How to organize yourself to study: 9 practical tips

When you want to prepare an exam it is very important that there is a correct organization, since otherwise it would be difficult for us to maintain a quality study in the long term. To do this, there are a series of guidelines to take into account that can be very effective if they are followed.

When it comes to knowing how to organize yourself to study, a series of tips can be taken as a reference, such as the following: choose a suitable place to study, schedule a study calendar, make outlines, flashcards and summaries of the subject or review the syllabus as many times as possible, among others.

In this article you will find a series of tips on how to organize yourself to study on a day-to-day basis and have more facilities to learn and memorize at a good pace.

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How to get organized to study: steps to follow and recommended strategies

Studying is a process that allows us to internalize information in such a way that, if we do it well, it or we forget it in a matter of a few days. Unfortunately, it is very common that people do not study well and try to save time using strategies that, deep down, only serve to memorize part of the information and forget it in question of hours. Therefore, the tips that you will find below will help you save time and effort in the medium and long term, making you learn more and better, understanding your notes and textbooks.

1. Choose an ideal space to study

The first thing to keep in mind when organizing to study is to choose an ideal space for it; either in your home or in the library, or even being able to alternate between both places.

Whatever the site, the important thing is to take into account a series of factors such as a place where one can feel comfortable studying and at the same time be motivated to do so. It should also be a space with good lighting and that is isolated from noise that makes study difficult, being able to resort to earplugs if they do not bother you and you tend to get distracted even with the slightest noise.

Besides, you must anticipate events and avoid distractions in the place of study, so we should have electronic devices, such as mobile phones, turned off or on silent; It is highly recommended that they are not in sight at the time of study, since being in sight makes it easier for us to use it more frequently. We should only use the computer or tablet when we need it to do academic work, search for certain information related to the subject we are studying or any type of homework related.

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2. Equip yourself with everything you need to carry out each day of study

When organizing to study, it is essential to equip yourself with everything you need to carry out the study each day (p. g., pens, sheets of paper, manuals or notes with the agenda that we must study that day, highlighters, etc.), trying to clear the table of everything that we do not need in order to avoid distractions, and also for save time when looking for what we need that day to study.

On the other hand, remember to have a bottle of water within reach to stay hydrated at all times.

3. Schedule a study calendar

Another very important tip when organizing to study would be to make a study calendar in which we program what we must study every day, every week and every month, starting by establishing small objectives, subdividing the tasks and the agenda that we must study every day. It is better to focus on small goals day by day because if we focus on long-term goals we could feel overwhelmed by so much agenda.

It is also very important to establish fixed study hours, as if it were a work schedule, in order to make it easier to get used to it and thus make it a routine.

Each day of study we could decide the tasks starting with the most complex in the morning that we are with greater energy and leaving others that are somewhat simpler for the afternoon, since it will be more likely that we will meet more tired. Another option could also be to start the first hour or the first hour of studying with some simple task and when we find ourselves more focused, go for the more complex ones; then, we could end the study day with a simpler task such as reviewing the syllabus studied that day.

In any of the cases, the best thing to do would be to leave the most complex tasks (such as understanding the new syllabus and preparing the summaries, diagrams, etc.), for the hours in which we find ourselves with more energy, which are usually in the morning.

Complies with the study schedule, although you can leave a certain space of time to recover certain time that you could have lost because of any setback that had arisen throughout the week (eg. For example, always schedule Friday afternoon to review the agenda seen throughout the week and to catch up in case one day you could not complete what you had scheduled to study, etc.). Above all, there must be coherence with the planning of the study calendar, establishing realistic objectives that we can meet.

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4. take small breaks

It's hard to be productive for too long, because if you don't rest while you're studying, your performance will likely drop and in some cases you won't even notice. So that, when organizing to study it is important to take short breaks of 5 to 10 minutes for every 25 to 30 minutes of study (maybe every 45 minutes in some cases).

Everything depends on the moment and on each person, but small breaks should always be taken, since, otherwise, the study would not be sustainable. in the long term (it would cause that person to arrive at the exam fatigued and that her performance would progressively drop as the exam approaches) Test).

During rest times, you should also take the opportunity to go to the bathroom and go for a walk, get some fresh air and stretch a bit, since sitting for so long can cause back problems.

It is also important to take breaks to eat, with slightly longer breaks than normal (eg. eg, 1 1/2 to 2 hour break for eating and resting; half hour break for a snack and perhaps a coffee).

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5. Make outlines, flashcards and summaries of the subject

Another very important piece of advice to keep in mind when organizing to study is to work on a comprehensive reading. For this, we should try a little harder when reading the content in order to understand it better in the first readings; To achieve this, it is usually useful to underline the most relevant, linking the contents that we are studying with other knowledge already acquired previously.

Other ways to learn the subject in greater depth would be by making outlines of the syllabus, flash cards (flashcards) and summaries or concept maps of the subject.

6. Do mock exams

When organizing to study, it is also quite useful to frequently try to do drills or loose questions of exams, especially when the exam that we are going to carry out will be multiple choice, since in some cases some questions. And most importantly, doing these drills will help us to be more trained and prepared at the time of taking the real exam, questioning ourselves if we really know what we think we know.

Likewise, it is as essential to do mock exams as it is to correct them, since by doing so we will learn from our mistakes and we will be more aware of which are the topics or subjects that we dominate less and thus we will know that we must reinforce the study of the themselves.

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7. At the end of the study day review everything studied that day

When organizing ourselves to study, a useful strategy is to do a review at the end of each study day; in them we will use summaries, flashcards or concept maps of everything studied that day in order to consolidate the new knowledge acquired.

Another review could also be carried out at the end of each week of study of everything seen the previous days; being that day the last one we study each week (p. g., Friday afternoon) and not the break time.

8. Review the syllabus as many times as possible

It is essential to review as many times as possible what has been studied, since the more reviews we can give to the syllabus, the more we will be able to focus on the details and we will acquire a greater mastery of the subject for the exam. Of course, following the planning, because we cannot pass the review of the next topic if we have not yet carefully reviewed the previous one.

For this reason, just as when studying a new syllabus, when we want to review we must dedicate the necessary time and establish a realistic time to do a quality review that will help us to strengthen the knowledge on the subject.

9. Rest as much as possible the day before the exam

To organize yourself to study correctly, it is important to arrive with sufficient planning for the exam, having studied the matter so that the day before we don't have to binge which, in addition to being of little use, could cause us to arrive at the test exhausted Y we can't concentrate enough to answer the questions correctly.

For this reason, it would be advisable that the day before the exam we rest as much as possible and even avoid studying, instead doing relaxing activities. such as going for a walk or watching a movie or, in the case of studying, light tasks such as looking at some mock questions, summaries, flashcards or concept maps, trying to leave the study at least mid-afternoon to lower the activation of the central nervous system so that you can relax to sleep more easily the day before the exam.

It is important to have time to disconnect

Now that we have seen how to organize yourself to study, it is worth remembering that it is almost as important to have time to rest and disconnect, since otherwise we could end up fatigued, unmotivated or even with anxiety problems.

For this reason, we should establish at least one full day a week of rest or two if possible to do activities that allow us to disconnect (for example, travel, play sports, watch series, etc.) and to be with our family, friends and/or our partner.

It is also important to establish moments of rest on study days (for example, at the end of the study day, go to gym and after dinner watch a series or something that we find pleasant and helps us to disconnect a little to better reconcile the sleep).