Effective Study

Techniques

What can I do to become a more successful

student?

Student Learning Centre

University of Otago
This booklet is an introduction to some of the skills and strategies that will help
you successfully complete your studies at Otago.

Based on an original booklet developed by Pauline Brook and Carol Hunter for the Student
Learning Centre at the University of Otago.

Version 1.0 Revised 2015

Introduction
The intention of this guide is to help you to be a more effective learner in time
management, note-taking, reading, and preparing for exams. During your first
year at university, in particular, you may be finding out what kind of learner you
are. It might be necessary for you to explore and experiment with different ways
of learning and working with material to see what works for you. In fact, you
may find that you use different learning strategies for different papers to process
academic information so that you understand and remember it.

Everyone has a different way of learning and theres no one right way for
everyone or for every paper youre studying. However, the crucial element is
that youre actively engaged in the process by thinking about information from
various angles rather than solely the way its been presented in lectures. This
approach will set you up well for being a critical thinker and for preparing
effectively for assignments, tests and exams.

The more strategies you bring to study, the better will be your understanding,
retention and recall. This Guide introduces a series of techniques to help you to
foster deep learning which requires active engagement with the material,
whereas surface learning is where you have only a superficial understanding of
the information, and have difficulty explaining and applying it to other concepts
or contexts. By engaging in a deep approach not only will your learning be more
effective but theres a greater likelihood that youll enhance your learning
experience and enjoyment at university. Remember that active engagement is
paramount to effective learning.
Time Management
Underpinning any effective study strategy is time management, a skill that can
be learnt. Students sometimes have a cluster of assignments or tests during
certain periods of the semester so its imperative to be organized. Being so
means that youre more likely to be an effective learner, youll enjoy your time
at university more, and your stress levels will be minimised. The sooner you
equip yourself with good time management strategies, the more effective youll
be with your study because having a plan focuses your mind. Remember that
friends, leisure and sport are important for a healthy life and that a balance
between work and other activities will help you to stay motivated. Good time
management skills are also an asset in your personal life and in your future
profession.

If you find one topic or paper harder than others, then obviously youll need to
devote extra time to it. Remember to consider how much learning happens in
class, labs and tutorials versus how much work youre expected to do by
yourself. Its also important to know the learning objectives for each of your
papers and the topics within them to guide and structure your study and the
amount of time you spend on it. Every week at university is different in terms of
workload, so you need to take a flexible approach to accommodate changing
priorities or circumstances. A time plan is a guide only, so dont panic if there
are disruptions to it some weeks.

Setting Goals
Identifying goals is particularly important to avoid procrastination and help you
to remain focused and motivated. Be clear about what you want to achieve at
university and work out some short-term, medium-term and long-term goals.
Make sure that these goals are realistic and achievable because doing so means
youre more likely to attain them. You may be unclear about which profession
youre aiming for but you obviously want to pass your exams.

Setting Priorities
Know your priorities for the semester, for the week and for the day. This
knowledge will help you to have a clear idea of what tasks need to be achieved.
However, having too many high priorities could have negative consequences.
Attending lectures, tutorials, and labs and meeting assignment deadlines are top
priorities, but balance these commitments by making time for social and leisure.
Making Plans
Making plans for the semester, the week and the day involves knowing exactly
what tasks are coming up and taking the steps required to achieve them. A wall
planner, a weekly planner and a diary are necessary for you to plan
appropriately.

