How to learn to learn: the keys to make the most of your study

Some research shows that the way most students usually study is not the most effective.

A) Yes, the strategies most used by students are also the most inefficient, such as rereading (reading the syllabus over and over again, doing reviews), highlighting (underlining, marking the most important parts of the text) and summarize (synthesize the original text, reducing the content in less words).

Not that they are an absolute waste of time, but they are not very good in terms of cost-benefit. There are ways to study that are more efficient.

It is true -at least in part- that the more hours you study, the more likely it is that you will get good grades; However, getting good grades is not only reduced to studying a large number of hours, because the quality of study is more important than the number of hours spent studying.

• Related article: "Cognition: definition, main processes and functioning"

The keys to studying efficiently

Studying inefficiently not only wastes a lot of time, it is also very frustrating to spend a lot of time on something and not get the results you want. This frustration can take a toll on our motivation, and studying requires motivation, especially when we don't like the subject very much or it is difficult or both at the same time. That is why it is important to use

a study methodology that is effective.

Then... What can you do to better retain the information you are trying to learn and thus achieve meaningful learning?

To answer this question, it is first convenient to know a little about some notions about memory.

The phases of the memorization process

When we talk about memory we can distinguish between sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory. As this is an article that aims to give some keys to better study and improve learning processes, we are going to focus on Long term memory.

Long-term memory corresponds to that store where we store the information that we can retrieve time after having stored it, whether it's the day of the exam or when we have to put into practice in the world of work what we learned at school, the academy, the university, etc.

Memorize is enter certain information into the brain, store it, and then be able to retrieve this information (bring her to consciousness). The phases of this memorization process are as follows:

• Encoding: transformation of sensory information into recognizable elements (attention and concentration are essential here).
• Storage: retention of information so that it can be retrieved later. The data will be more or less accessible and recoverable depending on the memory store where they are saved.
• Recovery: access the stored information, bring the memory to consciousness.

The aforementioned study techniques (rereading, highlighting, summarizing) do not take retrieval into account, and they focus solely on trying to fit as much information as possible into the memory store, but they don't care about trying to get that information out of the store.

However, there is research that indicates that what is most effective when trying to memorize is to try to extract the information, that is, put us to the test.

• You may be interested: "Types of memory: how does the human brain store memories?"

Active Recall (The technique of Active Recall)

Most students are only tested at the time of the exam, before that context they spend a lot of time reading their notes, underline them, make summaries, conceptual maps, schemes and diagrams, drawings or other systems to try to learn the content.

But what is most useful to strengthen the memory is the technique known as Active Recall (active memory), that is, try to evoke the information, remember it, explain it to a partner, answer self-assessment questions, etc. In short: what works to remember is to put yourself to the test, to remember actively.

Every time we put ourselves to the test, our mind learns from the mistakes we have made and the memory is strengthened, stored more deeply. You are less likely to make those mistakes again.

The repeated process of inserting information into our memory system and then trying to get this information out, when repeated over and over again, gradually shapes the memory. Every time we try to get the information the memory changes, the information is sculpted, it takes shape like a sculpture, making this memory deeper and more accessible.

It is like going through a labyrinth: the first time we will get lost in the labyrinth, we will turn around looking for the exit, we will we will disorient, we will make detours, but these errors will help us to mentally trace the correct path, which will remain engraved in our memory. Then we will be able to go through the maze making fewer mistakes and it will take less time to go through the path.

This metaphor, applied to memory, means that the brain will have less difficulty accessing that information and therefore you will make fewer mistakes and you will also do it more quickly.

The oblivion curve

Our mind tends to forget because our memory needs to discard part of the information (we can't save everything, it would be impossible). The rate at which our memories fade does not follow a linear progression; it is not constant like a drip from a faucet, the tendency for the material to disappear is more like an initial downpour followed by a light drizzle. That is, we forget a large proportion of the information we had saved immediately after studying and then slowly forget more and more material as time goes by.

The more time that passes from the moment in which the information was saved, the more of this same information we will have lost.. This phenomenon is known as the oblivion curve.

If you have ever studied at the last minute it will have happened to you that on the day of the exam you remembered quite well what you had studied, the next day you had forgotten much of it of what you knew on the day of the exam, after two weeks you hardly remembered anything and after a month you had practically forgotten everything you knew how to answer in the exam. exam. This is due to the forgetting curve.

I'll give you another example. Do you remember what you had for breakfast yesterday? What about lunch two days ago? How about if I ask you what you had for dinner exactly 6 months ago? You can probably answer the first question without any problems, but I would be very surprised if you could tell me what you had for dinner exactly 6 months ago, since the natural process of memory: that tendency to forget, will have buried the memory.

All this without taking into account another important aspect to understand memory and learning, and that is that you probably do not pay attention to what you had for dinner 6 months ago because it is not a very relevant. And the less attention you pay to something, the less likely it is to stick in your memory.

But, going back to the example, if in these six months you had frequently repeated the memory of that dinner, today you could answer me in detail: "It was May 6th, I had dinner with my boyfriend in an Italian restaurant, we shared an octopus salad with a honey and mustard vinaigrette and we drank a sparkling; I remember that for the second he ordered a prosciutto pizza and I ate stuffed pasta, they were cuori di zucca with funghi porcini; And we didn't order dessert." Make no mistake about it, if you had dedicated some time each day to remembering that dinner, today you would remember all those details.

Spaced Repetition (The Spaced Repetition technique)

We already know that we forget most of what we learn within a few minutes or hours of studying it (sorry, bad news, memory is like that). This can be very daunting, but here comes the second technique to improve study efficiency: Spaced repetition.

This technique -which is perfectly compatible with Active Recall- consists of reviewing the study to refresh the memory. To counteract the trend of this oblivion curve we will include a series of reviews, increasingly spaced in time. It's like giving the brain that "dose of memory", doing a reset in the process of forgetting.

So one can ask: Is it better to delay the moment of self-evaluation more and more or, on the contrary, should I be constant in the time I leave between reviews?

Some time ago it was believed that leaving more and more time between review and review was the best way to distribute the study to improve learning; However, subsequent research has shown that this is not the case.

Apparently, the most appropriate way to distribute this repeated practice is to do a first test of self-assessment (but not immediately after studying, but leaving time) and, then, add self-assessment tests but not spaced out more and more, but at a constant pace.

Final comments

Several conclusions can be derived from all this, but the most important ones are that we cannot leave the study at the last minute and that we should not limit ourselves to reading, underlining or adopting other passive strategies, because to learn it is much more effective to "activate" in our memory the information that we have put in it than to try to put more and more information.

This way of studying will bring us closer to our goal of passing the exam and really consolidate learning, so as not to forget it long after the exam.

However - and you will have already realized this while reading the text - this form of study requires a meticulous organization, perseverance and amount of time, and in turn demands more effort, since it is easier to read over and over again than to put testing.

The procrastination and inefficient study techniques are the student's greatest enemies, but other factors that we have not mentioned in this article and that have considerable weight are also determining factors. These are some examples: an inadequate diet (especially one rich in sugars), a sedentary lifestyle, not being well hydrated, high levels of stress (especially if sustained over time), drug use, insufficient rest, unrealistic expectations, a self-demand maladjustment, low motivation, and test anxiety, to name a few.

Definitely, the brain needs a series of conditions to function optimally and any situation that involves a reduction or interference in the performance of our brain will be harming our study.

Author: Cristian Mantilla Simón, psychologist at Rapport Psychology Center.