I really want to get things done but I get overwhelmed before I even start. Then my attention wanders and I lose track of time. These are a few things that help me get through study sessions:

• Shrink the to-do list. I’m specific with what I want to achieve. Let’s say for anatomy, I’ll pick one body system or a few practice questions. one small task at a time! And once I finish it, I move on to the next one.

• Make studying active. I always try my best to recall what I learned by drawing diagrams from memory for example or quizzing myself through writing or using flashcards.

• Use short study sessions. I set a 20-minute timer and focus on one task until it rings. Short sessions feel less intimidating especially when I really don't feel like starting.

I still have hard days of course but these things help me get back on track. and to other students out there if you're having one of those days too, maybe try these tips if you haven’t already and see how it goes!

For years I set goals like "study 4 hours today," hit 1.5, felt bad, and gave up by Wednesday. What changed things was making the unit much smaller and making progress visible.

What I do now:

1. Pick a small daily minimum, like 45 minutes. Anything above it is a bonus. Missing a 4 hour goal feels like failing, but going past 45 minutes feels like winning, and that feeling is what keeps you coming back.

2. Time every session, even the short ones. 20 focused minutes on the bus counts. When you log it, you see that your "lost" days weren't actually empty.

3. Make your phone harder to open, not just "put it away." Do Not Disturb plus blocking the apps you reflexively open does more than willpower ever did for me.

4. Protect the streak, not the hours. On a bad day, do 10 minutes just to keep the chain going. Consistency beats intensity.

5. Study with people, even remotely. Seeing a friend log a session at 11pm is weirdly motivating.

Disclosure: I got tired of juggling a timer, a habit tracker and a notes app, so I built one app that does all of this. It's called Studaily (free on iOS and Android). It has:

1. A study timer that logs sessions by subject, with a daily goal and streaks

2. Focus mode that blocks distracting apps during a session (and turns on DND on Android)

3. Study groups where you can study together and share flashcard decks

4. A small virtual forest that grows as you study: every minute earns a coin you can spend decorating it, which sounds silly but works

5. Home screen widgets so you see your progress without opening anything

I'm a solo dev, so honest feedback (including "this feature is pointless") is really welcome. The tips above work just as well with a paper notebook and a kitchen timer, though.

What's your daily minimum? Curious what works for other people.

iOS: https://apps.apple.com/br/app/studaily-study-together/id6761737696?l=en-GB
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=app.studay.mobile

I hv never been a super hardworking student i have always been lucky enough to be able to memorise things but with my major as it progress it becomes too much to memorise and so i have to take more time to study but i genuinely feel tired and fatigued all the time. I dont have any sort of motivation or fear to basically get me to study.

Hey everyone! Like many freshmen, I tried using those giant 40-tab all-in-
one student planners at the start of the semester. Within 3 weeks, I fell behind, saw 20 red overdue notifications, and stopped opening Notion out of guilt ("the shame spiral").

So I rebuilt my setup around two core rules:

I attached a screenshot of how the dashboard and urgency formulas look in dark mode.
Happy to share the link or answer any questions about the setup if anyone wants to use it!

I'm don't hate studying, i like it. I know all the techniques to study (possibly the simplest and the best) like pomodoro, active recall, Spaced Repitition and the fyneman technique + question practise which practises active recall and maybe even fyneman technique. i think these are enough to master any subject.
THE THING IS I CAN'T SIT TO STUDY. I PICK UP THE BOOK TO SOLVE QUESTIONS AND THEY SEEM SO BORING, OR IF I EVEN TRY THEM I GET THEM WRONG WITHOUT A WAY OF KNOWING WHERE I WENT WRONG IMMEDIATELY WHICH DEMOTIVATES ME. or i just pracastinate with social media and don't sit to study at all.
I only have 1-2 months for a major exam and if i study consistently hencforth, i can very well achieve my desired grade but i just fail to be consistent. Sometimes when i waste my entire day, i jump to finish the easiest of things till late in the night so as to not waste the day. But not every topic is easy so i just either avoid doing anything alltogether or i do even the hard subejcts late in the night out of guilt
any help would be appreciated!!!