Semester Plan
Have a written plan which factors in dates for assignments and tests for the
whole semester. Doing so means there are no nasty surprises regarding
assessments and you can see the lie of the land for the semester, including
periods that may be particularly busy because of a cluster of assessments or
tests.
This plan should include dates for assignments, tests, oral presentations,
and lab reports.
Be specific about the information you include in your time plane.g.
HIST 105 Essay 20% so that you know the weightings and you can
prioritise tasks and plan accordingly.
Use different coloured pens for different subjects to make tracking your
assignments easier.
Mark in assignment deadlines and work out the time youll need to
complete each one.
Ask yourself what steps you need to take to prepare for them. For
example, if an
essay is due in three weeks time, decide approximately how long youll
spend on research, planning, writing, and editing.
Note these tasks and dates for completing them in your diary or on a wall
planner. Use the value of the assignment (e.g. 15%, 30%) as a guide to
how long you should spend on it.
Put the plan in a prominent place such as in the front of your folder or
diary or on your bedroom wall. That way there are no excuses for not
knowing what your workload is, and theres the satisfaction of being able
to tick off tasks as you complete them.
Dont minimise the importance of noting these details even if, for example, a
lab report is due every fortnight and only worth 5%. Sticking to the plan (within
a day or two) will make the process more manageable, and youll do greater
justice to the assessment. Writing assignments is a process which takes time and
reflection, and it cant be hurried. Also note any employment and social
commitments so that you can clearly see what time you have available to
complete study tasks.
Weekly Plan
Work out your priorities for the week in terms of forthcoming
assignments, tests, labs and tutorials.
Dont minimise the importance of including slots for doing assigned
readings for lectures or tutorials as these are important tasks that also vie
for your time.

Break tasks into smaller steps. For example:

Start research for Assignment 299
Reserve Library book for Assignment 218
Set up meeting for MANT group presentation
Review lecture notes

This breakdown will make the overall task more manageable and less daunting.
Furthermore, youll have the satisfaction of achieving the incremental tasks, and
hence youll be more inclined to stay motivated. A similar procedure applies to
preparing for a test or exam: what concepts, terms, or theories do you need to
revisit? Do you find some ideas more difficult than others? For approximately
how long do you anticipate studying each section so that you get through all the
material before the test or exam? These are important questions to consider so
that your study is purposeful and tasks are achieved on time.

Daily Plan
Decide your priorities for the day and list them in your diary in order of
importance. Planning each day in this way will help you to stay focused on the
tasks you want to achieve.

Remember that not achieving one of these tasks may have consequences for
what you have to know or achieve the next day. For example, you may need to
seek clarification from a lecturer about an essay question so that you can begin
research that day. Again, make your tasks specific. For example:
Read 2 poems for tomorrows English tutorial
Learn German vocab list, lesson 4
Brainstorm for HIST Assignment 2
Read chapter 2 of Reid.

If you dont achieve one of the listed priorities, note it at the top of your list of
priorities for the following day.
Taking notes from readings
To make a coherent and full set of notes youll be drawing from material
covered in lectures, tutorials, handouts, and course readings. This integration is
an active process whereby you prioritise information, make further connections
between ideas as you decide how they relate to create meaning, and supplement
the framework of any lectures. Building up such a resource provides you with
information that will be invaluable as you prepare for tests and exams. Its a
much better idea to put in time creating a useful set of notes from the beginning
of semester than hastily reading assigned texts and trying to understand your
notes prior to a test or exam.
When taking notes, use your own words, bullet points, short phrases,
abbreviations, and bold lines to emphasise information. Obviously the process
of note-taking is a learning curve, and you wont necessarily end up with the
best set of notes the first time round. Thats OK because the more experience
you have with note-taking, the better you become as you see what does and
doesnt work. Dont be restricted by what others do.
Try new structures and approaches, and be an active learner. Continue to review
your notes once youve collated your material and work on consolidating them.
For example, you could write a summary of the topic from your detailed notes
and staple it to the front of these notes. Alternatively, you could represent this
information in visual form via a concept map. Either resource will be very
useful when you prepare for tests and exams. Organise your notes into topics,
rather than lecture-by-lecture, as this approach will better help you to make
links and see developments between ideas and thus see the big picture. This
process is part of actively working with your information so that:
1. 1.You understand it.
2. 2.You remember the most important parts.
3. 3.You can apply it to new situations.

By synthesising or bringing together the various strands of information via

questions and applications to other ideas, youre helping to enhance your
understanding. If note-taking is taking up too much of your time at the expense
of other study commitments, you may need to review your approach. Talk to
other students about their strategies, or talk to one of the learning advisers at the
Student Learning Centre.
Set yourself up to read well. Where do you read best?
What is the best time for you to read?
Will there be any interruptions? If so, develop strategies to handle them.
Remember youre reading to learn, so read with a mission. In other words,
have a clear reason for reading the text. Refer to the section on effective
reading strategies for further information.
Remember that your current reading doesnt exist in a void but is part of
 an integrated body of knowledge.

