Lecture is broken down into 7 main tips:

1. Break studying down into chunked sessions

How long can a typical freshman read and retain what theyre learning?

Med students reported 4-5 hours - not typical

Avg of UMich study: 25-30 minutes for both

Reading

Lectures

Classes are 50 minutes, but most learning will only happen in first 30

Study more is not helpful advice

Efficiency tapers off after 20-30 minutes

After that, its just wasted time

The fix? Take breaks.

The moment you start to slide, youre shoveling against the tide."

Taking a 5 minute FUN break resets the session and brings your efficiency back up

We tend to do more of what is reinforced and rewarded

Less of what is punished, ignored, or ineffective

Reinforce study sessions with breaks and FUN REWARDS once the whole thing is done

As you do this, youre training yourself to study and your sessions can start becoming longer.

Create a dedicated study area

Who has a true study?"

Most students study in bedrooms, kitchen or dining tables, or common areas

In bedroom, bed starts to call like Greek sirens

The context/environment largely determines the action youll take

example: questions asked in class

If asked to group, you raise your hand

If asked to you, you respond verbally

This response is pretty much automatic, because youre conditioned to do it

University of Hawaii study

Biggest study problem: We cant get into it."

Experiment - lamp in dorm room gets label, Study lamp"

desk turned away from bed

That desk, and lamp, is now only used for studying

When studying, lamp goes on.

At first sign of distraction, lamp goes OFF and student walks away

Those who did this had an avg. 1.0 GPA increase over control group

Music - should be truly background noise.

Dont be trading your attention between studying and singing along

Aside about application

If it doesnt change your behavior, you havent learned it"

Try at least 1 or 2 things you learn from this, else its useless

Study actively (and sleep well)

The more active you are in your learning, the more effective youll be."

Studying is NOT reading over and over - rote memorization can work for some, but for most of us its
ineffective

Best way to study - ask yourself, What am I learning?

Concepts - What does this bone do in the body?"

Facts - Whats the name of this bone?"

Most professors are concerned that you learn concepts.

Once grasped, they stay with you forever

Facts can fade away, by contrast

But we have Google to look them up again

Martys daughter knew all the lyrics to a song, but didnt know what it was about. Facts vs concepts

However, teachers test over both facts and concepts

To learn both , put the concept IN YOUR OWN WORDS

If you cant, you dont understand it!

Martys memory test - which string of letters can you remember better?

YTHURSPHDAAYP

HAPPYTHURSDAY

Same letters, different order - one has actual meaning

Deep application vs. superficial thinking

Marty asked one group to count number of vowels in each of 30 words

Other group was asked to evaluated usefulness of each in a survival situation

Short-term memory (about 20-30 seconds) was then dumped with name/date/phone number exercise

Afterwards, students were asked how many of the 30 words they recalled
o

Vowel-counting group: 5/30

Survival-usefulness group: 10/30

What is the meaning of meaning?"

Something is meaningful if it relates to something you ALREADY KNOW

Its like a file system or database - new entries are easier to find if they have data that links to
already existing entries

Teachers try to add meaning to concepts through:

Stories

Examples

But these dont always work for you, so you must work to tease out meaning for yourself

How to tease out meaning

Study groups
o

multiple people = seeing problems from different angles

Dont make highlighting mistakes

Highlighting can be dangerous. You highlight when reading, then come back and see the highlighted
sections and say, I remember that!"

Recollection vs. Recognition

its very easy to confuse simple recognition for actual recollection.

Look at an old magazine youve seen before - youll probably recognize the ads and picture

but unless you can PREDICT whats on the next page, you dont actually recall whats in the
mag

Same with highlighted text - you recognize it from before, but can you recall it truly?

this is the danger of highlighting - if you confuse recognition for recall, and youve
highlighted the most important facts in the text, then YOU DONT STUDY THE MOST
IMPORTANT FACTS!

A better way - test yourself. Challenge your recall

This is active learning

You also need to sleep well

Brain science is revealing that REM cycles are crucial for consolidating and storing memories
o

Lack of sleep = studying sabotage

Take smart notes and expand on them right after class

Taking notes is vital, but...

ASAP after class, you should try to expand on them so theyre more efficiently encoded.
o

This puts things in your own words

Only takes about 5 minutes per class, and you save so much study time later

This can be considered increasing Learning Efficiency in my study time equation

If youre fuzzy on a concept, ask a classmate to see their notes, or ask the professor

Go to office hours, or ask for clarification at the start of the next class

Summarize/teach what you learn

Best way to learn is to teach others

reinforces learning

true test of whether you understand material

will reveal gaps in your knowledge

No person to teach? Record a podcast or video! Or speak it to an empty chair

Or summarize by writing it.

Your own words = effective summarization

80% of your study time is best spend reciting - only 20% should be spent reading."

Use your books correctly - SQ3R method

Textbooks are a powerful tool

Designed for pedagogy - helping you learn

Martys recommended reading method: SQ3R

Survey

Question

Read

Recite

Review

I (and Cal Newport) dont think its necessary to stick to this system - its time consuming

However, individual pieces can be useful

Survey - also can be known as read backwards - go to end of chapter, note vocab and review
questions

This primes your brain to pick these things out when reading or scanning

Use mnemonics to study effectively

Mnemonics are great for memorizing facts - better than rote memorization

Acronyms
o

ROY G. BIV

Radeo - right deoxygenated"

Right atrium of heart pumps deoxygenated blood"

Coined sayings
o

In 1492, columbus sailed the ocean blue"

Rhymes are memorable

Interacting images (Martys favorite"

The weirder or more emotionally evocative, the better

Sinkhole to hell with weird demon fish popping out of it - Helsinki, capital of Finland (fish have fins)

This is one of mine

Car has 4 wheels, and pro circuit cars still have 4 wheels

Car - carbohydrate and pro - protein - each have 4 calories per gram

Cat has 9 lives - rich dude is a Fat cat - fat has 9 calories per gram

Want to see the original 7 notebook pages of Flow-style notes I took while watching the lecture? Youll find scans of
them here: http://collegeinfogeek.com/study-less-study-smart/