Good study habits and how to get them ?

Is your daily study routine isn't as perfect as it should be? Do you wish to increase your retention capacity? If yes, then it is time for you to adopt some highly effective study habits in order to provide yourself with an edge. Especially when a student is in high-school or college, there are many changes that he should make in his regular study pattern in order to develop good study habits.

1. Making Realistic Study Goals:

Sometimes, despite all efforts, some students seem to be unable to get grades as per their expectations. This is an indication that you might be setting goals that are unrealistic. Aiming higher is easier said than done.

Setting a goal is an important part of a good study routine. But one of the highly effective study habits is to set a goal that is realistic. If you set a target that is too difficult or nearly impossible for you to achieve, you might end up demotivating yourself in the process. Furthermore, the impact of failure would be even worse. One of the good study habits for students before setting a goal to assess themselves at different levels.

2. Active Listening Skills

Some students learn best when they listen to something over and over again. One of the good study habits for students like this is to record the lecture, listen to it multiple times, and note down the important points to refer to later. You can also note down the recorded lectures in the form of mnemonics and abbreviations. This will help you retain a particular piece of information for a longer duration.

Once you have written down all the crucial points, it is time to review it thoroughly. One of the study habits of highly effective students is that they review their notes either early in the morning or before going to bed. This way, they can absorb more information.

3. Replicating Test Conditions:

When you are preparing for an exam, you need to know exactly what you are getting yourself into. Most of the students appear for mock examinations or test series that are based on the same pattern as the final exam. But do you think that is enough for staying on the top? Perhaps not. Even though a mock test prepares you for what's coming, you can't make the most out of it unless you create the same conditions that you are about to face at the time of the examination.

Most of the exams have a pre-decided examination center. Students should carefully examine the exam center. They can also use their previous experiences to estimate the atmosphere during the examination and replicate those exact circumstances during their mock tests. If your examination hall does not have an air conditioner, it is probably a good idea to turn off the AC while solving a mock paper at home. If you hear background noises during the exam, you should refrain from solving the paper in a completely quiet environment. This way, students can get accustomed to the examination conditions which makes them better prepared and enables them to score better.

4. Learning From Your Mistakes

The silliest mistake you can commit during your school or college life is to repeat the same mistake over and over. When students participate in quizzes, every unanswered question and a wrongly answered question is an opportunity to learn. Take some time to examine in detail the marks of your recent test papers and pick out where you failed to score. When you know your mistakes, you can make an attempt to correct them. Once you understand your faults, make sure you never repeat any previous mistake. Instead of being ashamed of your mistake, proudly admit it, as it is a chance to improve your academics. Consider them as a source of better understanding.

One of the best ways to work on a mistake and never to repeat it to take help from your teacher. If you have answered a question and it is not up to the mark, ask your teacher to explain the solution to your problem in detail. Analyze the root cause of your mistake. Was it due to your lack of attentiveness or a concept remained unclear?

5. Study The Toughest Portion In The Beginning:

You are in the most energetic state of mind when you are just beginning your study session. This is the time when you should start with something that you find a little more difficult than other topics in your syllabus. If you take up easier topics right in the beginning it will consume most of your energy and focus and you won't be able to focus on tougher portions later.

Difficult topics require far more concentration than the easier ones. You can revise your strong points even when you are not feeling energetic. But if you are in a habit of leaving the tough topics for the last moment, it will create a state of panic for you which can adversely affect your learning.

6. Understanding Various Learning Aspects

It is also important to determine your style of learning before you set a target. Take into account the duration of your study sessions, the effectiveness of your methodologies, your level of satisfaction with past grades, subjects that require more emphasis, and your priorities. Only after scrutinizing these crucial aspects, one can make an effective study routine. Your goal should be time-bound. Taking forever to achieve something to fill your routine with monotony.

7. Rewriting Notes:

No matter how well you understand a concept, if you wish to write a perfect answer in the examination, you will have to memorize things to some extent. Since there are so many things to learn, topics might slip out of your mind during the exams. In order to make sure that you retain everything in an organized way, you need to adopt one of the best study habits for success, which is rewriting your own notes.

Writing something down helps you remember for a longer time. When you read the notes, try to memorize them on the first go. When you are done reading, take a separate piece of paper, and rewrite what you've read in your own words. This way you will get an opportunity to engage with the study material. This increases your level of understanding and helps you write better answers in your examination.

8. Interact With Teachers:

If you wish to achieve true excellence and develop the study habits of highly effective students, you should stay in touch with your teachers and professors. Since there are so many students the teacher is supposed to address in a class, it is not possible to clarify queries at an individual level. With so many subjects and so many topics to study, a student can easily get confused. There is no harm asking for help if you need to strengthen your concepts or clarify doubts.

You can contact them to know when they have some extra time and decide upon a study session. Teachers might offer you some effective tips and tricks to score well, thus helping you develop good study habits. Apart from teaching, they can also provide details regarding the format of your test paper or examination which will help you enhance your practice.

9. Conduct Research:

There are certain expectations you are supposed to fulfill when you are studying for an exam. Scoring good grades is just one of them. That is not everything you need to be concerned about. One of the most effective habits for effective study undertaken by brilliant students is that they never restrict their knowledge only to the course books. They use their syllabus as a guide, study the textbooks in detail, and conduct detailed research on the topic they are studying.

