Successful student

9

9. . . . don’t cram for exams. Successful students know that divided periods of study are more effective than cram sessions, and they practice it.

If there is one thing that study skills specialist agree on, it is that distributed study is better than massed, late-night, last-ditch effort known as cramming. You’ll learn more, remember more and earn a higher grade by studying in four, one hour-a-night session for Friday’s exam than studying for four hours straight on Thursday night. Short, concentrated preparatory efforts are more effective and rewarding than wasteful, inattentive, last moment marathons. Yet, so many students fall to learn this session and end up repeating it all over again until it becomes a wasteful habit. Not too clever, hah?

When you cram, you are taking a short cut, and short cuts never produce any real worthwhile results. Also, when you take shortcuts, you fell rather rotten knowing that you could have done better but didn’t. Shortcut cut you short. You can’t plant watermelons seeds and harvest fresh watermelons the next day. It takes time. cramming for a test or project and expecting to make a high score the next day is like planting watermelons seeds and expecting to harvest and eat fresh watermelon the next day. plus cramming for a test or project doesn’t help you academically. so why even do it. plan ahead, prepare ahead. give yourself plenty of days and weeks to prepare for upcoming accountability opportunities.