Category: Time Management

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Motivation Physical Study Technique Time Management

7 Steps to unlock the power of study motivation

A mountain, which is a metaphor for motivation.

 

Man playing games rather than be motivated to study.

You want to study but aren’t motivated? You know that it is important. But, still you find it hard to study. Every time you sit at your study table and start studying, you cannot concentrate. Your smartphone, video games, TV, and other distractions keep distracting you despite however hard you try to focus. As a result, you cannot study properly. You are not as productive as you can be.

Do you know why?

The answer to this question is simple- you lack the motivation to study. Now, can you do something about it? Yes, you can.

You can unlock the power of study motivation and be your most productive self while studying.

Here are 7 steps to do so:

1. Start your day with affirmations

The first and foremost step is to start your day with powerful affirmations. For example, if you want to study for 2 hours, then you can try reciting affirmations like- I can study for as long as I wish, I can study with concentration and I will. As you recite these affirmations, you signal your brain that you are capable and you can achieve what you want. You can complete all your study targets and accomplish good grades. Thus, you start feeling motivated. Further, you can customize affirmations in accordance with your study targets for the day. In order to get an idea about different ways to create affirmations, you can watch affirmations videos available on YouTube.

 

2. Determine your reasons to study

This is the second step of your journey towards unlocking study motivation. It involves determining your biggest reason to study. For this, you have to sit at a peaceful place and question yourself- “Why should I study?” You can receive different answers to this question from your inner voice like to keep your family happy or to live the luxurious life you have always dreamt of. Whatever be the reasons, write them on a notepad. Now, that you have the list of reasons to study, you have to go through it every morning after reciting affirmations. As you do so, your motivation to study will start soaring high.

3. Create a study space which reflects your reason to study

This is the third important step which you have to follow. Here, you have to create a study space that reflects your reasons to study. For this, you have to create or find from the internet, some posters, images or quotes which align with your reasons to study. Once you finish creating or printing the respective materials, you have to paste them all over your study space. This makes your study space highly motivating and every time you go there to study, you will automatically get motivated.

 

4. Set small study targets

This is the fourth and very smart step to unlock study motivation. It involves setting small study targets for yourself. For example, if you have to complete a whole chapter, break into three or four parts. As you do so, you make your brain believe that the task is small and easy to achieve. Thus, you start feeling motivated to complete your small study targets. Further, as you succeed in accomplishing a study target, your motivation level rises even more. As a result, you can proceed towards your next study target with enhanced motivation to study.

 

5. Use the Pomodoro Technique

The fifth step of your journey to unlock study motivation is to use the Pomodoro technique. It keeps your motivation level maintained by helping you take study breaks around the time when your brain is about to start feeling tired. Given below is the stepwise procedure which you can follow to practice the Pomodoro technique while studying:

  • Select a study target to complete
  • Arrange everything you need to complete it. For example, your textbooks, pencil, eraser, notebook, pen and sharpener.
  • Take a timer and set it to 25 minutes.
  • Take a pledge that during these 25 minutes you’ll only study and that too with full concentration.
  • Start the Pomodoro (timer) and start working on your study target
  • Keep working at your best
  • As the timer rings, you have to stop studying and take a 5- minute break
  • After the break time gets over, reset the timer and start studying again
  • After completing four successive pomodoros, take a longer break for around 20 to 30 minutes
An ice cream treat for staying motivated.
6. Reward yourself at the end of the study day

The sixth step of the process to unlock study motivation is to reward yourself at the end of the study day. You can become eligible for the reward only if you feel that you have actually worked hard. It is not necessary that you have to complete your study targets for getting the reward. This is because some things may take longer to complete than you expected. But, it is just that you should be content with your efforts. At the end of your study time, you should be proud of yourself for having studied well. If so, you can reward yourself with some time to play your favorite game, a chit-chat session with your friends, and your favorite dish to eat.

 

7. List your achievements for the day

This is the final step of your way to keep yourself motivated to study. Here, you have to list down your achievements for the day on a notepad. As you write your achievements, your heart smiles at your success. You bask in overwhelming joy at your study progress. This happiness which you feel is addictive in nature. Thus, it motivates you to perform even better. As a result, your study motivation keeps soaring high.

 

To conclude, the above-mentioned steps can help you unlock the power of study motivation. It is with this power that you can stay away from distractions and study with concentration.

Guest Author:  Jessica Robinson is a creative woman by heart and a research writer, who is solely dedicated to the task of conceptualizing, analyzing, and drafting articles on many issues. She is a woman of words, who has been delivering quality, accompanied by efficiency from the past 10 years. Additionally, it is much owing to her professional management degree from Melbourne University, which has exposed her to such proficient skills.

