STUDYING 101: HITTING THE BOOKS---Jenika Nero

                  Many students are not very fond of studying especially during Quarterly Tests. They say that scanning through the highlighted words on their thick books and reading the long notes they have taken down during discussions is quite boring and tiresome. Let’s admit it, though—studying 11 subjects (or possibly even more) that have different loads of lessons and answering one lengthy quiz for each in a short span of one hour is stressful. How can we possibly conquer the huge wall of temptation around us and focus on our main goal—to study and get good grades?

                  To be honest, I’m not a big fan of studying either, even though I know it is what’s best for me. I have to keep on reminding myself that surfing the internet can’t make me answer all  the items in the Quarterly Test correctly nor could it make my grades rise up to the sky like a rocket.

               Encouraging myself as hard as I can to read my notes and to stop taking glances at the Facebook app on my phone (it wasn’t easy), I decided to study what I considered as the hardest subject to understand—Math. Numbers confuse me—and maybe other students out there too—, which is why I made sure I am familiar with its terms and formulas by challenging myself to answer some to the activities in the book. I was actually able to do so, and I even got a technique in solving a certain formula. That’s two points for me!

             I then moved on to the other subjects, as long as it was part of the exam the next day. After about three hours of familiarizing definitions, analyzing situations, and memorizing terms, my eyelids began to feel heavy. I set my books and notes aside for a while and took a nap since my brain needed to, putting up a mental note that I should review the lessons again when I woke up.

I settled to follow this study pattern, always starting with the hard subjects that had to be taken the next day, resting for a couple of hours, and reviewing by night.

              Studying isn’t always dull and uninteresting after all; it’s up to how we make it entertaining and "learnable" at the same time. We just have to push all the temptations away as hard as we can and make sure that our full attention is only on studying the subjects, thoroughly understanding the lessons, and, as much as possible, on getting good grades.