As everyone knows, all the students who respect themselves get prepared for the exam during the last night before it. Night brainstorm is organized individually in different ways. Somebody writes cribs and thinks that the material is about to stay in their mind because of that (there are no many students doing like that, a method is archaic when cribs can be simply bought everywhere).
Others look for a friend who is going to agree on sitting “on the phone” the next morning and helping them pass the exam by using modern communication devices. And some of the students just curse themselves for being lazy earlier, start cramming everything with enthusiasm.
Everyone is worth sympathy, as students have their lives tough. But the cramming type of students is the one that can use some help, not only sympathy. There are several simple rules simplifying the remembering process and improving your brain activities. Described by greatpaper.co.uk.
Rule #1: Set Up a Correct Goal
It is difficult to meet a student who never studied philosophy, and it is even more difficult to find the one knowing something more than a couple of general phrases. This is not because a subject being boring and quite difficult to learn it, but because students mostly think this subject to be “unneeded” and study philosophy to “pass and forget” it.
This works perfectly: as soon as the grade is put where it should be, all the studied info gets deleted from the student’s memory right away. And here is nothing one can do, it is about psychology. That is why, before you start preparing for the exam, you need to tell yourself that this material is required for your future professional activity and successful career.
Rule #2: Don’t Try Grasping The Immensity
How long did it take the lecturer to give you all the lectures, during a semester? Well, even if there was only one lecture per week, you get 20 hours of a certain subject during the semester. That is too much for a single night, isn’t it? You doubtfully can read (not learn even) all the material during that time you have till the exam.
Well, you need to read all the lectures and notes, but without getting too deep into them. Perform a review, form the general picture of a learning course in your mind. Try to remember often-met terms and word combinations while doing that, and pay attention to examples: they can help you understand each topic faster.
Rule #3: Think Logically
We have already found out that it is not necessary to learn all the lectures by heart as a poem, just try understanding the point. It is much easier to be done if to find a logic in your studied material. Everything goes well for that: visualize the picture, draw schemes and tables, ask a friend to read the lecture and explain it to you in his or her own words.
The point is, you need to understand the process well, and to be able to describe it easily just basing on your logic and perception of things happening. Psychologists proven the profit of logical understanding the info to be 4 times more effective than the “mechanical” cramming long ago.
Rule #4: Study Definitions
Many students underestimate the meaning of definitions. In fact, they are to be learnt by heart (just like formulas if you are a “technician”), as this is what lecturers demand very often.
First, a properly composed definition can content the answer to one or several exam questions. You will be able to explain everything with more details due to understanding of the general subject “picture”.
Second, any scientific discipline has only up to 30 definitions one needs to know and use in it. This means, you need to study only 30 sentences. You can learn them all during 30 minutes, but you better repeat them once more 2-3 hours after studying and before the exam in order to keep them in your mind.
And finally, lecturers often give students a chance to get a “passable” grade if they tell the definition of the subject.
Rule #5: Do not Overload Yourself
This is an obvious and well-known rule: you need to make 5-10 minute breaks after every hour or two of studying. Go for a walk, do some exercises, breath in some fresh air, etc.
This is required for your attention and memory to work effectively, as all the psychic processes slow down if to repeat using them for 60 minutes in a row or more. And the main rule: if you feel you can’t study more, do not make yourself do that by consuming colossal doses of caffeine. Most probably, the best solution for you is to go to sleep, as you need to have your mind pure before the exam.