A study plan is one of the best things that you can do for yourself. It allows you to keep up with your teacher, while also allowing you to learn things that you are learning without a teacher. So, how can you create a comprehensive study plan?
To create a study plan, you must write a top down layout of the topic you wish to study which covers the main heading, and then subheadings. Then, you must tie this plan into your daily habits, and create a new nightly habit that should boost your productivity.
It truly is as simple as that, and a lot of the studies confirm this. Today, we will go over the study that emphasizes these points, and we will cover a comprehensive step by step guide to creating the ultimate study plan.
What Does A Study Plan Consist Of?
A study plan should consist of information given in a top down fashion.
The problem with studying is the studying treadmill that most people go through.
The studying treadmill is a scenario that most students go through where they spend a lot of energy trying to keep up with the teachers teaching and less energy actually studying.
It starts with the first day and introduction of a new topic. The teacher teaches something on one day, and the student does not keep up. The teachers moves on the following day, and the student has to choose either to leave what they are learning unlearned, or go on ahead with the teacher, and promise to come back.
This means they have to spend energy keeping in mind what they do not know and what they have to learn. Also, they have to spend energy doing half learning at class.
The divide attention makes the studied material harder than it actually has to be. This may make learning seem hard. But it is not the learning that is hard. It is storing all this stuff in your head. When you finally get to learning the topic, it is easy to forget what they are about because they are floating around purposelessly in your head, and you do not know where they belong.
In order to have a great study plan, it must consist of a structure, and information that will help you avoid all these. You avoid all these by first learning the topc of the subject, and then going down.
You study top down, then you can memorize it.
“Recent studies have addressed this question by demonstrating that several sessions of training that attempts to boost the specificity of memory retrieval in depressed patients (ie, practice with feedback in generating detailed, specific memories) increases the posttraining specificity of patients’ autobiographical memories, even when controlling for associated improvements in depression.”
DANIEL L. SCHACTER, MEMORY: FROM THE LABORATORY TO EVERYDAY LIFE
Get A Definition Of The Topic
The first step to doing a top down study plan is to try and define the topic that you must study.
You need to first learn the top of the topic. This means you must learn and above all, you must understand the overall information of the topic.
The first question that you need to ask is ‘What is the problem?’ Every topic that exists, exists to solve a problem. Some man or woman a hundred years ago found someway of fixing this problem.
BUT! There is a chance that you could figure out how to solve it yourself. So, ask yourself what they problem of the situation is and see if you can come up with possible solutions.
Then, you need to figure out just how this specific process solves the problem. This is usually a simple process. You just need to look at the verbs in the definition of the situation. So basically, google the definition, write it down, then write down the verbs that you see.
Consider a topic like ‘Quantitative Research Methods’. The problem is how do we find information that is most accurate, which we can then use to make predictions about the future.
Then you go look for the online definition of quantitative research methods and it ‘focuses on gathering numerical data and generalizing it across groups of people or to explain a particular phenomenon.’
‘Gathering’, ‘generalizing’ and ‘explain’. Are the verbs.
So, the top of this subject is basically trying to gather information, so you could be able to generalize it across groups of people or to explain certain things. We do this to solve the problem of how to learn information and knowledge.
Do this system with all topics, and you will see it works.
Go Over The Steps Of Fixing The Problem
The second step is to look at how the steps to solving the problem translate with the verbs of the definition that you have learned.
Here you need to get a text books, or some sort of lecture course outline. What you are looking for are the specific topics that you will be going over in the class.
Write these topics down. You should get a general image of the things that you will learn, even if you do not understand said words. Instead, look at the words, and translate them with the verbs learned from the definition.
Basically, write the verbs as headings for columns. Then, write the topics that you saw on the page of contents under each new column that you created.
Learn The Page Of Contents Page
Finally, write your plan in such a way that it will allocate enough time to learning each new topic.
The first few steps that you took here will be helpful for you because they are steps that can be taken within an evening. So if you find out you are starting a new class on Quantum Theory next week Monday, you could do this stuff the Sunday evening prior.
But this is just the preplanning, not the planning. What can you do then for the studying plan?
Learn the definitions of the information you have now. Just like the first time around, you will research the definition of these new words that you have discovered. Find out what problem each word is trying to solve, how it solves them, and then research the definition of the word. Then, loo for the verbs, and visualize what the verbs say is the solution.
Doing this will assist you in understanding the topic. Also, they will help you ask better questions when you get to class,. Finally, you will be able to keep up with the lecturer, and you won’t have to worry about keeping track of all the information in your mind.
You can focus your entire energy on actually memorizing, and studying the content you have discovered.
How To Create A Study Schedule?
To create a study schedule, you must create a habit that allows you to study when you are free, and feeling most productive, then you must do exercises to increase your motivation before each study session.
Basically, your study schedule will fail.
If you have a series of dates, and specific things that you will study at those dates, you will not make it. Those dates will just decorate your calendar, and whenever the dates draw nearer, you will probably forget them. Then you will not study.
To avoid this, its better to not concentrate on studying dates, and content, but on studying habits.
Tie your studying to your daily habits, and then activate the studying by creating new habits that will motivate you to study.
Plan And Write All The Night Before
You should start by creating a motivational routine.
The first thing that you should do is make sure that you have a nightly habit.
The upcoming steps are the things that you will write when you do the nightly habits. By doing the habit at night, you are practicing a mental distancing technique that allows you to see your self as a character in a game to be played. Sort of like sims.
