Learning. Life.

The semester’s just starting, and exams are almost 6 months away. Before you forget about them – stop. Please. There are some things you can do now to improve your exam performance exponentially, and they’re pretty easy, too.

1. Go to the first class.

D’oh. Here you learn about what you have to do, what the assignments are, and often you get into study groups. If you’re in a bad group for an assignment, you’re going to have to work a lot harder. If you’re out of the country and/or have a very good reason why you can’t be there, contact your lecturer in advance to apologise and ask what you need to know. They will at least be happier to help than if they think you simply couldn’t be bothered. Besides, if you skip any class you’ll have to live with that awful confused and worried feeling where you don’t know what you have to do and are worried you’ve missed an assignment. You know the one.

2. Then go to every class, even if you think it’s boring (in which case, see hack 3).

You’ll pick up lots of information about how to do the assessments, not to mention about the topic. The lecturer is also more willing to help you if they think you’re putting in the effort.

3. It’s not boring – you’re bored.

“Interesting”is a mindset, often based on how relevant you think the subject is. Make yourself interested. Talk to classmates who wierdly seem to find the subject fascinating or, if you can’t find any, ask the lecturer, especially if they seem to have a passion for their subject. One of the papers I teach was the most boring paper I took at university. When I came back to teach I wished I’d remembered half of it when I was working in that area. If you think the subject is irrelevant, ask someone who works in the area you want to get in to – they might give you a whole new perspective.

4. Your mission in class is to (a) understand and (b) take notes.

(a) Understand – if you are confused, get it sorted as it comes up, so that every time it is repeated it reinforces what you know, helping you remember. If you leave it til the end of semester, you have to do all that work yourself.

(b) Take notes. The lecturer will almost always expand on the topic – if they read from the textbook, complain – and they are covering the other things you should know. Because it’s not in the textbook, you need to write it down.

Also write down the little tips and hints you’re given. A colleague of mine tells his students that during the semester the lecturer will tell them what is going to be in the exam, and even what the answers are, if they listen carefully. No, he doesn’t mean “everything in the course could be in the exam” – he means that as he teaches a subject he’s likely to examine, he tells his students. I do, too. – very few of them actually write it down. I have no idea why.

5. After class, do the readings and homework, and write up your notes.

Highlight the important bits in your notes and *gasp* the textbook. Add to your notes from the readings. Do the homework, because the lecturer didn’t give it to you because she loves marking (trust me on this).

Write in my textbook? Yes – sorry. I hate writing in books, but it makes studying a lot easier. If the book is going to be useful in your career, you should probably keep it, anyway. Highlight the bits the lecturer says is important, or spends lots of time on. Make notes about the additional information they give you. Find the key point in the paragraph and underline it, so you don’t have to read all the “explanation” nex time. If you really can’t bear to write in the textbook, at least use post-it notes to do the same thing.

A little bit of time now makes things a lot easier later.