Ladies and gentlemen, if you clicked on this video, chances are you have a test or exam coming up and you want to get an A+. Look, as a computer science student at Yale, I've tried it all. Commodore method, highlighting, flashcards, you name it. I'm not gonna waste your time. That's why in this video, I want to share the three study tips that actually work.
If you're in high school or college, these tips will literally save you hours of stress and pain and you'll be able to get an A-plus on your exam with ease. So the first study tip that actually works is active recall. What is active recall? It simply means that instead of just reading the textbook, you're learning through answering questions.
You're studying through doing past paper exams. And the reason why this is so effective is because of the forgetting curve, which is basically a concept that says we quickly forget information unless we constantly practice it. So what does this mean?
It means that if all you do to study for your test is just reading the textbook or watching some random YouTube video, you're wasting your time. Instead, what you want to do is gamify your studying. And it's so easy, guys, to gamify your studying with Active Recall. Three easy things you can do. The first one is to make a quizlet.
Basically, from your class notes or from lecture slides, you want to transform those notes into fun flashcards, where your main objective is to get as many questions right as fast as possible, almost like you're playing a video game. Also, pro tip, you can use ChatGPT and AI to transform your notes into questions. It's really easy to do.
saves a lot of time and it's really effective. Now the second thing you can do is use past paper exams. This is probably the best method to study for almost any class and the reason why is because you're basically studying in the same format and structure of your real exam and most of the time 80% of the questions that will come out on your exam will be the same or at the very least the concepts will be the exact same.
So definitely put these past paper exams in high priority. Also when you're doing these past papers Don't do them like a dumbass where you're just lying to yourself and looking at the answer key, looking at the question, pretending that you actually know that information when you clearly don't. Put away all your notes, read the question, and then answer it.
Now, if you still can't get the answer, then you can pull out your notes. Then you can check the answer key. Guys, I know this method takes longer, but it's worth it because you don't have to do it many times. So at the end of the day, it actually takes the least amount of time. And it's so...
So effective. Now the last way you can do active recall is through the Feynman technique. Basically, the Feynman technique is where you teach the information and try to break it down in fifth grade terms.
By teaching what you study, it makes you better understand it. because you're forced to make it much more simple. Of course, if you have a friend who takes the same class as you, this would be easy. We can just ask each other questions while walking to class or chilling. But honestly speaking, you don't even need to do this with an actual person to get all the benefits.
You can just pretend to talk to someone, grab a stuffed animal or something, and then record your own voice on your phone. And then playback that recording of yourself talking about a certain concept and maybe even transcribe it. By doing this, you're forcing yourself to make that unnecessarily complicated physics equation into a very easy to understand term.
So in recap, Quizlet, Practice Papers, and the Feynman Technique. If you follow these three active recall strategies, I guarantee that you guys will be acing your exams with ease. Now the next study technique that you want to do is spaced repetition.
And spaced repetition actually works really nicely with active recall. So basically what you want to do is study over increasing intervals of time to improve your long-term memory. Guys, spaced repetition allows you to feel much more relaxed when you're studying for exams.
It's not like when you're panicking and cramming the night before. And I personally find that three is the magic number when it comes to spaced repetition. So for example, if you have flashcards on Quizlet, you want to be able to do it three times and that's where you're going to get the most optimal benefits.
The same thing goes for past papers. Just do that same math paper three times and get faster each time, almost like it's muscle memory. Ideally, you want to try to do this in three separate days where you're allowing your brain to sleep and process that information. So let's say you have an exam in two weeks.
Maybe tomorrow you do that first practice paper and then in a week you do that same paper and then the day day before your exam, you do that again. By doing spaced repetition, you're defeating the forgetting curve. And especially if you combine it with active recall, you will literally become unstoppable. Now, the last study tip that actually works is priming and optimized breaks.
So what is priming? It's basically when you try to manipulate your own mind to feel more focused and to be more productive. And you can do this in two easy ways. The first way is by closing your eyes for 30 seconds to a minute and just visualizing the big picture on why studying your class is important.
You want to visualize yourself knowing all that information as an academic weapon and being able to ace that exam. And by doing this you're creating meaning in what you study and you're tricking your brain into thinking that studying is easy. Now the second way to prime yourself is by listening to music. Now personally I like listening to some jazz music or even some 432 Hertz music on Spotify just to make my brain relaxed. But you can also listen to anything from classical music to house music to lo-fi.
It honestly depends on your personal preference. The point here is you want to get yourself excited. to study. Now you also want to integrate optimized breaks.
A couple of key things you need to know. First, the time you study does not equal knowledge gained. I don't care if you study like 12 hours a day or pull an all-nighter. For me, it's not a flex.
I'd much rather just study for two or three hours but I'm fully focused and I'm studying with effective active recall principles. Second, use naps to your advantage. Just short ones like 20 to 30 minutes whenever you have free time in between classes or after lunch. Or you can also do NSDR, non-sleep deep breaths.
There's also of research and benefits to NSDR, Andrew Huberman recommends it, and I would recommend trying out this video if you're just getting started. Guys, if you integrate priming and optimized breaks into your study routine, you'll be able to make studying much more fun and easy. And if you follow all these steps in this video, active recall, spaced repetition, priming, and optimized breaks, I have zero doubt that you guys will ace your exams. But that's gonna be it for this video, I hope you guys got lots of value from it. If you did, make sure to smash that like button and subscribe to be part of the family.
God bless the hustle. We're all going to win one day and I'll see you in the next one.