How do you study?
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I used to study from about 1 to 6 in the night. Basically when everything is closed and asleep. I then mostly listened to Binärpilot and Röyksopp. This was usually mere days before exams or when papers were due.
I somehow managed to finish studying, so it worked out fine. Work, being a parent and owning a house nearly broke me though. Currently trying to find new coping mechanisms. Fuck adult life.
The time put in is a huge factor, even when it's done "all wrong".
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Pomodoro timers, as someone else mentioned, are great. It was a lot easier to start when I could tell myself "ok, I only have to do this for fifteen minutes" -- and most of the time when that first timer went off I'd gotten into a groove and kept going anyway.
For writing assignments, I found starting with a blank page really difficult, so I'd paste in a paragraph or two of lorem ipsum or some other nonsense text and go from there. Having words on the page, even though they were irrelevant and I knew I'd have to delete them later, tricked my brain into thinking "oh, I've already started this; carry on, then!"
The habit of doing even just a little bit every day was more sustainable and more effective for me than infrequent big cram/study/writing sessions.
I had probably the most success with using musical cueing. Whenever I sat down to write or study, I listened to one of the same two albums on repeat. (I like classical; one was Handel's Messiah and the other was a two-disc set of Thomas Tallis choral works.) Even now, almost a decade later, when I put either of those on it instantly snaps me into work mode. Creating that kind of association is really helpful! And having only one or two choices also meant I couldn't distract myself by trying to figure out what to listen to: it was A or B, end of.
You might also consider how/whether you could spread out your course load. Most years in undergrad I did five classes a semester, but one or twice I did four only (plus a summer class to stay on track) and being at only 80% of a full load made a huge difference.
Good luck!
Great advice that works for many, including myself!
Even if you don't get into the flow and do a single pomodoro session per day, a lot will be gained over 1 year, 5 years, 10 years. A degree 3 or 5 years later is much better than no degree.
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Long-time lurker, encouraged by this community to get properly diagnosed recently (Thanks!).
Ok, to the point:
I know taking longer to reach a college degree is normal, and I should just make peace with the fact that it might take me an extra year or two.
But two whole years into college, trying hard and never being enough (to prevent failing subjects & falling behind) is ...just sad.Studying feels like trying to make the stars align.
I will have to be in the library, with minimal smart devices (Laptop + MP3 player at most), properly prepare for what I need to study (The correct textbooks, maybe a calculator, the right notebook, etc..), in order to have 90% chance of studying.(Basically the good ol' "For the next 3 hour I am holding you hostage" way)
This works.... but it is really slow and takes a lot of time for average amount of studying.
I would love to experiment with other methods, and hope to hear about how other people manage their studying.
I didn't unless I was with other people, in class or the exam was the next day.
Got my college diploma and now I'll never go back to that hellish place
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Long-time lurker, encouraged by this community to get properly diagnosed recently (Thanks!).
Ok, to the point:
I know taking longer to reach a college degree is normal, and I should just make peace with the fact that it might take me an extra year or two.
But two whole years into college, trying hard and never being enough (to prevent failing subjects & falling behind) is ...just sad.Studying feels like trying to make the stars align.
I will have to be in the library, with minimal smart devices (Laptop + MP3 player at most), properly prepare for what I need to study (The correct textbooks, maybe a calculator, the right notebook, etc..), in order to have 90% chance of studying.(Basically the good ol' "For the next 3 hour I am holding you hostage" way)
This works.... but it is really slow and takes a lot of time for average amount of studying.
I would love to experiment with other methods, and hope to hear about how other people manage their studying.
For me, it was studying more effectively. Whether it's studying, cleaning, or even enjoying a hobby, I just cannot buckle down and grind through the hard part. My brain needs some minimum level of efficiency to be satisfied. If it feels like I'm working too hard without enough of a result, it's an impossible battle.
So I figure out how to do things better. Someone already mentioned Anki flash cards, and those were great for pure memorization. But every subject - and person - is different. The key was always going off the beaten path to look for other ways and other resources rather than just trying to grind it out. If I were in school now, I'd probably ask ChatGPT a lot of questions to help me learn. But I want to stress that I'd do so very carefully.
Maybe it's because I'm AuDHD, but I tend to have to figure out my own way of doing things anyway. I rarely expect that the way other people do it is going to work for me. So I research and experiment until I find my own unique path. That feels less awful and it's much easier to stick with.
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I mean… yes. Definitely yes to the impostor syndrome. But people thinking I had answers made me pay attention differently and made me work harder to understand stuff because people were counting on me to always know.
