How to Study

I recently read an article about how to study effectively by Professor William J. Rapaport.

I found that it had lots of useful information, much of which I agreed with, speaking from personal experience.

Here are my personal notes on that article:

Notes

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The Myth of Learning Styles

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• Learning styles, e.g. verbal, aural, visual, kinesthetic, don’t exist.
• “There is no evidence to support the idea that matching activities to one’s learning style improves learning”.
• Hundreds of studies have been doen on learning styles, and there has been no evidence that they exist.
• Pashler et al. 2009: “using learning-styles theories in the classroom does not bring an advantage to students. … There’s increasing evidence that people [who claim to have learning preferences] act on those beliefs …. But doing so confers no cognitive advantage. People believe they have learning styles, and they try to think in their preferred style, but doing so doesn’t help them think.” (pp. 28–29)
• This means my idea that I’m a “verbal” thinker is, sadly, false. It all goes back to there not being any shortcuts.

Take Notes In Class And Rewrite Them

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• Take complete notes, prioritizing it even over understanding.
  • Write down as much as possible.
  • It keeps you awake and attentive in class.
  • You can always review and understand concepts later.
• Use abbreviations in your notes.
• Neatness doesn’t matter. You just need to be legible enough so that your notes are legible a few hours or days later.
• If you have questions or interesting thoughts, jot them down in the margins or inside big, bold square brackets.
  • Ask the teacher the question whenever possible so you can get it answered right away.
  • If you have a question, then it’s likely others will have the same question.
• Rewrite your notes as a way to study them. Use this opportunity to fill in the gaps, organize the information more logically, and note down questions for the future.
• Taking notes with pen and paper is better than typing.

Study Hard Subjects First

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• Study the hard subjects first, when you have the most energy available.
• Start homework early so you have time for the large assignments.

Reading

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• Read slowly and actively – reading without thinking about the text is just a waste of time (unless you’re skimming).
• Algorithm for reading any text slowly and actively:

WHILE there is a next sentence to read, DO:
  BEGIN { while }
    Read it, SLOWLY;
    IF you do not understand it, THEN
      BEGIN { if }
        re-read the previous material, SLOWLY;
        re-read the incomprehensible sentence, SLOWLY;
        IF you still don't understand it, THEN
           ask a fellow student to explain it;
        IF you still don't understand it, THEN
           ask your Teaching Assistant (TA) to explain it;
        IF you still don't understand it, THEN
           ask me;
        IF you are in an upper-level course & you still don't understand it, THEN
           write a paper about it (!)
      END { if } 
END; { while }

• Take notes while reading and record the important passages.
• You can read a text, especially literature, quickly and passively, but make sure you also go through it slowly and actively.
• Ideally, you should read each text twice: quickly and passively before class, and slowly and actively after class.

Studying For Exams

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• Study to learn, not for the sake of exams.
• Start studying about 1 week before an exam.
• Dedicate roughly the same amount of time for each course.
• “Re-reading your textbook has ’little or not benefit’ when you are studying for a test.”
• “You learn better and remember more from repeated testing than from repeated reading.”
• For final exams, create a cheat sheet for each course.
• For exams with essays, prepare by writing sample essays.
• For subjects with problems, the key is to just do a lot of them.
• You can create your own tests by dividing a sheet of regular-sized paper in half, vertically, and writing questions on the left and answers on the right. Cover the right side with a sheet of paper, then try to answer the question by writing it down. Repeat until you can get everything right.
• When you feel confident, that is a signal that you can stop studying.

Taking Exams

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• How to answer an essay question:
  • 1. Do a mind dump of everything you remember about the question’s topic.
  • 2. Develop an outline for an answer.
  • 3. Write the essay.
• In general, do the easy questions first – this builds momentum to solve the other questions.

Research and Essays

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• Avoid topics that are either too broad or too narrow.
• When researching, note down quotations and where to find them.
• With your notes, write an outline for your essay. Start at a low resolution first, then gradually move to a higher resolution.
• After you’ve written something, re-read it, revise, get a friend to read it, then revise again.

Kurt Vonnegut on Writing

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• Find a subject you care about.
• Do not ramble.
• Keep it simple.
• Have the guts to cut.
• Sound like yourself.
• Say what you mean to say.
• Pity the readers.