Importance of study skills free essay sample

?Study skills or study strategies are approaches applied to learning. They are generally critical to success in school,[1] considered essential for acquiring good grades, and useful for learning throughout ones life. There are an array of study skills, which may tackle the process of organizing and taking in new information, retaining information, or dealing with assessments. They include mnemonics, which aid the retention of lists of information, effective reading, and concentration techniques,[2] as well as efficient notetaking. [3][dead link] While often left up to the student and their support network, study skills are increasingly taught in High School and at the University level. A number of books and websites are available, from works on specific techniques such as Tony Buzans books on mind-mapping, to general guides to successful study such as those by Stella Cottrell. More broadly, any skill which boosts a persons ability to study and pass exams can be termed a study skill, and this could include time management and motivational techniques. We will write a custom essay sample on Importance of study skills or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Study skills are discrete techniques that can be learned, usually in a short time, and applied to all or most fields of study. They must therefore be distinguished from strategies that are specific to a particular field of study e. g. music or technology, and from abilities inherent in the student, such as aspects of intelligence or learning styles Study Skills: Memorize with Mnemonics Memory techniques for College success by Gregory Lloyd What did you learn in high school? If you re like me, you learned a lot. You just dont remember it. Thats the blessing and the malediction of our memories. We absorb so much knowledge throughout our lives, but when it comes to remembering it for say an exam, we cant put it into words or even recall it. If we do bring it to mind, the information is incomplete or doesnt serve us well. Does that mean were just victims of our imperfect brains? The good news is, no. We all have more than enough brainpower to remember anything we want and recall it when needed. All it takes is a slight change in how we commit things to memory. Think back to some of your earliest recollections. Why do they stand out? Were they shocking, fun, or unusual in some kind of way? Thats one way to emblazon something on your memory. But what do you do when you have to learn material that is dull or painstaking to learn, such as numbers, formulas, dates, terminology, names, places, and concepts? We cant make them fun or unusual, can we? Yes, we can, by using mnemonics, a memory system developed by the Greek scholars and orators to help remember long passages and speeches. Today there are many fun mnemonic techniques you can use to encode information so that it can be stored almost effortlessly in your long-term memory. These techniques work especially well for multiple-choice tests, which dont require special writing prowess, superior phonetic ability, or lengthy memorization. You merely have to encode your memories so you can trigger the information when you need it. Here are just a few of the fun mnemonic techniques Ive used to remember what I needed to know for tests: 1. Rhymes. Thirty days hath September How many of us remember this one? This technique works just as well for memorizing dates and facts: Examples: America discovered: In fourteen hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue. Path of incoming air (in order): Pharynx, larynx, trachea, left and right bronchia, bronchioles, alveolus. (This is an ideal list because there are three rhymes or almost-rhymes built in to the sequence. If you want, you can pronounce bronchi as bronchia. ) 2. Silly sentences. When the list must be memorized in order, form a sentence from the initial letters of the words you are trying to memorize. Examples: Remembering the division of the animal kingdom (in order): Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, Species King Paul Called Out For Gus and Sam Remembering the six stages of fertilization (in order): Note-Taking Skills Effective notetaking from lectures and readings is an essential skill for university study. Good notetaking allows a permanent record for revision and a register of relevant points that you can integrate with your own writing and speaking. Good notetaking reduces the risk of plagiarism. It also helps you distinguish where your ideas came from and how you think about those ideas. Effective notetaking requires: recognising the main ideas identifying what information is relevant to your task having a system of note taking that works for you reducing the information to note and diagram format where possible, putting the information in your own words recording the source of the information Reading and note-taking strategies 1. Be selective and systematic As you take notes from a written source, keep in mind that not all of a text may be relevant to your needs. Think about your purpose for reading. Are you reading for a general understanding of a topic or concept? Are you reading for some specific information that may relate to the topic of an assignment? Before you start to take notes, skim the text. Then highlight or mark the main points and any relevant information you may need to take notes from. Finally keeping in mind your purpose for reading read the relevant sections of the text carefully and take separate notes as you read. A few tips about format Set out your notebooks so that you have a similar format each time you take notes. Columns that distinguish the source information and your thoughts can be helpful. Headings that include bibliographic reference details of the sources of information are also important. The use of colour to highlight major sections, main points and diagrams makes notes easy to access. 2. Identify the purpose and function of a text Whether you need to make notes on a whole text or just part of it, identifying the main purpose and function of a text is invaluable for clarifying your note-taking purposes and saving time. Read the title and the abstract or preface (if there is one) Read the introduction or first paragraph Skim the text to read topic headings and notice how the text is organised Read graphic material and predict its purpose in the text Your aim is to identify potentially useful information by getting an initial overview of the text (chapter, article, pages) that you have selected to read. Ask yourself: will this text give me the information I require and where might it be located in the text? 3. Identify how information is organised Most texts use a range of organising principles to develop ideas. While most good writing will have a logical order, not all writers will use an organising principle. Organising principles tend to sequence information into a logical hierarchy, some of which are: Past ideas to present ideas The steps or stages of a process or event Most important point to least important point Well known ideas to least known ideas Simple ideas to complex ideas General ideas to specific ideas The largest parts to the smallest parts of something Problems and solutions Causes and results An example: Look at thetext on underwater cameras below and then look at how the text is presented in note form. The most important words to include in notes are the information words. These are usually nouns, adjectives and verbs .