College can prove difficult for some people. If you are one of this group; however, have no worries. I’m going to give you five easy study tips to be able to memorize texts for better grades.

Before we begin, let me start off by saying that not any one studying method will work for everyone. I urge you to try all of these methods and see which works best for you. Personally, I use a combination of these methods to maximize my information input. Depending on what subject you are studying for, adjust your methods to fit.

5 Study Tips to Boost Your GPA

1

Read the Chapter

When you sit down and turn on your television, you find a TV show or movie you decide you are interested in watching. From beginning to end it tells a story; a series of events to follow. Your textbook is the same. Yes, the information may be dry in some subjects but if you read the chapter from beginning to end, you will develop the story and series of events in your head.

  • Don’t skim read. In doing this, you cannot grasp the full concept of the chapter seeing that you are only looking for key words.

  • Don’t take notes. At least not at this stage. If you stop to take notes while reading through a chapter, the full picture begins to become lost. You quickly concentrate on note taking instead of understanding the whole chapter. This is a trap!

2

Taking Notes

Now that you have finished reading the chapter and have a general understanding, now it’s time to take some notes. This is where different subjects start to vary. In some subjects, vocabulary is written in bold and often repeated as a side note of the page or the end of the chapter. If this is the case, make sure you write these down. They are in bold for a reason and are keywords you need to know on the subject.

But what about classes such as math? You are less likely to have many key terms in a class like mathematics. Instead, you have formulas. Think of these formulas as your vocabulary; which, they technically are the vocabulary of math.

Keywords are not the only important bit of information; however. This is where skim reading comes into play. Now, you already know of the important information in the chapter because you’ve read it. Skim through the text for that concept, find it, and use your own words to detail the concept. You needn’t copy these word for word. Why? Because putting these concepts in your own words helps your brain retain that information much better and faster.

3

Critical Thinking

In almost all textbooks, there is a critical thinking, or check your understanding section at the end of the chapter. Books call this section by many names but it is basically a way for you to see if you can apply what the chapter just attempted to teach you.

Take five or ten minutes to go over these questions. Are you having trouble un

4

Note Cards

Note cards are a great way to learn vocabulary. 3x5 cards are cheap; often you can find them for $1-$2 for a count of 200. Take out your notes. Now, we already have all of our vocabulary terms neatly written down. Write the key term on the side of the note card with no lines. On the opposite side, copy the definition word for word. If it is hard to understand, write a brief description in your own words underneath.

Once you have all of your note cards filled with vocabulary, quiz yourself! Read the definition of a term and see if you get the answer right. Separate the cards you get right from the ones you get wrong. Once you’ve gone through all of the cards, look at the ones you got wrong again.

So now you’ve gone through all of the flash cards, some of them twice. Now what? Repeat. Continue this process until you are confident you can come up with all of the key words that fit the definitions.

5

Homework

Doing your assigned homework is so important. It is practice for tests and quizzes. Let me assure you that it is not busywork designed by evil teachers to make your life difficult. Homework is practicing what you should expect to see on your future tests and quizzes.

In most mathematics books, answers to odd questions can be found toward the back. Do not stop after completing each odd question to check the answer. Complete all assigned problems first. When you are done, check all of your odd answers. Did you get some wrong? On a clean sheet of paper, attempt these questions again. Feel free to refer to your notes or the book if you are having difficulties. Oftentimes, simple math was done incorrectly causing the whole answer to be incorrect. If you are still not confident on getting the right answers for a specific type of problem, do other odd questions in that exercise that are similar.

Homework is all about practice. Repetition is a strong way to learn new material.

6

Final Words

If you follow and use these studying concepts, you are guaranteed to produce a strong outcome. Does it take time? Does it take additional effort? Of course! If you are taking classes but only skating by with Cs, this is your solution to raising your grades.

The whole concept of college is to prepare you for your future profession. So why not acquire and retain as much of that information as possible? Believe me, you will be glad you did.

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