Last week, I did a blog post on how to How to Take Finals Week on Like a Boss, which I recommend checking out if you’re currently going through, or about to go through finals week. In that post, I talked about different tips I have accumulated throughout the years that have really helped me do my best during finals week, especially when it comes to planning and studying.
The key aspect of preparing for finals is studying. Studying will make or break how you do on finals and it’s also something that is really personal. What might work for one person, may not work for another. There are a lot of different techniques to studying, so it may take some time to find what works best for you. Once you can figure out what works for you in terms of studying, another huge problem, I’ve found when it comes to studying is actually finding the motivation to study.
I’ve also done a blog post on How to Instantly Get Motivated when it comes to anything, however, studying for hours, something that’s not always fun, takes a different level of motivation, which is why I thought that this post is the perfect post to write about this week as I’m going through finals week and struggling to find the motivation to study. Check out my tips for how I find motivation to study and how I think every college student can find some extra motivation when it comes to studying.
Study With Friends
Studying with friends makes studying a more sociable activity instead of a super boring one. When I study with friends, it helps me learn the information better by discuss the main points with someone out loud, but it’s also great because if either of you have questions, you can hopefully help each other out too.
If I don’t have classes with any of my friends, I still like go to the library or study with them. Even if we’re working on different things, having a friend nearby or someone to talk to every now and then, really makes the whole studying thing a lot less awful and makes it feel like you’re not so isolated during the whole studying process.
So next time you have a big exam, see if your friends or roommates have any big assignments or tests coming up and order a pizza and have a study date. You’ll be a lot more motivation if you’re held accountable for the time instead of just laying in bed by yourself with a textbook.
Multi-Task
If you’re studying material that needs undivided attention, I don’t recommend this tip. However, for me, part of the way I study is creating study guides and flashcards. Both tasks are extremely tedious and can get incredibly boring. Especially around this time of year, watching holiday movies with my friends while creating my study guides or writing my flashcards, helps me get it done without making me feel like I’m studying or working on school work.
Multi-tasking is great for the mundane activities that may happen before the studying actually occurs, like writing down flashcards. If you have something like flashcards to write or a cheat sheet you can bring to your exam, popping on a movie or some Netflix is a nice way to break up the studying and not make you feel like you’re going crazy from studying forever.
Get Out of Your Usual Environment
I don’t know about you, but when I’m in my bedroom or even apartment, it’s incredibly hard to focus and find the motivation to study. My apartment and especially my bedroom, is somewhere where I associate with eating, sleeping, relaxing, and watching Netflix. So naturally when I’m in that environment that’s what I want to do. Going to a study room in your dorm or apartment, the library or a coffee shop, is a great way to get out of your usual environment and focus on just studying.
Sometimes it may take a couple tries to find your perfect studying atmosphere. Try out the library, a common area in your apartment building, and a cute cafe down the street. Try out different atmospheres and spaces to find what your perfect studying atmosphere is. One of the things that I make sure when I look for a studying space is a large table that I can spread all my studying material out and an outlet for either my laptop or phone to be able to charge when I’m studying.
Create A Study Playlist
I’m someone who has to have background music on while studying. However, listening to music that I know all the words to the song and love to sing along, while studying, does not work for me. I get distracted way too easily and if you’re struggling to find motivation, setting yourself up to get easily distracted, is not ideal. What I like to do is listen to a few different playlists on Spotify such as Relax & Unwind, Your Favorite Coffee House, or if I don’t want music with any words at all Calm Vibes is the way to go. I highly recommend checking out these playlists if you need background music while studying like I do. They’re great because they’re songs that put you in a coffee shop atmosphere, one of my favorite studying atmospheres and get you in the mood to get work done.
Take a Break
I cannot recommend taking breaks enough. Taking a break refreshes your brain and helps you avoid getting stir crazy, which helps you stay focus when you’re actually studying. However, with studying specifically, I like to reward myself. Say I study for an hour, I reward myself by allowing myself to go get a coffee or say after I finish my study guide, I can watch an episode of How to Get Away with Murder. This reward system gives me an incentive to really get my work done and doesn’t make studying seem like a never-ending task.
I hope these tips for studying really help you during finals week like I find they help me. If you need more tips and inspiration on how to stay motivated make sure to check out my post How to Instantly Get Motivated. If you have any tips yourself on how to stay motivated while studying make sure to comment them down below!