As you approach the reading, ask yourself the following questions:

1. Why am I reading this?
2. What do the title and subheadings suggest?
3. What do I want to get from this reading?
4. Is the aim to support my lecture notes or extend or elaborate existing
information?
5. How does this reading fit in with the objectives for my current module or
set of lectures?
6. How does this reading fit in with this weeks lecture(s)?
7. Take notes that reflect the purpose of your reading.

Focus on the central ideas or key points of the reading, and when taking notes
dont simply copy material word for word. Instead, use your own words as
much as possible as this will help you to think about the information, make
sense of it and keep you focused. By doing so, you may find that you end up
with four lines of the authors ten lines because youve extracted the essence of
the idea. Consider the following when taking notes from your readings to guide
your understanding and plot the ideas:
a) topic areas
b) chronological sequence (sequence of dates and associated events)
c) sub points

In your notes be sure to differentiate between direct quotes and your own words
by putting quote or me in the margin. Record the author, name of the
publication and the page number(s) of all your sources because it can be very
frustrating and time consuming trying to find this information later on.

Concept Maps
Concept maps, which can include diagrams, tables, mind maps and flow charts,
are another way of representing and working with information in an interactive
and flexible way. This learning tool is useful for helping you to see connections
between ideas, for summarising lecture notes and for retaining and recalling
material for tests and exams. If youre a visual learner, you may find that
concept maps are a useful way to capture a lot of information. They help you to
categorise ideas and this hierarchy can be shaped into a triangle or a pyramid,
for example, or in the form of a mind map as explained later on. However, not
everyone finds it useful to make notes in this way, or you may find that concept
maps work well for some subjects but not so well for others. As with all forms
of note-taking, creating a concept map requires practice and experimentation.
You may not necessarily be happy with the first one you create, but youll learn
how to refine it when you create the next one.
Apart from using concept maps to integrate notes, they can also be used in other
ways:
to brainstorm ideas;
to take notes during a lecture (however, this can be difficult if youre
unsure of the structure of the lecture);
to take notes while reading;
to revise before exams;
to counteract writers block or blanks during exams or other situations.

Example of a concept map

Add symbols, pictures, and colour to make it more meaningful to you.

Dont crowd your mind map with too much information. Use key words
or phrases rather than full sentences. The key words will act as a
springboard for other words and enable you to weave additional content
around them.
A series of lectures can be encapsulated in a mind map and stapled to your
notes as a summary. Alternatively, some students prefer to put a diagram
in a more prominent place such as on their wall or wardrobe door,
especially for a core part of a course.
Reading Strategies
When students are asked about their frustrations regarding reading academic
material, the following concerns are inevitably mentioned:
Volume of readingHow will I get through all the readings?
Time managementHow will I find the time to do the readings?
ConcentrationSometimes I read five pages but I have no idea what Ive
just read.
How do I know whats important?
How will I retain all the information?

Reading at university level may necessitate a change in your usual concept of

reading. Its not just a matter of stringing words together and making your way
through yet another ten pages of material. Rather, its a question of becoming an
effective and efficient reader which means reading with a purpose or being clear
about what ideas youre looking for in the reading. Youll read differently for
assignments and exams so be clear about why youre reading a text. Knowing
how to read effectively involves understanding the structure of texts, how this
structure can direct your reading, the purpose of your reading and reflecting on
it. For most students this is a process which requires experimentation and
practice, and the more actively you read, the greater the benefits. These are
some of the issues that will be dealt with in this section. Firstly, however, it is
important to know that:
1. How you approach the reading depends on the nature of the text.
2. The overriding aim of effective reading is to plot the authors message by
reading strategically.
3. The essence of reading is thinking, and reading is a form of research. Tips
on how to do this will be discussed later on.

