Tag: Studying

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Get a New Perspective

By Cory Lauer

            Have you ever wondered what the best study methods are? This conundrum plagues many incoming and first year college students. But, something to be taken into consideration is how the information is presented on the page. Repetition is helpful in remembering material but presenting the material with other similar material and restructuring it into something easier to digest is paramount to better learn and remember the information. This is one of the goals of Gestalt psychology. Similar ideas and theories will be better associated when they are presented together, and each idea or theory will be better remembered if it is framed in a different manner. Because of this, utilizing Gestalt representation and restructuring will promote better study habits and increase the amount of information remembered. Continue reading “Get a New Perspective”

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Interleaving: Helping To Link You To Success

By Beth Mickna

Entering college is going to be one of the greatest times of your life, but it will add a new amount of stress to your life as well. There are going to be many new opportunities for you throughout the time you spend here. Every class you take is going to be instructed differently. You will have to learn to study different ways in order to be successful in your college academic career. Some professors use powerpoints that you can copy the notes down from, and others will lecture the entire time.  With those professors, you will have to be able to listen carefully while writing the information you think is important. I cannot tell you the ways that will work best for you in the classes that you are going to take, but I can give you a few tips on how to study. Using the method I am telling you about can help you to be ready for whatever information is thrown at you.

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Test Better Using the Testing Effect

By Sydney Abdnour

We’ve all heard the saying “you get out what you put in.” This statement applies perfectly to schooling, specifically studying and test taking. In high school, it is easy to cram the night before a test and get a good grade. Unfortunately, that is not the case in college. Even if you consider yourself a “good test taker,” it is important to put more time into your studies than you did in high school. There are many techniques out there to enhance the learning and studying experience for students of all ages. One of the effective ways to help students (especially college students) study and retain information better is the Testing Effect, known more commonly as the Retrieval Practice Effect.

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Music While Studying: Does It Motivate Or Distract?

By Marissa Corder

Can music help you study more efficiently? Unfortunately, this question is not easy to answer, and research has yielded contradictory evidence. The effect of music on cognitive performance depends on a multitude of factors including tempos of songs, types of cognitive tasks being performed (such as reading comprehension or solving algebra problems), and prior listening experiences. The arousal and mood hypothesis proposes that music’s influence on cognitive performance is a result of physiological responses (1). This hypothesis was developed to explain the “Mozart effect” – the popular misconception that listening to Mozart makes you smarter; that is, after Mozart-listening sessions, participants scored higher on spatial abilities compared to silent conditions or listening to instructions on relaxation (2). Later research found supporting evidence for the arousal and mood hypothesis and thus, “busted” the erroneous conclusion of a causal relationship between music and intelligence.

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Chunk Your Life Together

By Laken Barlow

Congratulations! You’re going to college! Or you may already be there, still good for you. Going and getting into college is an important milestone in many people’s lives. It prepares you for your future career. College is also a time to figure out who you are as a person and to help you grow. It can be intimidating sometimes, I’m not going to lie. You’re put in a completely new environment where you have to make new friendships and completely start over in sports and other organizations. You have to create a positive image of yourself to your peers, all the while under the pressure of doing well in your classes. The whole reason you came to college is to prepare yourself for your future, so you need to learn how to balance out your social and academic life. A key component to managing your academic work is your study habits.

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Generating a Better Memory

By Heather Triplett and Patrick Haas

Studying can be something that is hard for students as they begin college. In high school you might have been able to pay attention in class and still get A’s without worrying about studying, or you might have just had to read the text and known everything that was going to be on the test. Yet, as we get older teachers and professors ask more difficult questions and expect you to know more information when it comes to test time. For each class in college your professor will ask you to purchase an expensive textbook, and read a certain chapter from the book to be prepared for class. These topics are no Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows people, these topics are dry definitions with no stories in them. So what can you do to make it easier to retain the information rather than just simply reading your textbook?

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Studying Smarter, Not Harder: The Keys to Consolidation

By Cara LaBelle and Niki Bending

Every college freshman struggles with adjusting study habits from high school to college. They go from studying for their finals the night before, and doing well, to studying for a regularly scheduled exam the night before, and failing. Sadly, there is no exact formula for how much or how long you need to study in order to do well. Through our study conducted on consolidation methods, we have discovered some tendencies and tips on how to study more effectively in order to get the desired grade.
           

Disclaimer: Only one exam was failed in the making of this blog post.

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Don’t Ignore the Voices: They Could Be Helpful *insert suspenseful music*

By Joseph Contezac and Darlene Valdez

If you go in any coffee shop or public place on a college campus other than the library, you will see students studying and chatting with their friends. But is chatting while you study preventing you from remembering key info on that test you are studying for? Though studying with a partner has been shown to actually help with remembering information, simply chatting about everyday things while you study is a distraction that is anything, but helpful to your academic success. Due to the amount of media we consume and how readily available it is, millennials have adopted “strategies” for multitasking. Millennials in general, are all about multitasking, especially when the amount of work you have is not equal to the amount of time you have to do it. Focusing more on chatting and studying, it is important to note the reasons why this might be affecting your ability to remember key material. It all comes down to the concepts of divided attention, and the distinction between on-topic and off-topic conversation.

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Go Test Yourself – Serial Position and Testing Effect

By Jeileen Belen and Veronica Rzepniewski

College is a difficult time for people; you’re adjusting to a new environment, taking difficult classes, and surrounding yourself with people that you don’t know yet. Though it may seem stressful, college is a great time as long as you find your balance.

If I could go back in time, I would have listened to older college students who told me that the techniques used for studying in high school is not an effective way to study in college. To all of the first-year college students, the best way to study for a test is to ACTUALLY STUDY; studying the day before or the day of is a sure way to fail a college test. There are expectations of college students to have a fun and active social life while maintaining a good academic standing, and these expectations can be overwhelming. It is important to enjoy your college years, but it is more important to understand your boundaries and find a good social and academic balance. Sources say that having good study skills improves academic self-efficacy and achievement motivation which are the two constructs that best influence GPA (1). College is a whole new ball park, so developing great study habits from the bat will help you succeed. Continue reading “Go Test Yourself – Serial Position and Testing Effect”