Categories
Study Technique Time Management

Time Management Using the Pomodoro Technique

Do you struggle with wasting time and need a tool to help you focus your attention?  The Pomodoro technique, developed by Francesco Cirillo in the 1980’s, is been used by me and millions of others. Let me quote from his book, The Pomodoro Technique. “Every day I went to school, attended classes, studied and went back home… feeling that I didn’t really know what I’d been doing, that I’d been wasting my time…. It was clear to me that the high number of distractions and interruptions and the low level of concentration and motivation were at the root of the confusion I was feeling. So I made a bet with myself, as helpful as it was humiliating: Can you study – really study for 10 minutes?” Does that sound familiar? Do you have problems keeping focus? Even if you are reading, do you ever find that you’ve been reading but you stopped thinking about the reading several pages earlier?

Franceso’s Plan

So here is what Francesco did. He went to his kitchen and grabbed his tomato shaped timer (this is the link to the one I purchased).  By the way, the Italian word for tomato is pomodoro. He then forced himself to study in concentrated bursts, with small breaks in-between each study segement.

Recommended Approach

First, decide what task you are going to work on. Second, set a timer for 25 minutes.  Third, start the timer and continue working on your task until the timer goes off.  Fourth, stop when the timer rings, place an X on a piece of paper, and take a 5-minute break.  Fifth, after the break, go back to the second step and do another pomodoro.  A pomodoro is each uninterrupted 25-minute session, so if something breaks the 25 minute session you don’t mark that down as a completed pomodoro—your good intentions don’t matter.  Finally, when you have four X’s on your piece of paper, take a longer break:  15 to 30 minutes. For those of you that are already studying for long periods of time, you may find that this method helps you with mental exhaustion.  Also, it will help you with knowledge retention. Our brains need breaks to process what we have just learned, so you may learn more by taking mini-breaks rather than longer breaks every few hours. In other words, this technique may allow you to study more efficiently.

Kitchen Timer

With regards to the timer, Francesco recommends a manual kitchen timer, a piece of paper, and a pen or pencil. He believes that taking the timer and winding it creates a psychological decision on your part to complete the task. From a behavioral perspective, you now associate setting the timer and working till the timer goes off, which strengthens your commitment to completing the task. The key is to not give up right away. You should notice a difference within a few days, and mastery of the pomodoro technique anywhere from a week to three weeks of use.

My Experience

As I was preparing this episode I decided to search for pomodoro apps. Sure enough there are several, so I downloaded a free one called Focus Keeper Free. It makes a ticking sound, just like a manual kitchen timer.  It has a digital countdown and an analog rotating scale like a kitchen timer. At first I thought the clicking sound would be disturbing, but the sound was actually soothing.  Ironically, I usually have long periods of time without interruptions, but during my first 25 segment I got a phone call and my wife came in to talk to me.  This means I can’t count that segment as a pomodoro.  The app also has a five minute timer that comes on for break time. After a few weeks, I decided to purchase an analog kitchen timer.  I like the physicality better, and it also allows me to move my phone away from me (one of my main distractions). As with any time management technique, the pomodoro technique may or may not work for you. Some people swear by it and others despise it.  All I can do is suggest that you try it for a few weeks and see if it works for you.  For example, do some practice essays using the IRAC method.  If you’ve got a kitchen timer start with that, but if not, try it with a free time management app for a couple of days.

 

 

Categories
law school academic success Time Management

What to do Between Semesters

woman at beach

Wondering what to do between semesters? Are you bored, or ready to get a head start? Here are 12 tips on what to do between semesters. Some of the tips are school related, while others are not. The key is to find a balance between preparing for school and relaxing a bit—both are important. You may have two, three, or even four weeks off, so use the time wisely.

Tip #1

Family and friends. This is the time to reconnect with your family and friends. School is demanding, so take time over the break to visit with them, ask them what their last few months were like. Resist the temptation to talk about yourself, and instead listen to them. If you have trouble focusing on others, consider reading this short article on active listening.

Tip #2

Reflect on the past semester. Ask yourself what worked, what didn’t work, and what you will do differently. Not only in school, but in your personal life. I used to think reflection was silly, but there are significant educational benefits to self-reflection. You may want to start journaling if you don’t do so already.

