How do you study?

[CleverThought]

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This is more of a curiosity to kill some time while waiting for December to roll around.

How do you study? Do you rewrite notes? When you take notes is it on a tablet, laptop, handwritten? Do you study in groups or alone?

 

[slm266]

Pay attention in class. Almost all my classes post the lectures on blackboard and in dental school they video record the lectures and post them online too. So I pay attention to what the professor says in class, write down things that they say that are not on the PowerPoint, and then at home I re-listen to the lecture and look at the PowerPoint at the same time. With playback software I listen at ~1.5x speed to get through it faster and I pause when I need.

Then I just go through those power points over and over, and use study groups to quiz each other.

You can use your iPhone or laptop to record the lectures. Now in dental school there's always someone who will listen to them and write down everything said and email the transcript to the whole class so I just study those. We also have access to past exams, but those last 2 things you probably won't get at a competitive undergrad university.

Classmates always forward on links to quilzlet flash cards that they have made.

 

[Illfavor]

Read book, take notes...or if it's a lecture, take lecture notes. I then review notes and recopy them. Rinse, repeat.

 

[toothexplore]

in dental school i have perfected the skill of memorize and regurgitate slides... there is just such limited time, i haven't even purchased a textbook yet :/

 

[tendram]

I study differently depending on the material. Biology and material that requires memorization I generally use note cards whereas with chemistry, math, physics, etc. I usually do a lot of problems. I've found that copying my notes verbatim doesn't do me much good so generally I break the notes up and rewrite them in my own words or make diagrams and charts.

 

[y3nd0]

I'm similar to tendram in the sense that it depends on the class. For anything math related (math, physics, pchem), I do practice problems. For more conceptual things like Chem, or mainly biology, I take sloppy, quick notes on loose sheets of paper in class and go home and rewrite them neatly in a spiral notebook. I use the textbook or the internet to fill in knowledge gaps when I'm rewriting (never read the textbook before going to class). For exams and quizzes, I review my rewritten notes out loud.

 

[anddymaicha]

You can use your iPhone or laptop to record the lectures. Now in dental school there's always someone who will listen to them and write down everything said and email the transcript to the whole class so I just study those. We also have access to past exams, but those last 2 things you probably won't get at a competitive undergrad university.

 

[flaming0duckie]

What has successfully pulled me through the later years of college and grad school is grabbing a person who studies at the same level as you (hopefully a lot and won't settle for anything less than an A) and the two nights before a test, go over our self-taken notes from class and then teach each other the holes, if any, in our knowledge for the test, then quiz each other mercilessly until 100% of the material is absorbed. 'My person' and I in grad school have almost identical grades/GPA. I plan to continue this in dental school.

 

[LaughingGas]

lol it might sound like advertising, but I started using my Galaxy note, and jeez. I love this.
I import the pdf lectures, write notes on top, and per slide I can record the audio (although proximity to the professor matters a lot). I rewrite my notes in paper where I can condense everything and review a week before each test.
And I agree with flaming. I used to study by myself, but once you find someone similar to your level, studying together became more efficient by quizzing each other and agreeing to the "right" information.

 

[tendram]

+1 to using the Galaxy note. This is probably the best phone you can have in college IMO. I even took notes on it for a while using the handwriting to text function but eventually I gave up. While it could recognize most greek letters I usually spent more time fixing the stuff it didn't get than paying attention to the teacher in Pchem

 

[niv3k]

Depends on which subject I'm studying for and how the class is set up for me. I have a bio class that has a TON of fluff in his presentation slides, about 700 slides a test. I reorganize and retype the notes to get the more important details so that I can study. If it's a "list" type question that may be incorporated into an essay I will rewrite the essay till I know it. If it's just stuff to remember I try to be able to recall everything from memory until I know it. For chemistry or physics I just worked problems until I felt comfortable with the material.

Not really sure how else to give tips for studying. I just try to really know the material, know equations inside and out, know what it means. Being able to put stuff in your words really helps cuz if you can do that about a certain term or topic, you obviously know it.

Just study study till you KNOW it. Understand the material, don't just memorize to regurgitate it later. If you don't know a term or something, just look it up.

Hope this helped ):. Difficult telling people how to study since I just picked up my own habits as I went along. I use to be the notecard king, now I just write out outlines and make sure I can discuss whatever topics are on there.