The halls echo with well-earned sighs of relief, now that first semester finals have finished. Whether students did superbly well, are beleaguered by that one mistake, or utterly bombed, the start of a second semester means many feel entitled to forget about finals for a while.
After all, finals are stressful. Finals mean late nights studying or, unfortunately, ‘winging’ it. Finals are often also headaches students give themselves. Study smarter, not harder. The less joy the thought of finals fills your heart with, the more you need to think about them now.
The first step to pain-free finals is cliché, but it still counts: focus. You may need to endure the occasional pinch on the arm.
It takes about twenty nine repetitions for a fact to lodge in long-term memory. Finals are easier when you know the material. If you know you should study, but also know that you won’t, there’s still hope. That’s because paying attention in class is even more effective than solitary review. A little known bonus for your final is that what you learn in your classroom, you’re more likely to remember when in that classroom, thanks to a quirk of the mind called context-dependent learning. It’s another incentive to pay attention in class while you’re already there.
Second: use your resources. Strange as it may seem, teachers who take sadistic glee in watching their students flounder are fewer than the students would like to believe. If class material confuses you, clear the misunderstanding that day. Never let it linger past a week. If you do, bet that it will only haunt you when it’s too late. “If you wait until the end of the year to review, so much time has passed that you may not remember what you needed help with,” said Parent Teacher Coordinator Mrs. Lentini.
We all have our habits, and cramming is difficult to quit. To make it easier to ease out of, don’t lose your notes. Assuming you take notes in the first place, put them in a notebook, a binder, a folder, or anything that you will keep.
Bulky binders and book bags are annoying, so leave the old notes in a drawer, but once every few weeks flip through them. Jogging your memory over time like this is not only easier than attempting to swallow a textbook in four days, but it will get you better results. Jot down any questions and take them to your teacher.
According to UC of San Diego professors of psychology Hal Paxter and John Wixted in their study “Improving Long-Term Learning Through Spacing of Lessons,” if you want to remember something for a year, space the sessions out over about a month. If you become a more conscious student before the test, you may very well ace it without batting an eye. No cramming required.