Tip #3

Create process goals. A process goal involves how you are going to do things. For example, you may decide to get to school an hour earlier so that you can study in the library. Or you may decide to make flash cards each day after classes are over. A goal to get an “A” in a class is not a process goal. You can control the process, but not the outcome. To delve deeper on this, watch this video on how to set goals.

Tip #4

Plan next semester’s schedule. If you don’t have a schedule, then make one and stick to it. This includes not only going to class, but deciding when you are going to study, eat, sleep, exercise, shop, relax, and attend religious services.

Tip #5

Exercise. You need exercise not only for your body, but also for your brain. Studies show that exercise is correlated to increased cognitive ability.

Tip #6

Read a good book. And no, I don’t mean your textbook. Read something that is going to challenge you and get you to think about the great ideas. I recommend Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, Thomas à Kempis’ Imitation of Christ, Sun Tzu’s Art of War, Sertillanges The Intellectual Life, or any other of the numerous great books.

Tip #7

Review the material for next semester. If you have your textbooks, look through them and start getting familiar with what you will be covering next semester.

Tip #8

YouTube and blogs. I don’t mean for entertainment, though you should do some of that. Look for videos and blogs that will help you next semester. If you need help with writing essay exams, find a useful blog post, like this one on the IRAC method. If you are having problems with grammar, find blogs that will help you improve your language skills.

Tip #9

Online courses. If you can find online courses that will help you with the skills you need next semester, or in courses that you are going to take, then enroll in the course. I’m talking about relatively short courses so that you can complete soon, that way you can go into the semester with an understanding of the material. It takes our minds some time to digest knowledge, so get a head start over the break.

Tip #10

Watch a movie. Go out and enjoy some popcorn, a drink, and movie with some friends. This is the time to relax a bit before you start the next semester.

Tip #11

Enjoy nature. Find a park, mountain, ocean, or other nature preserve where you can walk outdoors. It’s important to get away from the city and enjoy an open space.

Tip #12

Improve your writing. Figure out where your writing needs improvement and then work on that area. I’m not saying move from a weak writer to the best writer in the world, but make one incremental improvement. The key is to not give up on this important skill, and instead to continue improving. One day, you will be the great writer that you need to be to get top grades on your essay exams. If you don’t have an exam improvement book, I recommend Writing Essay Exams to Succeed in Law School.

 

 

Categories
Essay Exam Exam Preparation Study Technique Time Management

Answer an Essay Question Before You See it!

Word test on chalk board.

Would you like to answer an essay question before you see it!  Want to have more time on exam day to think through your answer? You can have 60% of your essay exam complete before exam day with this preparation method.

Ideally, you should already have three sets of notes, as I mentioned in my episode called “Three Sets of Notes Method.”  In addition, you need to create a fourth set of notes, which I call your Exam Answer outline. This is an organizational tool that will allow you to move quickly during the final. Also, you will write a much stronger essay.

The Process

Here’s how it works. For each possible issue, you will write the ideal answer into your Exam Answer outline. Obviously you won’t know the names of the parties so simply use “Defendant” and “Plaintiff” for the parties involved. And while you do not know the parties’ names, you do know the law and how rules interact with each other.

Negligence Example

Let’s go through a negligence example. Ask yourself what the ideal first sentence of a negligence answer looks like. Then write out something like: “The issue is whether D was negligent when he committed the act against P.” On exam day, you will replace “D,” “P,” and “committed the act” with the facts from the exam.

The next sentence is your ideal rule statement, which you will pull directly from your rule outline. “Negligence occurs when a defendant owes a duty of care, breaches that duty, is the actual and proximate cause, and there are damages to the plaintiff.”   Then wrap up the first paragraph with a brief conclusion. Because all the elements are met, D is liable to P for negligence. By the way, if you haven’t noticed, I am using the IRAC method, which I covered in an earlier blog post.

Now, write the second ideal paragraph, which in this case involves duty of care. “The first issue is whether D owed P a duty of care. Duty of care is a legally recognized relationship between the parties, and is measured by the reasonably prudent person standard. In this case D owed P a duty of care because….” At this point you’ll have a blank, which you will fill in on exam day. Then the last sentence will read: “This element is met (or not met) because D owed (or did not owe) P a duty of care.”

Negligence Per Se

You will do this for each element, but don’t stop there. You also need to create alternative paragraphs, depending on the issues that might appear on your exam. For example, before you get to the final exam, have you thought through how to deal with negligence per se? I ask this because when you have a negligence per se question, you need to discuss the negligence per se AND the reasonably prudent person standard. And you need to do this because it is always possible that the court will deny the negligence per se instruction, leaving you with having to argue the reasonably prudent person standard. This means you need to have an ideal paragraph for this possibility.