Managing Reading Workload

Many subjects at university often require a lot of reading so its important to
adopt some good time management strategies to ensure you align the required
readings with your lectures and tutorials. By doing so, youll reinforce the
information and be better able to follow subsequent lectures. Sometimes theres
so much to read and so little time. Therefore, factor in time(s) on your wall
planner or in your diary when you intend to do the readings for your respective
subjects. When are the gaps in your day or week when you could do your
readings? Do you have several slots during which you can read particularly
dense information in sections? Is it best for you to read material which requires
a high level of concentration in manageable chunks in the morning or at night,
in other words when you are most alert?
Another important aspect to consider is the priority of your readings. In the
scheme of university life, some readings are more important than others, and
you give priority to essential readings. Some readings are deemed essential,
while others are called secondary or suggested readings, and some courses have
both required and recommended readings.
The good news is that you dont usually have to read everything at university;
its a question of taking cues from lecturers and from how the readings are
classified. If a lecturer says a particular reading is important, then it is! If the
reading is classified as essential, then it is!
In an ideal world youd be able to do all the readings but a key survival strategy
is the ability to be selective. Life being life, sometimes you might get behind
with your readings. If this happens, its best to keep up with the current
readings. Otherwise, youll be perpetually behind. Furthermore, the current
readings will have ramifications for understanding this weeks lectures which
build on next weeks. Catch up on the readings youve missed when your
timetable allows.

Maintaining concentration while reading

Sometimes students say they can read several pages of an assigned reading
without being able to recall any of the ideas. In fact, people can carry on reading
whether or not its productive. To avoid this situation its important to be an
active reader rather than mechanically reading or rereading material without
being engaged in the process.
Strategies to effectively read include:
breaking up your readings into sections so that the process and volume are
manageable;
making your way through the reading step-by-step or section-by-section;
taking short breaks, taking notes or creating concept maps from the
readings.

Also, consider where you read best: do you need to be by yourself or

surrounded by others? Where are there no or few distractions? Make sure that
you have good lighting and that youre comfortable, and if you need a change of
scenery, work in different libraries or locations around campus. Tips on plotting
the readings message, which are discussed further in the next section, will also
help with concentration.

Plotting the message

Effective reading is all about working out what a text means, or getting under
the skin of the text to extract its essence. Theres a reason youve been
assigned the reading. Therefore, before embarking on it, ask yourself the
following questions:
Why am I reading the article or chapter?
How does it fit into this weeks lectures and look forward to next weeks
lectures?
What assumptions arise from the title and subheadings?
What do I want to find out?
What terms or ideas do I want to have clarified?
Why do I need the informationfor a lecture or an exam?

By answering these questions, youre already establishing meaning and looking

for connections. Some lecturers provide a set of questions to be answered
following the reading, so looking at these before starting the article or chapter
will help you to focus and to know what to look for in the text. In other words,
they give you a framework on which to hang the ideas. Be sure to check that
you can answer these questions at the end of the reading! If you struggle to fully
answer some questions, then its important to revisit the information concerned
and decide to what extent you need to fill in the gaps.
The features which apply to effective reading, that is, reading for understanding,
also apply to effective writing, so by paying attention to the former theres a
greater likelihood that youll improve the latter.

How text is organised

Meaning is found in the structure of the text so its important to be able to
identify this structure and see how the ideas are built up. Thinking carefully
about how a text is organised fosters an appreciation of structure and linking
ideas in an argument, and this recognition will help you to consider how youre
ordering your ideas in your own writing. Structure helps to provide meaning at
the macro and micro level of the text, and ideas are built up from the sentence
level to a paragraph and then to the text as a whole. The development of the
argument is built up via the development of sentences and paragraphs, and the
argument is expanded through the evidence or examples provided.
Good writing is all about making meaning clear, establishing relationships
between ideas and providing appropriate evidence or examples to support the
points being made. Therefore, in a reading its important to see how the ideas
are ordered, how they connect or flow one to the other and how they build on
one another to form a road map of ideas. It can be potentially daunting to be
faced with a lengthy article, particularly one which is dense, but considering
how its parts make up the whole will make the reading process easier and more
profitable.
To further help you to plot the authors message, pay attention to signposting
words or words which give you an idea of how the next piece of information is
going to be dealt with. For example, however denotes that some contrast to the
previous idea is being introduced, while furthermore denotes that the previous
idea is being elaborated. When you read such words, you can anticipate the
angle of the next part of the authors message.
Some students find it helpful to initially read the introduction and the conclusion
because the introduction briefly tells the reader what the article or chapter is
about and the order of points which are to be addressed, and the conclusion
summarises the key points or findings. By adopting this technique you have a
head start because you have a potted version of the whole, as opposed to
mechanically reading paragraph by paragraph without being truly engaged.

