Opinion: Easy study tips for finals

As the semester draws to a close, the time to take our finals is upon us. Some may feel prepared for them already while others are worrying about doing well on their finals. Preparing for finals is a matter of self-discipline and perseverance. During my time here, I have developed my own study habits for finals which have helped me stay on task during productive studying.

Identify Exam Material

I can’t emphasize enough the importance of knowing what material will be covered on the exam. Some professors give out comprehensive finals while others give out finals that cover the material taught since the last exam. By knowing before hand whether it is comprehensive or not, you can prepare more effectively.

For comprehensive finals, I tend to review all material on previous exams to see what I missed on those as well as determine what subject material was not asked about on these exams.

For non-comprehensive finals, you would be wasting your time reviewing your old exams unless the final module of material built upon previous knowledge from the earlier modules. I tended to focus on reviewing homework and textbook chapters from the last material for this type of final.

Schedule Study Sessions

Set time aside for each final to study for it. By this, I don’t mean you need to go out of your way to find someone to study with. If you find studying with a classmate is helpful, you should by all means see if any classmate can study with you for any final(s) you share together. However, you may find studying with someone or in a group is a distraction because I definitely do.

My point is, you need to make a plan and stick with it. If some event comes out that conflicts with your planned study session, you should probably not attend that event unless you are confident in your preparation for whichever final you were going to study for.

Study Process

Classes widely differ from each other in course material. As such, you will need to identify how to study for each particular course individually. For my engineering courses, it is best for me to work multiple engineering problems as that tends to be the bulk of my exams. For my general education classes, most of these finals consisted of multiple choice or short answer questions thus I would need to focus on memorizing facts or concepts. I use flashcards to help me memorize any key terms, people, events and any relevant information on them.

These practices may not be best for you. You will need to identify how you learn best. Do you retain more information from visuals such as graphs, pictures, and text? Or do you perform better through practicing or teaching the material? Perhaps a combination of both? Whichever the case, it is important to tailor your study habits personally in order to get the most out of your study sessions.

Relax a Bit

I am not saying that you should go out for several hours and splurge yourself. Rather, you should take short incremental breaks while studying or between study sessions. If you spend a couple of hours studying cramped up by a desk somewhere, you are going to feel restless. I find it more tolerable to get up and stretch a bit. Plan for meals in between study sessions rather than tackling another course’s material back to back.

As far as all-nighters go, I would encourage against it unless you are familiar with the strain of sleep deprivation has caused you in the past.

There have been times I have been unfortunate enough to have 2 finals on the same day. Rather than attempting to use the time between the two exams to study, I used the time to rest my mind from the first one by eating a snack, meal and/or taking a nap.

Last minute studying is generally not helpful because you are unlikely to retain the information in such a short time span.

Final Misc. Tips

The ideal study environment should be one where you are comfortable and void of distractions or clutter. This will help you stay on task. When taking the final, remain calm and do not stress out. If you do not know an answer, move on to the next question and come back to it later.

To all students out there, I wish you the best on your finals. You can do it!

Edited by Jessica Carr