It was like having an accidental accountability buddy. I could be questioned on the testing material basically at any point in time. So I tried to always be ready.
That makes sense. I had a consistent fear that I would graduate, get a job, and not know what I was doing at all. So it pushed me to understand materials beyond what the class required.
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Long-time lurker, encouraged by this community to get properly diagnosed recently (Thanks!).
Ok, to the point:
I know taking longer to reach a college degree is normal, and I should just make peace with the fact that it might take me an extra year or two.
But two whole years into college, trying hard and never being enough (to prevent failing subjects & falling behind) is ...just sad.Studying feels like trying to make the stars align.
I will have to be in the library, with minimal smart devices (Laptop + MP3 player at most), properly prepare for what I need to study (The correct textbooks, maybe a calculator, the right notebook, etc..), in order to have 90% chance of studying.(Basically the good ol' "For the next 3 hour I am holding you hostage" way)
This works.... but it is really slow and takes a lot of time for average amount of studying.
I would love to experiment with other methods, and hope to hear about how other people manage their studying.
This is what I had to do in college and the real game changer was getting meds. It went from spending a long time to get a reasonable amount of work to spending a lot of time to get a lot of work done. So if you haven't already, get diagnosed and get meds. It'll make the rest of college way more enjoyable and useful.
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Long-time lurker, encouraged by this community to get properly diagnosed recently (Thanks!).
Ok, to the point:
I know taking longer to reach a college degree is normal, and I should just make peace with the fact that it might take me an extra year or two.
But two whole years into college, trying hard and never being enough (to prevent failing subjects & falling behind) is ...just sad.Studying feels like trying to make the stars align.
I will have to be in the library, with minimal smart devices (Laptop + MP3 player at most), properly prepare for what I need to study (The correct textbooks, maybe a calculator, the right notebook, etc..), in order to have 90% chance of studying.(Basically the good ol' "For the next 3 hour I am holding you hostage" way)
This works.... but it is really slow and takes a lot of time for average amount of studying.
I would love to experiment with other methods, and hope to hear about how other people manage their studying.
Looking back I was never really able to do long study sessions. What helped me a lot was to break it down into smaller sprints with something as reliable reward inbetween.
In the past that was OGame or other browser games where you couldnt play for long and had to wait some time inbetween. Nowadays it’s tarkov scav runs that sometimes work well. Im currently trying to write my PhD thesis so this is my struggle again
Also for me it’s specifically a momentum thing so just telling myself 5 minutes is enough will get me over the hump usually.
And not expecting too much for the day. Otherwise I will be demotivated even if I managed to do a fair bit. -
Pomodoro timers, as someone else mentioned, are great. It was a lot easier to start when I could tell myself "ok, I only have to do this for fifteen minutes" -- and most of the time when that first timer went off I'd gotten into a groove and kept going anyway.
For writing assignments, I found starting with a blank page really difficult, so I'd paste in a paragraph or two of lorem ipsum or some other nonsense text and go from there. Having words on the page, even though they were irrelevant and I knew I'd have to delete them later, tricked my brain into thinking "oh, I've already started this; carry on, then!"
The habit of doing even just a little bit every day was more sustainable and more effective for me than infrequent big cram/study/writing sessions.
I had probably the most success with using musical cueing. Whenever I sat down to write or study, I listened to one of the same two albums on repeat. (I like classical; one was Handel's Messiah and the other was a two-disc set of Thomas Tallis choral works.) Even now, almost a decade later, when I put either of those on it instantly snaps me into work mode. Creating that kind of association is really helpful! And having only one or two choices also meant I couldn't distract myself by trying to figure out what to listen to: it was A or B, end of.
You might also consider how/whether you could spread out your course load. Most years in undergrad I did five classes a semester, but one or twice I did four only (plus a summer class to stay on track) and being at only 80% of a full load made a huge difference.
Good luck!
That is smart! Could also do a reverse-challenge: The goal is to write something worse than anything that has has ever been turned in to that teacher. "teecha has a stoopit" (but don't forget to delete)
Brian Tracy mentioned a similar trick for his shady cold calls business: A reward to the first employee who gets a rejection every morning, with a bell and everything.
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Long-time lurker, encouraged by this community to get properly diagnosed recently (Thanks!).
Ok, to the point:
I know taking longer to reach a college degree is normal, and I should just make peace with the fact that it might take me an extra year or two.
But two whole years into college, trying hard and never being enough (to prevent failing subjects & falling behind) is ...just sad.Studying feels like trying to make the stars align.
