Productivity

How to Create an Effective Study Schedule

How to Create an Effective Study Schedule 
Heading into exam season whether this is your first year or your fourth can be stressful. 

You just spent the last 4 months preparing for tests that are squeezed into only a couple of weeks! 

How do you study for all of them at the same time? How can you make sure you’re actually retaining what you studied so you’re ready for each test?

These types of questions can consume you if you don’t set yourself up for success and stick to a schedule. 

If this is the first time you have tried putting together an exam season study schedule there are a list of things you need to consider before setting it all up:

1. How many exams do I have and when are my exams?
2. How many sections are covered on each exam, is it cumulative?
3. How much sleep do I need every night in order to perform at my best?
4. What are my favourite leisure activities, do I like to read, watch tv, hangout with my friends?
5. How do I like to stay active throughout the year, do I like yoga, or running or going to the gym?

These questions can help you understand your priorities throughout the exam season, keeping in mind that it is 100% important to spend time away from studying throughout to keep yourself from burning out. Let’s address these questions, in an example, to set up our exam timetable.

Know Your Exam Times  

Below is a set of actual exam times for a first-year science student at Western University in Fall 2018:

Psyc 1000 Mid-year exam: Dec. 13 @ 7pm
Chem 1301A Final exam: Dec. 15 @ 2pm
Calc 1000A Final exam: Dec. 17 @ 9am
Physics 1301A Final exam: Dec. 19 @ 9am
Bio 1001A Final exam: Dec. 20 @ 7pm

If all of these exams are cumulative, with an emphasis on material that has been covered since the midterm, then you will need to schedule time to go over all of the lecture material for each course. 

Don't Forget to Sleep

One thing that I cannot stress enough to undergraduate students is that all-night study sessions do NOT work! 

Getting an appropriate amount of sleep is crucial in doing well on your final exams. When you are making new neural connections between ideas our brains need sleep in order to consolidate those connections and transfer them from short-term memory into long-term memory. 

Without sleep, by the time you sit down for the exam you will have forgotten all of the information you just learned! Getting the right amount of sleep is also super important for making sure that when you are studying that you’re alert, and your brain is functioning properly. 

Being sleep deprived is almost like being drunk, and you wouldn’t study for finals after going out drinking, would you? So, budget 7-8 hours of sleep every night, as well as maintaining the time that you go to sleep and wake up every day. 

Leave Time for Activities

Making sure you take time for yourself, to unwind and try to think about something other than the scary tests looming around the corner is important for maintaining sanity and balance throughout the exam period. If during the year you read a chapter of a fiction novel before bed every night, continue to do that. 

If you LOVE Grey’s Anatomy or Friends, make sure that you budget time to watch some episodes. It is also essential that you make time to be active throughout the exam period as well. Lifting weights, running, or doing yoga helps relieve stress and can also kick start your brain to work through problems or concepts that you might have been struggling with. 

Being prepared for exams doesn’t mean that you need to give up having fun and being yourself, so make time for it!

How to Create an Effective Schedule 

Now that we have asked ourselves all of these questions, it's time to try making a schedule. When building the schedule, it’s best to only study one subject matter for 2 hours at a time, making sure that you take breaks in between each study session. 

Studying smaller amounts of information early, is better than cramming right before one test. What does this mean? It means it’s better to study biology, chemistry and physics for short bursts all on the same day, mixed in with eating properly, a leisure activity and athletic activity, is better than studying for one subject for an entire day. 

It’s also a good idea to set goals for each of your study blocks but make sure that they are realistic (you aren’t going to go through half the course in 2 hours). This way you either take a break according to the schedule, or when you have accomplished the goal that you set for that study block, whichever comes first.

It can also be in your best interest to sign up for Wize courses where they are available as they have already condensed the material that you know into efficient to study videos and quizzes, plus you get to ask questions if you get confused!

Check out the example schedule that I have come up with for the first-year science student at Western University for Fall 2018:

Week 1

Week 2