Mistake 1 - Simply reading notes or handouts
Simply reading notes or reading a handout that the teacher gives you is a mistake we all make. While this is great for quickly looking over information before tests or just regrouping your thoughts it isn't going to make connections between topics and subtopics that will stick in your brain. So the best way that I found works for me is making all kinds of different study guides and study materials that will help you link information in different ways.
Mistake 2 - Studying in bed
The next mistake is extremely common and I think we've all done this at one point or another. A lot of us like to study in bed. This is something that's really bad and damaging to you for two reasons:
- First of all, your brain has made a strong association between being in bed and sleeping and if you continue to study while you're in bed it's more likely that you will fall asleep and your productivity is basically zero because you've fallen asleep during your study session.
- The second reason is that if you continue to study or do homework while you're in your bed that strong association that you've made between being in bed and sleeping has been weakened because of other non sleep related activities. So when you do try to go fall asleep at night it's going to be harder to fall asleep just because you've been doing other things in bed while you were awake.
Mistake 3 - Procrastinating
If you have a really long to-do list of a lot of things and you having a really bad day there's a good chance that you're thinking to yourself "I'll do it later" so this is really really harmful just because this first thought is what procrastination is stemmed from. Procrastination causes stress so avoid it as much as possible.
The best thing to do if you're procrastinating on a lot of things is to literally force yourself to sit down with all of your books. Set a timer it can be on your phone or in the kitchen.
