By: Kendall Knauer

For many high school and college students, finals are looming– but what are the best ways to study to ensure getting the best grade possible? Here are some study tips to prepare you to be confident and ready when taking your exams: create flashcards, take in-depth notes, find the perfect study spot, review previous assignments or tests, get the proper amount of sleep and eat enough to fuel your body! 

First, creating flashcards is an old-fashioned way of studying, yet still very useful. When trying to learn terminology, flashcards are definitely the way to go. They will test your knowledge of both knowing the word by reading the definition, and being able to recite the meaning of the word just by reading it. You can make flashcards with notecards so you can take them anywhere you go, or you can make a study set on Quizlet so you can quickly star the terms that are giving you trouble and have quick access to reviewing those starred terms.

Flashcards are useful to study vocabulary, but taking high quality notes will help you learn all the necessary material. What makes notes, good notes? To maximize the amount of content you will learn by writing notes, one suggestion would be to use several different colors to separate different sections of the material. Separate the material you need to know into sections and dedicate a color to each section, then write the notes of each section in its designated color. Then, when you are taking your exam and a question comes up where you cannot easily remember the answer but you can remember the section you assigned it to, you can think of the color in which you wrote the information and the answer may come back to you. After writing these colorful notes, take a highlighter and highlight the most important information within the notes. This will help you focus on the most important information when you are quickly reviewing the notes before the exam. 

Speaking of studying your notes, the location in which you choose to study is just as important. You have to find somewhere comfortable where you could spend hours studying if needed, yet where there are minimal distractions so you have a hundred percent focus. A reliable place to study is always the library as it is quiet and comfortable with few distractions, but a room in your house could work just as well. The biggest distraction of all is our phones, so putting it on “do not disturb” and setting it far away from your studying space can help limit the urge to check your phone which will help maximize your studying. 

While at your perfect study spot, you should find your previous assignments, tests and quizzes from the class and review them. First, when reviewing these assignments you should do a quick skim over the content to refresh your mind. Then, you should focus on the parts of these assignments, tests or quizzes where you struggled. Whether you got the question wrong or there were comments made on the work, reviewing your previous mistakes will turn your weaknesses into strengths that you will use on the final exams. 

Studying may be important, but fueling your body is just as important. Starting a few days before your exams you should get the proper amount of sleep for your body to function, which is about eight hours a night. Not only should you fuel your body with sleep, but you should also fuel your body with food. Eating good, quality food– and eating enough– will help improve your brain function, which will help you do your absolute best on your finals. 

Now that you have all the perfect skills to study for your finals, put them to use and ace all your exams!

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