Effective Study Techniques

Effective study techniques
If we ask students how they study at home for an exam we will see that the most popular answers involve `read notes` and `highlight key-points`. Actually these are the most popular study habits for the 75% of students in the U.K.! However, according to neuroscience these are the least effective study techniques as well.
Neuroscience provides us with a lot of evidence with regard to how students can learn and retain knowledge for long. Research has shown that cramming knowledge right before an exam is a failed technique for high success rates and retainment of information. As a first advice i would suggest that a student should study a new topic once and then revisit the same topic after a few days (...and then revisit...and revisit as often as possible).Students should set a timetable for their revision and set exact timings for revising different subjects.
In the place of `read notes` and `highlight key-points` one should test themselves and answer exam style questions. It is very important for a student, beyond studying notes or just `reading` material from a study guide to do past papers. Past papers practice is an essential part of study and it can lead to higher success rates in exams. Past papers completion and checking answers from mark schemes help students to-familiarise themselves with the format of exam-style questions- realise what is expected from them to do according to the Mark scheme lt;br>- practice giving answers that lead to full marks.
So don`t leave study/revision for the last moment (cramming knowledge doesn`t help!), make a timetable for your study, study from past papers with exam style questions and allow time for understanding and remembering new topics (revisit-revisit-revisit).