So work through negligence per se, using this approach, and end the negligence per se paragraph with something like this: “Plaintiff should be able to establish duty through negligence per se. However, if the court finds that negligence per se cannot be used, then Plaintiff can still prevail under the reasonably prudent person standard.”

There are other areas that you also need to think about. Where does res ipsa loquitur fit into an exam? On a criminal law exam, where do you discuss premeditation? On a contracts exam, where do you discuss a UCC distinctive?

Final Advice

Word plan on a puzzle. Answer an essay question before you see it.

You can wait till exam day to think about all this, but if you plan it all out in advance, now when
you have time, you will know exactly how to structure your essay answer and understand the connections between the different rules. This approach will also give you more time to focus on the analysis portion of the exam, which is where most professors award points. For some additional ideas on how to structure a pre-planned essay, see this guide on how to structure an essay.

By the way, if you have an open book exam, you will truly have a huge advantage over your colleagues that haven’t done this.

 

Categories
Study Technique Time Management

How to Remember Better

Finger on brain, helping to remember better

If you want to improve your memory and remember better, try the spacing effect. The spacing effect is a scientifically documented phenomenon where people learn better when they learn material over time. The opposite of spaced presentation is massed presentation, which we call cramming. Many students wait till a week or two before the exam to really begin studying. And then spend the night before the exam reading the material over and over again. Though cramming works up to a point, studies confirm that students who use spaced repetition outperform those that cram. By the way, if you cram the night before an exam, you might want to watch my episode 10 Exam Day Tips.

In legal education, spaced learning is extremely important because of the bar exam. In college you could take a course and never again be tested on the date that Rome fell or on the innerworkings of a cell. But the material in your first semester of law school will be tested again on the bar exam. By studying the material throughout the semester, not only will you do better on the final but you will also perform better on the bar exam.

How to Remember Better

You are probably asking, “How do I do this?” One technique for incorporating spaced repetition is through the use of Leitner boxes, which I describe in detail in my post on memorizing information.  This flashcard technique incorporates spaced learning into your daily study routine. You create four boxes, or stacks of cards if you don’t have actual boxes. Then you regularly look at the flashcards reviewing information you don’t know well often, and information that you’ve mastered less often. This technique has been proven to reduce the overall amount of time you study.

Wrist watch to help remember better over timeIn 1885, German psychologist Julius Ebbinghaus published his work called “On Memory.” For the first time in history, he quantified how quickly we forget by charting the “forgetting curve.” The most drastic forgetting occurs within the first hour and then begins to level off after one day. The good news is that you can benefit from Ebbinghaus’ breakthrough study. Given the rapid decline in our memory, the optimal time to review information is within the first 24 hours of first learning it. If you review your notes within 24 hours after class, you will make a stronger mental connection to that knowledge. This will help keep it in your memory longer. By repeating this process, not only will you retain the knowledge for the final, but also for the bar exam. For additional interesting information on how memory works, here is an article on long term memory retention.

Bart & Lisa

Let me end with a short apocryphal story. Bart and Lisa were both in the same Torts class, each struggling to understand proximate cause. On the final exam, both got an A on the proximate cause question. But Bart spent 20 hours learning the concept while Lisa spent 15 hours on it. Lisa was able to accomplish this by starting earlier in the semester using spaced repetition. Bart waited until two weeks before the final and then he crammed. Three years later, Lisa quickly picked up proximate cause while Bart spent hours relearning it.

The moral of the story is this: if you start studying right after class, and keep reviewing up to the final, you will take less overall time mastering the material and retain it in long-term memory. Cramming may help, but in the long run it won’t help you remember better.

 

Categories
Study Technique Time Management

Akrasia: How to Overcome Procrastination

Procrastination on an iphone with a computer

Procrastination

What’s the most creative excuse you’ve used for your procrastination? There is the usual: Facebook, surfing the net, checking your phone. Successful people do better because they put the important things, like studying, first and avoid the unimportant, like watching that 10,000th cat video.

Akrasia

Socrates called this problem akrasia, which is when someone acts against their better judgment. In the Bible, some English translations use the word self-indulgent. Regardless of the translation, the idea is that you know what is best for you and instead you do something else. For an easy-to-read article on why we procrastinate, read this article 0n procrastination.

100 Mile Hike

Last year I decided that I wanted to go on a two-week hike with the Boy Scouts at the Philmont Camp in New Mexico. But I had a problem: I needed to lose 75 pounds to be eligible to go. Over the course of 18 months, I experienced akrasia numerous times by indulging in several pizza buffets or eating ice cream. Each time I deviated, I knew I was hurting my chances to go on the hike.

