A lot of the stress that students experience in college is related to studying for exams (we'll leave out social and personal factors here and concentrate on the academic realm).  Much of this exam-related stress is NOT NECESSARY!  Cramming for exams causes much stress, makes you lose sleep, disrupts your body's time clock, and does NOT allow you to place material in your long-term memory storage banks.  Save for getting a few extra points on an exam (and some of you have surely mastered the act of cramming and do quite well on exams!), there are no long term personal gains to this practice.  STOP THE STRESS by following the tips below.

TIPS FOR EFFECTIVE STUDYING AND LEARNING

        I am always amazed at how many students come to class, watch me teach, take very few notes, and expect to remember the class material a month later during the exam.  It doesn't work.  Very few of us humans can actually remember the fine details, and even the major themes, of a lecture or discussion several days later, let alone a month.  That is because your mind is cluttered with so much information and so many experiences after a particular class that you lose much of what you learned very quickly. It's natural, and it's to be expected.  As Billy Joel sings, "You're only human".

1)  Sleep, sleep, sleep!
    First, and perhaps most importantly, be sure to get enough sleep on a regular basis!  If you manage your time well enough, there is no reason why you cannot get 7 to 8 hours of sleep on most nights.  Research has shown that you can accomplish much more during the day if you are not tired due to lack of sleep.  If you go to class and fall asleep, or just "zone out" temporarily, then you might as well not be there.  Lack of sleep not only leads to inefficiency and slow brain activity during the day, but can lead very quickly (within a matter of days) to a weakened immune system.  It is much easier to get sick if you have not been getting the sleep you need!  If you need a nap during the day, take one!  A half hour "power nap" can do wonders for several hours afterward.

2)  Take thorough notes.
        When you go to class, it is a time to work hard and concentrate.  Whether it is a lecture, discussion, video, or other situation, you need to take notes, and good notes.  This is a MUST if any of the other study tips are to be followed.  Very few of us, myself included, can remember numerous ideas, concepts, or statistics even ten minutes after learning them.  You must write these things down, whether or not the professor puts it on an overhead transparency or provides a class outline.  That means that you need to be efficient, so that you don't spend so much time writing down every last word that is said or written in class.  In some way that you are comfortable with, you need to document what has transpired in class.  Some students use mini-cassette recorders, so that after class they can take good notes on their own time.  Others will rewrite and organize their notes after each class so that they are more understandable.  If you are a decent notetaker already, then your own notes from class should suffice.

3)  Review material immediately after class.
        The learning process has only just begun in the classroom itself.  Even if you take great notes, they will not benefit you much in the long-term if you don't look at them again until the day before the exam.  Sure, they're there so that you can cram the night before, but you won't LEARN the material very well.  Thus, you must review your notes within a few hours after the class -- either immediately after class if time permits, or sometime later that day.  This does not require a lot of time!  Maybe 10 to 15 minutes, unless the material is complicated and requires more time.  Importantly, reviewing class material soon after the class will help you to retain the information that you learned, and to understand it more thoroughly.

4)  Recite and Repeat
         Reviewing material after class is a big first step.  If you really want to learn the material and reduce the stress from cramming, however, you need to return to the material several times within a couple weeks after class.  Further, you should recite the main ideas and concepts back to yourself without looking much at the notes!  As you repeat this process several times, you will find that you can look at key words or phrases and discuss them without needing your notes!  This step of reciting and repeating the material to yourself takes the most work, but it is the most important.  Notetaking can be easy, and reviewing notes can be easy.  Forcing yourself to repeat it back to yourself several times, however, takes some effort.  Still, it is a MUST! This is the key to storing the material in your long-term memory and avoiding cramming sessions all together.
        There are several methods to accomplish this.  For one, you can simply refer back to your original notes on a regular basis -- maybe use Sunday evening to return to the previous week's material from all your classes.  Secondly (and this is my personal favorite), use notecards.  On each notecard, you can write down major themes, lists, definitions, story highlights, etc., depending on the class and material covered.  Carry the notecards around with you during the day, so that you can use them as flash cards while waiting for a bus, "killing" time between classes, or exercising in the Rec Center.  The notecards will allow you to "pull up" key themes and terms, forcing you to remember the details associated with those themes.  Then, try to recite them to yourself.  Still having trouble with certain material?  Return back to the notes themselves and refresh your memory.  Finally, try getting together with some classmates to study with each other, well before the actual exam!  Study groups will allow you to quiz each other on various material, and it will force you to explain it to someone else.
        When you have mastered the ability to recite the material -- and understand it at the same time -- you will no longer need to cram for exams!  Most of the material will already be stored in your long-term memory.  All you should have to do is take a couple of hours the day before to review some of the more complex material, and run through the bulk of ideas and concepts to see if you need to spend more time on something.
        The night before the exam, you can SLEEP!  Don't worry -- you will not forget everything if you get a good night's sleep!  On the contrary, you will be able to think faster and more sharply during the exam.  Try it!  I bet that you'll like the results, and at least some of the stress that you have as a college student will disappear -- over night!

5)  Ask for Assistance!
        If you do not understand some of the class material, call or talk to your professor/instructor well before the exam.  If you are reviewing material regularly, you should be familiar with the areas that you need help with. In advance of your meeting, write down a short list of things that you wish to discuss, so that your discussion can go more smoothly.  I always encourage students to see me during office hours or by appointment to discuss class material.  Many of my own students have benefitted directly on exams because they took a little time to ask me a few questions about material that was unclear.  Most importantly, it will help you to learn what your instructor set out to teach you.

6) Take a Break!
        It is difficult to study intensely for a long period of time without taking frequent breaks.  The breaks are part of the learning process, believe it or not.  Although you will discover what works best for you, I suggest that for every 20 minutes of studying/reviewing, take a five minute break to walk around a bit, let your mind drift, or get a snack.  For every half hour, take a ten minute break.  Again, this will vary highly from one individual to the next, but I view it as a necessity!  Your brain needs time to rest and to absorb the information that you are piling into it.  This of course does not mean that you should study for ten minutes, take an hour off, then come back for another intense ten-minute work session.  Use your own judgement.  The important point is that you can overdo it and decrease the efficiency of learning if you try to do too much at one time.

7)  The Night Before the Exam
        At this point, it is important to review the material for the exam.  The main difference is that you do not have to cram, because you have already learned most of the material!  Instead of cramming, all you should need to do is take a couple of hours, if that, to review your notes, review sheets, etc.  If there are any chunks of material that you still need to focus on, you can do that without worrying about the rest of it.  Instead of an intense, sleepless cramming session that does not teach you anything, you will be enjoying a relatively stress-free review session before getting plenty of sleep that night.