How can I study if I have no time to study?

You mean you don’t have hours to sit at your desk and study, right?

Maybe you moved to a new city and getting from home to school takes forever by train or bus.

Maybe you’re a student with a part-time job.

Maybe you’re a student who is also raising a small child.

Maybe there’s so much going on in your life right now that sitting and studying for 5–6 hours each day seems like a luxury.

Either way, it’s still OK. Because studying doesn’t have to be a 12-hour ordeal.

The solution is to get strategic about studying. Which means:

• Being smarter about your time and what you need to do with it
• Not waiting until one week before exam time to open your textbook
• Being proactive about reaching your study goals every single day

How does this look on a day-to-day basis?

If you follow these 5 strategies, you’ll see that it’s actually doable.

Strategy #1. Finish your most difficult study tasks early.

• Why? Because you take full advantage of your circadian rhythm — your biological clock. For most people, the brain’s peak performance happens 2-4 hours after you wake up: if you get up at 8, the peak time is 10–12. This is the time when your analytical brain takes over and you can focus better on absorbing new material.
• What are the benefits? Doing your hard work early in the day allows your brain to focus fully on the material in front of you with fewer distractions, less inputs from your environment, and with more energy that you’ve gained from a restful night.
• What about distractions? When you’re in learning mode, turn off your phone or at least the volume setting, avoid responding to calls and text messages, and ignore other distractions such as emails, reading the news or what’s in your social media feed. You’ll notice a big difference in the way and the speed at which you can absorb new material.

Strategy #2. Use a timer so you don’t waste time.

• Why? Reading for hours on end is probably the worst approach you can take when studying. It will zap your energy, decrease your motivation, and negatively impact your focus on what’s in front of you. Instead, use a timer to allow your brain to focus in a more targeted and effective way. Here’s how.
• How to review study material? Set the timer to 30-60 minute increments to maximize concentration; or, you can also try the Pomodoro technique which consists of 25 minute blocks of time, followed by 5 minute breaks.
• How to prep for exams? Use your timer to simulate an exam. First, start by reading the review questions in your textbook or those provided your professor. Or, you can create your own questions based on the most important concepts from each chapter. Write the questions on a sheet of paper in a list format. Set your timer to the Pomodoro technique to give yourself only a short time to answer the questions, and go down the list until you’ve covered them all.
• How to make sure you remember it? Write an outline of the basic points and then say each point out loud. You can take it a step further: tell a friend, family member or even your dog what you’ve just learned and why you thought it was interesting and important. This help you review, recall, and retain what you’ve learned in a much better way than just silently looking over the material and writing it out.

Strategy #3. Take notes as you read your textbook.

• Why? Taking notes is a valuable skill to learn not just for the sake of giving your reading experience more structure. It’s also really good for your brain because it helps to amplify your focus and concentration, makes retaining and recalling information easier, boosts your cognitive skills, strengthens memory, and engages your critical thinking skills.
• How?
  • Dedicate a notebook to your reading. Then, as you read through articles and books, start a note on each one by writing the title, author’s name, and date when you read it, which can be an added memory boost when you look at your notes later.
  • Focus on key concepts, ideas, and topics. Don’t make it a goal to write down every little thing you read. That will take forever and you won’t benefit from your notes. Instead, boost your critical thinking skills by identifying what is relevant to the topic. If you’re not sure how to begin, try the Cornell Method.
  • Write everything in list format. This saves time, enables you to skim the material when you need it, helps you locate information faster, and makes the review process easier.
  • Get creative with drawing and color. Use markers or highlighters to prioritize concepts (use one color to mark those that are top priority, and a second color for second level priority items). This helps important information stand out and makes it easier to find later.

Strategy #4. Talk to someone else about it.

• Why? Telling a story is easy to practice because it’s not formal so there isn’t pressure to make it perfect. It also gives you confidence by strengthening your knowledge of the study material, and it boosts your memorization. You can review, recall, and retain what you’ve learned better and more effectively.
• How?
  • Find your audience. It can be a friend, roommate, study partner, sibling, or parent. Embarrassed to ask? Get your pet to participate—they’re usually a loyal audience.
  • Find the right time. Don’t just assume everyone will want to pause what they’re doing and pay attention to you. Pick a time when they’re not in the middle of working or finishing up a task, so they can also enjoy the story. For example, you can talk while taking a walk together or just chilling out in the evening.
  • Make it concise. Nobody wants to sit through an hour’s worth of lecture, especially if it’s during their downtime and not an obligation to do so. Think about what is the main point of what you read that you’d like to share, and then explain it in a few minutes.
  • Make it lively. To make your story interesting, mention an example you really liked and say why you liked it. Add a detail that you found fascinating or unusual. If there’s something that was not clear to you, mention that too. It’s an excellent way to prompt your friend to give their opinion.
  • Encourage dialogue. You told your story. Now what? Use the opportunity to get your friend’s point of view. Ask them if they heard or read anything similar, and you might get a recommendation of what to read next. Turn it into a conversation so you can both benefit from the experience.

Strategy #5. Implement what you learned.

• Why? When you apply the details of what you’ve read to your life, it means you are making a connection between learning something new and the way you think, study, work, or communicate with others. In other words, you are applying that knowledge to something concrete and tangible that can benefit you.
• How?
  • Use every opportunity to review. When you are on your commute or walking or running errands, ask yourself what were the key concepts from the article or book you just finished. Go over them, remembering what you wrote in your notes and how you emphasized each point.
  • Use the new material to generate more ideas. Sometimes reading something can give us ideas on how to do our job better or how to improve one area of our life. It can be about developing a new habit, practicing a skill, or going more in depth on a topic that we find fascinating. It’s an excellent starting point to do more research on what interests us.
  • Take one idea and practice it. Find one idea you liked, then come up with ways to practice it at work or school. It can be learning a few words in a different language or practicing a small habit to make your day more interesting. Pick something that can help you improve the quality of your everyday life so you feel the benefit of learning something new!