I am glad to report I reached my goal and completed the entire two-week, 100 mile hike! To see how tan I got on this hike, and for some lessons I learned that apply to law school, check out my video on tips from hiking you can use in law school.

Tip #1

You need a commitment reminder system. I began doing this years ago by using a day planner. If you haven’t used one, this is a paper calendaring system where you place your activities into a schedule. Today you can  do this with any calendar app, or if you want something a little bit different there is an app called BeeMinder. This app allows you to track any goal that can be measured by numbers. For example, you may want to spend 60 minutes a day studying for Constitutional Law. BeeMinder will send you reminders, where you can input your commitment into the app.credit card use to stop procrastination But here’s the twist: the first time you don’t meet your goal, BeeMinder will ask you for a credit card. And if you get off track a second time, BeeMinder will charge you five dollars. By having a disincentive to lose five dollars, you are more likely to keep your commitment.

Tip #2

A second approach is for you to use short-term rewards to help you defeat akrasia. The part of teaching that I hate is grading exams. To force myself to grade, I place all the exams in stacks of five. When I grade five, I then have permission to go do something else, like get some coffee or talk to a colleague. Think about short-term rewards that will work for you. Maybe that means Facebook for five minutes or eating a chocolate kiss. Keep in mind that these have to be short-term rewards rather than long-term rewards. If you know that that 5 minute Facebook break will turn into a 60 minute Facebook break, then you should think about doing something else like going for a short walk. Exercise is a great way to get your blood flowing, which in turn helps you focus and retain information better. Watch this video on how the brain benefits from exercise if you want to learn more.

For more ideas, here are 10 more tips for overcoming procrastination. One good book you may want to read is Procrastination: Why You Do It and What to Do About it Now by Da Capo. If you need help with your procrastination, reach out to our tutors and let us help you overcome this bad habit.

 

 

Categories
Study Technique Time Management

Don’t Give up on Difficult Reading!

Medieval manuscript that is difficult to read.

Don’t give up on difficult reading! We’ve all been there! It’s 11:00 at night, you’re tired, you have been in classes all day, and now you have 50 pages of reading to get through before tomorrow. You find yourself struggling with understanding concepts within the material. Most law students, especially new law students, struggle with law school textbooks.

To be honest, a lot of lawyers sometimes struggle to get through wordy legal documents. This is why they employ associates and paralegals to do that kind of tedious work. But in law school, you can’t exactly hire someone to do your reading for you. This would be ineffective and a violation of a school’s honor code!

Dale Corson Method

So, what do you do? Dale Corson, the eighth president of Cornell University, developed a technique to help students not only get through difficult reading, but to also understand it. When you are having a hard time with a reading assignment, mark each paragraph that you don’t understand with a small “s” which stands for “struggling.” Many times, the next paragraph or two will help to clarify what you did not understand in a previous paragraph. However, if this is not the case, and you have a page or two of “s” paragraphs, you must first struggle to understand it on your own. This is vital! (For more information on pushing through when you just want to give up, watch my video on grit and motivation).  Once you reach your breaking point of truly not being able to understand the material without help, follow these steps.

First

First, get paper, a pencil, and a timer. Set the timer for 15 minutes. During that 15 minutes, give it everything you’ve got to try to understand the material. This may seem like a pointless exercise because you have already hit that mental block where you feel like you just can’t get it. But there is a good reason to do this. You have given yourself permission to stop working on the problem at a definite time.

A stop watch.

The fifteen minutes you set on the timer acts as a trigger to your brain to relax and often this will be enough for you to be able to figure it out.

Second

Second, during those fifteen minutes, go back to the first “s” that you marked in the material. Write down everything that you do not understand. What is it precisely that does not make sense? If you figure it out while you are writing these notes, great! But if after this exercise, something still does not make sense, then take it to your professor, private tutor, or study partner. You will have fifteen minutes worth of detailed notes to go over with that person. (Just as an aside, writing your notes, as opposed to typing them on a laptop, will vastly improve your note-taking abilities. See another episode of mine titled Handwrite or Type Notes

Many professors will have more sympathy for the student who has struggled with the difficult reading, over the student that just shows up at the professor’s office to ask him or her to explain a concept covered in class. Additionally, the student that uses this method will be in a much better position to understand the material because they worked so hard to understand it on their own before seeking help from anyone else. Finally, if you aren’t getting the help you need from your professor, you can always reach out to one of our tutors.

 

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