<ul><li>Active recall + Spaced Repetition </li><li>Sleeping </li><li>Relating </li></ul>

Three Techniques for Being an A+ Student 

Ask yourself questions on every topic you are studying, and repeat the process over time, until you become familiar with it

Active Recall + Spaced Repetition 

In the NREM (Non-rapid eye movement) phase, short-term memories stored in the hippocampus are sent to the prefrontal cortex, which let (most of) them become long-term ones, which is what you want with new knowledge.

Sleep 7-9h Each Day 

We need something we can relate new concepts too, and there is no better way to do it than by using the knowledge that is already there. By doing that, you will be acquiring new knowledge each day, since everything you learn will turn into a snowball, which will be paving down your lifelong learning road

Relate New Learning with Prior Knowledge

After discussing time-management &amp; task-management techniques, now it’s time to give you the icing on the cake. That’s why here I’ll be taking you through 3 practices that have (significantly) improved my grades. <UL><LI><img src="https://www.juanotalo.com/content/images/size/w100/2021/06/download--2--1.png" alt="Juan David Otálora-Diaz" width="46" height="46"></LI></UL><h4><a href="https://www.juanotalo.com/author/juan/">Juan David Otálora-Diaz</a></h4><div dir="ltr">
 <time datetime="2021-07-14" dir="ltr">Jul 14, 2021</time>
 • 2 min read
 </div><figure><img srcset="https://www.juanotalo.com/content/images/size/w300/2021/07/pexels-energepiccom-313690.jpeg 300w, https://www.juanotalo.com/content/images/size/w600/2021/07/pexels-energepiccom-313690.jpeg 600w, https://www.juanotalo.com/content/images/size/w1000/2021/07/pexels-energepiccom-313690.jpeg 1000w, https://www.juanotalo.com/content/images/size/w2000/2021/07/pexels-energepiccom-313690.jpeg 2000w" src="https://www.juanotalo.com/content/images/size/w2000/2021/07/pexels-energepiccom-313690.jpeg" alt="Study Tips 101: Part III - Study Method" width="785" height="589"></figure>After discussing time-management &amp; task-management techniques, now it’s time to give you the icing on the cake. That’s why here I’ll be taking you through 3 practices that have (significantly) improved my grades.<h3>Active Recall + Spaced Repetition</h3>After reading the book called Make It Stick, and finding out that techniques like underlining, rereading, or summarizing, which are said to be highly effective techniques among the people made a little impact in learning when tested in scientific studies, I said: “I’ve been studying wrong my whole life” which made sense because at the time my grades were not as good as I would like them to be.Fortunately, in that book the authors also show what the best study method practices are, emphasizing this technique:Active recall: since playing is an active sport, you should treat it that way, that’s why constantly asking questions to yourself when studying is fundamental.Spaced repetition: to learn new content, we have to avoid something called: “the forgetting curve” which was discovered by Hermann Ebbinghaus in the 19th century and relates memory retention with time elapsed.His main discovery was that this relationship is negative, which makes it important to repeat over time learning of new knowledge, after the forgetting curve turns into a zero-slope graph, meaning that no matter the time elapsed, the content will remain there (which typically happens after spacing out study sessions about the same topic).Active recall + spaced repetition: ask yourself questions on every topic you are studying, and repeat that process over time, until you become familiar with the topic.<h3>Sleep 7-9 Hours</h3>As soon as I read <a href="https://www.juanotalo.com/why-we-sleep-summary/" dir="ltr">Why We Sleep</a>, I understood the value of sleeping properly: it boosts memory retention. There were conducted severe studies, which showed that when you are slumbering, specifically in the NREM phase, short-term memories stored in the hippocampus are sent to the prefrontal cortex, which let (most of) them become long-term ones.<h3>Relate New Learning with Prior Knowledge</h3>We need something we can relate new concepts to, and there is no better way to do it than by using the knowledge that is already there (in your brain). It is like when you need to hang a lot of clothing, you first need a rope (general concepts) to hang the clothing (new knowledge). By doing that, you will be acquiring new knowledge each day, since everything you learn will turn into a "snowball" which will be paving down your lifelong learning road.

personaldevelopment

Personal Development

education

Learning & Education

After discussing time-management & task-management techniques, now it’s time to give you the icing on the cake. That’s why here I’ll be taking you through 3 practices that have (significantly) improved my grades.

After reading the book called Make It Stick, and finding out that techniques like underlining, rereading, or summarizing, which are said to be highly effective techniques among the people made a little impact in learning when tested in scientific studies, I said: “I’ve been studying wrong my whole life” which made sense because at the time my grades were not as good as I would like them to be.

Fortunately, in that book the authors also show what the best study method practices are, emphasizing this technique:

Active recall: since playing is an active sport, you should treat it that way, that’s why constantly asking questions to yourself when studying is fundamental.

Spaced repetition: to learn new content, we have to avoid something called: “the forgetting curve” which was discovered by Hermann Ebbinghaus in the 19th century and relates memory retention with time elapsed.

His main discovery was that this relationship is negative, which makes it important to repeat over time learning of new knowledge, after the forgetting curve turns into a zero-slope graph, meaning that no matter the time elapsed, the content will remain there (which typically happens after spacing out study sessions about the same topic).

Active recall + spaced repetition: ask yourself questions on every topic you are studying, and repeat that process over time, until you become familiar with the topic.

As soon as I read <a href="https://www.juanotalo.com/why-we-sleep-summary/">Why We Sleep </a>, I understood the value of sleeping properly: it boosts memory retention. There were conducted severe studies, which showed that when you are slumbering, specifically in the NREM phase, short-term memories stored in the hippocampus are sent to the prefrontal cortex, which let (most of) them become long-term ones.

We need something we can relate new concepts to, and there is no better way to do it than by using the knowledge that is already there (in your brain). It is like when you need to hang a lot of clothing, you first need a rope (general concepts) to hang the clothing (new knowledge). By doing that, you will be acquiring new knowledge each day, since everything you learn will turn into a "snowball" which will be paving down your lifelong learning road.

Study Tips 101: Part III - Study Method

Three Techniques for Being an A+ Student

Active Recall + Spaced Repetition

Sleep 7-9h Each Day

Relate New Learning with Prior Knowledge

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