An even better approach though is to take this strategy further and read the
opening sentence of each paragraph. Why? Good academic writing deals with
one central idea at a time and the topic sentence of each paragraph tells you
what the paragraph is about, and it allows you to plot the authors message. The
structure of the text holds the text together so look for the anchors or topics of
each paragraph. This framework should leap out at you and allow you to sketch
out a plan of what youve read. If youre in doubt about the main point of each
paragraph or the overall thrust or point of the reading, skip to the conclusion
where the finding or thesis statement is located. Until you can identify the
overall structure, you can miss the point of the reading.

This approach to plotting the message will capture the key ideas of an article or
chapter but then you need to go back and read about the specifics. That is, you
need to read each paragraph in its entirety to flesh out the information gleaned
from the topic sentence. You could look upon the topic sentence as a coat
hanger on which the rest of the paragraph hangs. In other words, the evidence,
which follows the topic sentence, supports the argument, and that evidence
helps to forge a connection or relationship with the argument. Making
connections is what effective reading is all about, and the more you practise
this, the better youll become at the process.

Understand what you are reading

To be an effective reader you need to interpret the material to understand it and
explain it, whether to yourself or to someone else. Therefore, by asking yourself
what the author is saying in each paragraph, youre saving a lot of time and
effort, and at the same time youre gaining direct information about the texts
overall message. Also, ask yourself what conclusions can be drawn about the
various messages. Interpreting the text in these interactive ways inevitably
requires analysis and critical thinking about what youve read, which means
deciding what the key points are, how they fit together to create meaning,
weighing them up against other information or viewpoints, and assessing their
strengths and weaknesses. Identify important ideas or principles and work out
which ones are more important than others. By adopting this approach you
should be able to summarise the key points.

As youre unpacking the information in this way, you could put the key ideas
into circles or place arrows between them. You may even like to create a
diagram of the information youve gleaned from the text. Also, keep track of
key words, dates, names and phrases as you chart the message, and note your
response to the ideas and arguments, and any questions that arise. This approach
helps you to be in control of the material, to feel less daunted by its volume and
content, and to be more motivated to keep reading.

This process also helps you to understand what the text is about. Ideas stick
when you think about them and when you can understand and use the
vocabulary that is specific to the paper(s) youre studying. Otherwise, you can
feel alienated from the information and start to think about something else.
However, youll likely need to read some sections of a difficult text more than
once.

If youre having trouble with this vocabulary, you need to practise spelling it
and saying it. Keep a notebook with a glossary of your subjects specialised
terms and establish this technical language before proceeding with the next
reading. Noting and revisiting these terms will help you to reinforce and keep
track of them. You could also keep a list of non-specialist language used to
increase your vocabulary.

Another facet of the interactive approach to reading is to test yourself or have

someone else test you on the concepts and examples. Many students find it
helpful to explain or discuss the text with other students because it helps to
solidify concepts and it boosts confidence by showing you what you know, and
it picks up areas where you need to do more work. Working with others can be a
motivating factor because when everyone is doing the same reading theres a
sense of unity and you gain energy and encouragement from the others in the
group. Consequently, the whole reading process is more doable and you dont
feel so overwhelmed. Furthermore, by talking and writing about the ideas in
whatever form and listening to how others have interpreted the concepts, the
better youll understand it. Also, the more you apply the ideas to what you
already know, reflect on connections between the text and other material youve
read, and then incorporate it with new knowledge, the more likely youll
remember it.