When you perform outside research, you gain in-depth knowledge that further helps you develop an interest in the subject. Textbooks can get a little boring considering there are long paragraphs to read. If you know some interesting facts beforehand, you can study better.

10. Taking Breaks And Rewards:

Studying won't feel as overwhelming when you take short breaks in between study sessions. Set rewards for yourself so that you have something positive to look forward to when you finish studying. This approach helps in developing a positive approach to studying. When you are positive, you can gain the most out of your education and improve your abilities.

You must have observed that when we study, we develop certain habits of studying, depending on our general attitude and the knowledge we receive from different motivational sources. To a large extent, these habits decide a student’s success and failure in the long-term. So it is better to focus on the study habits right from its conception. If the environment along with the seeds and soil is right, the fruit borne will be of better quality. But some argue that study habits are driven by inborn traits like planning abilities, motivation, hard-working nature, etc. This is not true. These habits just require a good environment to nurture.

The sooner the good habits are practiced, the better the chances of following them for a lifetime. The motive behind inculcating good study habits is not just to become a topper, but to inculcate the values of hard work, commitment and discipline in the self which will help and applied to all avenues in life.

Having understood the importance of good habits, let us discuss what and how’s of developing good habits. Here, I am giving some tips to develop them and the best practices to follow.

i) Decide the time of study:

Consistency rewards labor. A student needs to maintain regularity in regard to the study time. Continuous small drops can fill a big pitcher in no time. Continuous motivation to study little every day can help anyone to become better day by day. The motivation should come in a positive manner and not in the form of continuous scolding or hammering. Even 15 min. a day is enough to start with. To motivate your child to study regularly even if for the short spans. You will see for yourself that quickly these small spans will take longer the paths in no time.

ii) Stop procrastinating:

This is a disease which if takes deep root gets difficult to be treated. ‘I will do it tomorrow’ or ‘Can I do it after coming from my Friend’s house?’ are the questions that need to be handled carefully. You must have observed that simply putting off the things for long will not ward off the situation. Then why to delay and postpone? Develop an attitude to deal with everything right now.

iii) Space for the best place to study:

Space and its ambiance have a direct effect on studying abilities. It is advisable to develop a small area for study inside the house. That area maybe someplace in the child’s or parent’s bedroom, or even a center hall. But make sure that whenever it is the ‘study time’, the area must be quiet and serene. All of us get frequently attracted by the noises and thus get distracted even by the small noises around. Fixing a special area of study helps to arouse a sense of responsibility towards the importance of the study.

iv) Make use of Memory Games:

Memory games use common words in a simple association and this helps to retain the information in the mind for long. For this, people make use of some of the ancient techniques like picking the first letter of the different words and then putting them together. In our times, we used to learn the Periodic Table in such a way. There are many other ways also. You can explore them in abundance all over the internet. These methods are also called mnemonic devices. The frequent use of these techniques trains the mind to retain all the information and that too for a long time. This is one of the best study habits that can gain excellent future results.

v) Practice alone or in a group:

‘Practice makes a man perfect.’ Even if you make good use of mnemonic devices, but you do not practice, you will not get any good results. Although all of us know that practicing is the best way to learn, we get confused about the ways to be used for practicing. Well, there are basically two ways of practicing

(a) Practice by yourself:

Test yourself in many ways like using past quizzes, practice exams, sample papers, past year papers, flashcards, etc.

(b) Practice in a group:

Some of us when left alone lose the motivation needed to practice and learn. For people like us, practicing in the group is the best way out. But the success of this method depends on what type of group you chose. Mostly, groups work best when they are kept small, say 4 to 5 people. Some groups study by doing a chapter-wise practice, while some other groups just review the class notes. So choose the group that suits your needs and like. It may sound mean, but remember, one size never fits all.

Good study habit is a lifestyle trait which helps to achieve the best results not only in school or exam but in life as well. Developing good study habits is a very important part of the learning process. Keeping a good daily routine and treating all the subjects equally is the ultimate aim of developing any good study habit. Good study habits together with hard work are the assets that need to be nurtured carefully to get a good life.

vi) Start supporting instead of Instructing

In research, it was found that if parents focus more on the homework content, sometimes their good intentions backfire on them unknowingly. It may be because here the intentions do not play a good role, but the support does. Schools provide a lot of instructions, and homework is a chance for the students to work independently and learn by doing. So at this stage explaining everything and instructing is not a way out. The better way would be to simply provide encouragement to solve a problem or to give feedback.

vii) Boost their hard work rather than only intelligence:

Mistakes are a part of the learning process, so if you will only praise the intelligence, indirectly it will convey the message that more is the mistakes the lesser is their intelligence. I think this is not what we want to convey to our children? So the better way is to praise their efforts rather than their intelligence. For e.g., if a child writes right ‘A’ one time and writes wrong ‘A’ for four times, praise your child for the effort he has made 4 times to get the right ‘A’ one time.

Conclusion:

Adopting various develop good study habits will not only improve your academics but will also help you gain a lot of knowledge. So instead of merely focussing on achieving good grades, a student should ensure that he approaches opting for good study habits for success. Even if a particular topic doesn't spark your interest, keep looking for interesting facts related to that subject in order to keep your curiosity spiced up. The earlier you undertake effective habits for an effective study, the better it is for your career and your overall personality.