10 Smart Self-Study Tips for Students to Improve Learning
Today, information is available everywhere. The best way a person can make the most of the information is to gain it by himself/ herself. Many students study at home to complement their classroom studies. This is what we call self-study. Self-study is a great way to enhance the learning experience. It is a learning method where students study at their own pace, outside the classroom, with less or without direct supervision. As self-studying is quickly becoming a popular method to advance learning, we will discuss how self-study tips help to study effectively and the best self-study tips.
When a student studies in the classroom or attends a lecture, it is not always essential that he/she absorbs what has been taught. This is why self-study becomes crucial. Self-learning allows students to go beyond learning what their class textbooks and instructors teach them. It also encourages them to further explore topics they are interested in, improving their study skills and learning experience.
Why is Self-Study Important for Students?
- Self-study gives students a sense of understanding to determine what they should study and how to study based on their own capacity.
- With effective self-study tips, students can make their own notes and study them in the language they are most comfortable with.
- Self-study helps boost a student’s confidence. It satisfies their need and allows them to study freely.
- Self-study empowers students to take learning at their own pace, helping in focusing on areas they are most interested in.
- Self-learning helps lessen the frustration, anxiety, or boredom that students may struggle with within a classroom setting.
- Self-learning allows students to choose something they are excited to learn about, leading to a more engaging and effective learning experience.
10 Smart Self-Study Tips to Make Your Learning More Prolific
No matter how many hours you spend at a coaching institute or school or in any distant online course, listening to your teachers, is impossible to retain unless we study the same on our own.
Self-study forms a vital part of any preparation. The concept of self-learning is not only to spend every hour on your books. It also means to make your study hours more effective and productive. Let’s check out the 10 smart self-study tips to make your learning more prolific.
Set a realistic goal
Unrealistic goals can lead to laid back attitude and disappointment. Setting a goal that realistically fits in with your commitments is crucial when making self-study habits. You can plan and set a goal for success by allocating time to read one chapter every day, for example. By setting goals, you can understand what your workload is? And how to adjust your time to avoid a hectic schedule. It gives you a mental break to let your mind rest and learn things effectively.
Self-Study Tips with Different Ways
Reading the same textbooks every time and every day can be monotonous and can hamper your learning and productivity levels. However, adding different ways to your learning excites different brain areas and fuels brain activities for better studying. In today’s digital world, you can embrace a variety of tools in your learning and improve your productivity. Apart from reading class notes and textbooks, you can explore online learning resources such as eBooks, test series, and video tutorials to enhance your knowledge.
Self-Realization
Here, we connect self-realization to your learning process. What is my sitting capacity? What are my strong and weak areas? Are some of the questions that you need to answer yourself.
Having a self-realization ability helps you understand what you have learned at school and which topics you are interested in. It will encourage you to strive to explore and learn more, keeping you ahead of your classroom learning. There are numerous ways to learn. Self-realization allows you to realize what is important for you to study and how to get the most of your learning.
Study Different Subjects
You can study different subjects in a day rather than focusing on a single subject or chapter. Doing so will help increase effectiveness and productivity. Let’s say you have different subjects in your curriculum, including Science, Math, Social Science, English, Hindi, and Computers. To improve productivity in each subject, it is better to study two or three subjects every day instead of allotting one week for each subject.
Allotting a week to a subject might take all your attention away from other subjects. You may also end up feeling bored and eventually lose interest in the subject.
Make Notes Every Day
Making notes is the best way to retain knowledge. It allows the brain to absorb and process the information a student gathers as their study. Once you read a subject or chapter, make hand-written notes right away. Through this, you can immediately go through that note when you forget any topic and retain information. This way, you can improve your clarity and understanding of the specific topics.
Using colorful sticky notes, that are readily available in the market, will make the study hours more interesting.
Test Yourself Regularly
Self-learning is not something through which you can improve your performance instantly. You need to be constant and test yourself daily. When you read textbooks and class notes, you do not have any ways to know how much of it you have actually absorbed and understood. This is where self-assessment becomes essential. You should test yourself right away instead of waiting for class tests or exams. You can test yourself through puzzles, small quizzes, solving sample papers, mock tests, etc. It will give you an understanding of your progress and help you identify your stronger and weaker areas to be addressed.
Watch Video Tutorials
You can make your self-study worthy by watching videos related to the subject that you are currently reading. It will help keep you actively engaged with your chapters and concepts. Many video tutorials nowadays are available online, designed to give students new skills, complementing what they learn in the classroom. Educational videos also help solve some of your queries related to your subject. For example, you can figure out how to conduct a science experiment effectively.
At Turito we provide subject-specific online video lectures for students that they can access anytime and from anywhere.
Study with Educational Games
Educational games are a proven way of improving the self-learning experience. There are numerous apps available based on every subject. For example, if you want to make your Math fun and interesting, you can access these apps through your phones and solve questions more interestingly. One of the most advantages of educational games is that they promote learning, engage students with their subject and improve knowledge retention.
Gamification in the form of educational quizzes and games is an interesting and new feature. You can access this feature easily at our website.
Read Out Loud
Reading out any text loud is the best way to remember that text. When you read a book loudly, you do not only see it but also hear it. This way, you can better focus on the concept. When you read silently, you only see the text; thereby, there are the chances of getting forgotten things you have learned due to thinking in higher. Conversely, when you read any text aloud, your mind sticks with that text and allows you to focus on what you are reading. You can also highlight the key points to recall them later.
Take Short Breaks Regularly
It is proven that taking short breaks during the study helps improve attention and productivity. Rather than sitting for long hours, you can allot your study time in a spell of 40 to 60 minutes. After that, you must take a 10-15 minutes break to walk around or talk to someone, etc. Reading by setting alarms is a good idea that helps you remind yourself to take a break and continue studying as per the schedule.
At times students even do not take eating breaks which adversely affect their health.
Conclusion
Above all, self-study is a proven and significant method to improve your learning ability through which you can reap the most of your study. It helps inculcate discipline and boosts self-esteem. Self-learning techniques can be a series of trial-and-error where you should set your own goals, figure out how to track progress, and understand how to manage your time wisely.
It is a self-realization process where you analyze yourself critically, learn to identify your strengths and weaknesses and overcome them effectively.