This time builds anticipation for the following day’s work, and allows you to look forward to working. Thus, it is what I call a motivational booster..
Additionally, it would help if you were to mix these steps with my how to have an insanely productive morning trick.
Spend A Day At Each Phase
The next step is to try and learn as much as you can about each section, but do not spend more time than necessary.
So, now you have the specific sections that you have to learn, given to you by the table of contents. Also, you have their definitions, and their meanings. Now, you must spend a day learning about each section.
Get textbooks, and read only the chapters that cover that specific topic.
The thing is, these sections tend to take a week to learn because our teachers have to teach us 45 minutes with each section. But if we are going by our own pace, we can spend 5 hours a day on a section, and we can learn as much.
Learn the definition of the topic for an hour. The problem, the solutions, maybe even the history of the topic. This is not to remember the names of the people who’d done it before, but to try and see the different solutions and how they’d failed. How can you come up with a solution that will work. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday will be spent the subtopics, and what they intend to do.
So on the night before, decide which section you will be learning for. Use the 5 points planner to help you out.
Choose A Study Time
The night before, you will have to choose a specific time when you know you will not have anythign to do.
I mention in my productive morning article that we normally do have time. When we say we did not do anything today, what we really mean is we did not do anything usefully productive. We did something uselessly productive.
We watched YouTube, Played video games, read fiction books, or ate and slept, instead of studying, working out, practicing or working on our business.
At the time, it is hard for us to see how pointless the task we are doing are. Only in the night can we look back and truly appreciate our stupidity.
Use that to your advantage.
Look at the following day, and look at the moments you spend doing stupid stuff. The moments you spend doing non-productive stuff, and also the moments you waste on silly things.
Then write your study sessions into those moments.
If you can’t find none, you can choose the morning after you wake up, or the night, just before you go to bed. In the last few days, I’ve been trying the night. I do not like it honestly, but maybe it will work better for you.
Choose A Place To Study
The next thing you will have to write down is where you will be studying.
A work space is an extremely good idea because it is where your mind will get in the mood to begin working. Unfortunately, the inverse is true.
If you study where you normally play, your mind will be in a play full mood. So choose a new work place.
This can be your room, the table, or maybe the dining room table. Even the carpet floor is good. I’d advise against the bed because resisting sleep becomes a choir. But maybe it will not be for you.
Choose A Means Of Eliminating Procrastination, and Distractions
You should choose a studying time, then be at the study place an hour before the studying, and finally, work on the study session with all distractions placed away.
You eliminate the procrastination by choosing a very specific time to start. For me, it is at 5 pm in the morning. I always miss it, but by 6, I am typically typing something on my laptop.
Eliminate distractions. Laptop, phone, books, sleeping, and for me, it can even be maladaptive daydreaming. Use passwords, and website blockers for the laptop, AppBlock for your phone, and then put it away in the car or something.
For the distraction of sleeping, you could take your bed apart. It takes a minutes. For daydreaming, look at the physical action you do when you daydream and hinder it. I tend to mutter, so by covering my mouth, I stop the daydreams.
How Can I Study Smart?
In order to improve memorization, you must constantly test yourself as you are doing the studying, then again after you have completed your studying.
The final test should see you summarize everything you learned, starting from main topic, to subtopics, and then down to the problems that each face, and the solutions proposed for each.
This retrieval technique has been shown by the previously quoted study to assist in learning.
“The beneficial effects of practice testing for students are based mainly on studies demonstrating that the act of retrieving information can be a highly effective means of strengthening memory for the the retrieved information.”
DANIEL L. SCHACTER, MEMORY: FROM THE LABORATORY TO EVERYDAY LIFE
Test Yourself After Learning The Definition Of The Topic
Test how much well you know the main problem.
This is as simple as trying to define the main topic of the top of your head.
Basically, when someone asks you what is abc about, you should be able to say, abc is ….
You can check the definition online to see how well you have done, but I advise that you use your own words in place of the previous verbs that you knew before
Test Yourself As You Are Learning The Subtopics
You must try and see how well you know the subtopics.
After every studying session, you should make sure that you test yourself on what you have learned.
First define the problem. Then define what the subtopic’s solution is, and how it fixes this problem. Finally, try to breakdown the mechanics of the problem and you should be fine.
Test Yourself On The Topic In Its Totality
Finally, test yourself on the entire subject in its totality.
Now, you are going to have to first define the problem, then define how the main topic fixes said problem. Usually you will find that the main topic fixes the main problem using the subtopics.
Then, go over what the subtopics are, and define their problems. Then define their solutions. Finally, define how you can fix these problems.
Answer what you learned from each session of study, and write down as much as you can, then compare it to the notes you have taken over the last couple of days. You will be surprised with how much you have learned.
Test Yourself With A Test Or Assignment
You will need to test yourself.
“interpolated quizzing to enhance learning in educational settings, and specificity training to enhance memory and associated functions.”
DANIEL L. SCHACTER, MEMORY: FROM THE LABORATORY TO EVERYDAY LIFE
This study shows the benefits of recollection in helping people suffering from truly severe and harsh events. If it can work for them, then sure it can work for you.
See how much you can answer without having to read anywhere else. Then, see how well you did, before trying again, until you get a mark you are satisfied with.
This is the method I use to teach myself how to learn concepts about writing. Things like prose, characterization, and verse etc. Once you have mastered creating a study schedule, you will be that much closer to mastering mastery.