How to exit your exam room proud and victorious

Lily Song ASSOCIATE FEATURES EDITOR

Photo: (Lily Song / THE MIKE)

For so many university students across the campus, there is something that frightens us more than the winter weather around this time of the year — ’tis the season of final exams! To make sure that your efforts have been worthwhile and you get that mark you deserve, let’s take some time today to review our universal first step toward success — your study habits! 

Don’t know if your study habits are effective? Do you need new study habits to do better than you did on your midterms? You’ve come to the right place! Let’s review all the basic rules and tools for study habits that have proven to be effective. 

Record your lectures. Before you proceed, please keep in mind that some professors do not feel comfortable with having their faces or voices being recorded and class content being available to the public, so always ask for permission whether you plan to record for every class, or only for a selected few. Double check online to make sure your professors have not already posted recordings or videos of their lectures themselves too. Some professors allow their students to record under the condition that they must keep their recordings only amongst themselves, so make sure to confirm all of this with them before you begin.  

I mention this tip, not because you should stop taking notes altogether, but because to many, you may miss important points while you were busy writing down the previous point. If you base your lectures more toward listening, you can write down only the most important points to help you get started with your studying, and add additional points you have missed to help you broaden your knowledge by going back to your recordings. I warn you that you should never replace your lectures with your recordings though, because you may not have enough time to review your recordings at all. It is essential to have a good set of notes just in case.  

Start ahead of time. Most of us suffer from procrastination constantly, but the more you practice ignoring your temptations, the better you will be when it comes with time management. Practice makes perfect, even when it comes with procrastination! We can all admit that it is common sense that the more you review, the more you will succeed in memorizing and retaining that information for a longer period of time. 

Print your study material. Especially if you have readings that you need to study for, it is better for you to have both copies — an electronic one and a printed version, even if you learn better on a screen. You can still read and study off of your computer, but highlighting important content on paper will help you remember important information even better. Print lecture slides if necessary, as well! You can print them three per page with lines beside each slide if you print them through Microsoft PowerPoint, which would be very helpful if you would like to add additional notes beside your slides that you think would go along well together.  

Join a study group. It would be preferable if you make one amongst your friends because you know that you can rely on them, but it is beneficial for you to be part of any study group as well. If you learn best with speech, talking about the class material with your peers could help you immensely. Sharing notes for lectures you have missed is also a great idea, and even if you do not wish to meet them in real life, study groups via social media could help you and everyone else in the group. The group work will allow you all to come up with questions about what could possibly be on the test and how to answer them.  

Many of the tips previously mentioned may seem redundant to you, but that is exactly my point! These ideas keep being circulated because they really work. So don’t feel intimidated and start studying now — because we all know the good old saying: “No pain, no gain.”