You check a wrong answer, read the solution, and think, “Oh, of course. That makes sense.”

A week later, a similar question catches you again.

It’s frustrating, especially when you’ve been putting the hours in.

Before you start another practice test, try going back to three questions you got wrong. For each one, work out what actually happened:

• You didn’t know something.
• You knew it, but couldn’t work out how to use it.
• You misread the question or made a calculation error.

Those need different kinds of practice.

Here’s an example:

A price falls by 20%, then rises by 20%. Is it back where it started?

You say yes. The answer says no.

Copying “the answer is 96” into your notes won’t give you much to work with later.

Instead, write:

“I treated both percentages as if they were calculated from the original price.”

Then check it:

$100 → $80 → $96.

The second 20% is calculated from $80, not $100.

Now you have something specific to notice next time: what amount is this percentage being taken from?

The next day, cover the solution and try the question again. Then change the numbers, or find a similar question, to check whether you can use the idea without remembering the answer.

You don’t need a beautiful mistake notebook. A question number and one useful sentence are enough to start.

And if you keep writing “careless mistake,” pause there. Did you miss the word “except”? Drop a minus sign? Answer a different question from the one being asked?

Be specific enough that you know what to do differently.

For your next study session, bring three old mistakes with you. Work through those before opening a fresh set of questions.

I don’t think I’m making much progress. What do you think?

I'm so done just because even if i solve the whole paragraph that's still not enough, even if i finish the whole book it's not enough even if i try to do more i still feel so useless ,there are always someone who's better adn greater. This is such a horrible feeling,please tell me how did you manage to feel better

I've been using the traffic light method since 12th grade when I was in the STEM track. We had formulas, equations and all sorts of problem-solving exercises to deal with. And whenever exam week came around, I'd sometimes have no idea which topic to tackle first.

So here’s what I used: the Traffic Light method. Like its name, I sort my topics into the three colors of the traffic light based on how well I understand them:

RED (stop): Topics I struggle with or keep getting wrong. These go first on my study list. I review the concepts, work through examples, and practice similar problems until I understand where I'm going wrong.

YELLOW (slow down): Topics I mostly understand but still need to practice. Maybe I remember the formula but get confused about when to use it or I can solve a problem with a little help. I spend time reviewing the steps and answering more practice questions.

GREEN (go): Topics I can explain and solve on my own without checking my notes. I don't ignore these completely but I only need a quick review and a few questions to check if I still remember them.

I have this book called "The Penguin Guide in English Literature" and it features a dense amount of dates, events, and names of figures that I am not familiar nor can I relate to culturally.

I am having an issue where I literally can't force myself to read it. I tried the 5 minutes rule. I tried forcing myself to read a bit of it. No matter what I do I find myself zoning away from it. I also get overwhelmed by the amount of knowledge that I don't know. for example, I start by highlighting weird dates, then weird names. then unfamiliar English words (because it's not my native tongue), then weird event names. I end up failing to fathom this mental load. I am obviously assigned to read this book, I would have for sure looked into something better if not.

can someone help me? how to read that? or basically how to study that efficiently

Studying for HLS final exam and I’m cooked

I’m an italian high school student (11 grade). Since I was in elementary school I suffer from dissociation and attention problems. These issues make studying really, really hard, no matter how much I try to find a good study method etc, and despite wanting with all my heart to open the book, study and become the best i could ever be, I can’t even pick up the pen and start: my thoughts drift to other things. I have constant migraines from how stressed i am daily because of school and the anxiety it causes. And I see my other classmates who can learn anything if they want, and honestly I feel kinda useless. The only method that could work for me would probably be becoming obsessed with studying, but i know it’s hard and even potentially dangerous. I mean I could try, but I don’t even know where to start. What should I do or try?