I will have to be in the library, with minimal smart devices (Laptop + MP3 player at most), properly prepare for what I need to study (The correct textbooks, maybe a calculator, the right notebook, etc..), in order to have 90% chance of studying.(Basically the good ol' "For the next 3 hour I am holding you hostage" way)
This works.... but it is really slow and takes a lot of time for average amount of studying.
I would love to experiment with other methods, and hope to hear about how other people manage their studying.
I was never able to do well enough in school to get anything other than a 2 year degree. I have a good white collar job and have been in IT (for lack of a better word) for 20 years or something at this point.
School isn't everything.
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Long-time lurker, encouraged by this community to get properly diagnosed recently (Thanks!).
Ok, to the point:
I know taking longer to reach a college degree is normal, and I should just make peace with the fact that it might take me an extra year or two.
But two whole years into college, trying hard and never being enough (to prevent failing subjects & falling behind) is ...just sad.Studying feels like trying to make the stars align.
I will have to be in the library, with minimal smart devices (Laptop + MP3 player at most), properly prepare for what I need to study (The correct textbooks, maybe a calculator, the right notebook, etc..), in order to have 90% chance of studying.(Basically the good ol' "For the next 3 hour I am holding you hostage" way)
This works.... but it is really slow and takes a lot of time for average amount of studying.
I would love to experiment with other methods, and hope to hear about how other people manage their studying.
I didn't get a degree until my thirties, once I got diagnosed and figured out my needs.
For me it was:
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Accomodations,
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Meds,
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Moving a lot,
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Low music with a predictable beat and no vocals,
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Accountability checks (showing up for every lectures or partnering/grouping up for every assignment),
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Active participation,
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Learning by doing, and
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Learning by talking.
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For maths (the bane of my existence, but soooo satisfying once you get it!) I also got to do the exams in a separate room with headphones on, and could take breaks to run around the building or up and down the stairs a few times whenever I needed to restart my brain. Plus extra time to account for those breaks and the mental breakdowns that preceded them.
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Meds are essential for me, but they can make me miss cues from my body. So it's important to manage my body's needs like clockwork while on them, regardless of what I feel like I can do or do without in the moment: eat breakfast and lunch and an afternoon snack/mini-meal to avoid emotional outbursts or binge eating when the meds wear off. Take breaks (just stepping out or standing by an open window to breathe, or set an alarm and lie down with legs up and closed eyes) for a few min every hour. Go to the bathroom. Drink water. Blink. Do not put in overtime to "only" solve/finish this one thing -that thing won't get solved until you have a shower or talk to another human. Overtime/cramming will not be efficient studying, the goal is not just passing one test and forgetting, but actually learning and understanding...and resting is an essential component of that.
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Listening to online lectures (or even worse, pre-recorded one's) was impossible until I got a walking pad, and it made writing assignments and at home-tests way easier. For on campus-days I'd run up and down the stairs during every break in or between lectures (most teachers would do breaks every hour but if not I would just ask them for it). Blood flow through legs means blood flow to brain!
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Low music without vocals with a good chill beat fill the silence when people are talking too slow and keeps me on track when it gets boring, without stealing attention or focus by being too loud or interesting.
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With daily lectures I got a schedule and routine, which got me up and started in the morning and left a suitable time slot for lunch (missing lunch is a big no-no!). While doing assignments with someone else it was a lot easier to get started (I'm great at filling uncomfortable silences that happens when no-one know where to begin) and organise and section off the work into manageable parts, while having someone else to take charge of those last 5% that I seem unable to do.
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I need to take plenty of notes during lectures (might never read them again, but just the motion of writing the words help my listening and retention). I also always ask as soon as I get lost or have a relevant question, and attempt to answer any questions during (even if I get it wrong) a class. If I think my question will get answered I'll write it down and ask them at the end if I'm still unsure. If I don't do this, I'll get stuck on something in my mind and stop following along.
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I chose a school with a lot of practical learning built into the education. Lots of practical assignments, internship opportunities etc.
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Our brains are evolved for conversation, language and communication. When getting stuck, I usually need a break... But if the break doesn't solve it, explaining the difficult thing to someone else will often make me figure it out by the time I've finished talking. If not the other person might have an idea for how to think and move forward. Asking questions, explaining complex concepts to each other, bouncing ideas, telling stories are all great tools for learning and more importantly gaining understanding of a topic.
Good luck, and if you managed to read all this: you're gonna be fine!
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