Make sure to have enough sleep at night before an exam. During sleep the nerve endings, activated during the day, are being rehabilitated and are getting stronger, and the accepted information is moving from the short term to the long term memory. That is why sleepless nights before an exam are useless and even harmful. Planning a brainstorming preparation, you should know that in addition to time for studying information you will need a night for its “maturation”.
Information is easier tomemorize if:
- It is interesting, controversial or unexpected;
- Emotionally colored;
- Expands already existing knowledge;
- It is learned in the respective context (for example, it’s easier and faster to study zoology in a museum of zoology, astronomy – in a planetarium, etc);
- The process of memorizing occurs in course of a physical activity. It is proved that when doing fitness, walking or just standing up we memorize better.
Learning strategies
Our memory has a feature: created associations are destroyed in about 40 – 60 minutes if they are not fixed by repetition. Similarly been proven to be remembered as, repeat with sufficiently large intervals. Here is an algorithm that will allow your memory to keep as more knowledge as possible.
- If you need to memorize a text:
1. for the first time, mentally repeat it immediately after reading;
2. for the second time – 15-20 minutes after;
3. the third – in 6-8 hours (on the same day);
4. the fourth – on the next day.
- If you need to memorize exact details (such as formulas):
1. second repetition – in 40-60 minutes;
2. the third – in 3-4 hours (on the same day);
3. the fourth – on the next day.
Conclusions
1. The night before an exam is time for sleep, not for the last attempt to learn something.
2. In order not to waste time and energy on ineffective learning, we should learn to work with information and to use rational methods of memorization.
learning-mind.com
