What is the best way to study?

[Anonymous No.8725311]

There is an exam coming up this week.

The exams are notoriously difficult for this professor. Typically there are 2 midterms but professor reduced the exams to 1 and covered more material than normal.

He has 6 prior midterms posted, 3 midterm 1 and 3 midterm 2. He said our midterm will be a bit of both midterms 1 and midterms 2 from previous semesters.

I have been taking each exam as if it were the real deal and then grading myself against his rubric. After this I been analyzing every problem I missed and in some cases wait a while and reworked each problem I missed and checked against the answer again. if I missed anything again I'd make the minor corrections and analyze why I missed what I did, and reattack it a day or two later, each time learning more and more about certain tricks/seeing new patterns. After being able to do all the problems on said exam to near perfection I moved on to the next exam.

But what has discouraged me about this approach is I am seeing a lot of post online where students are simply looking at the answer to a problem and asking why the answer is what it is. They are doing it so frequently it looks like they aren't even taking the exams but looking at the problem, the solution and doing 'mental checks' that they could have came up with the solution and move to the next problem.

Is my approach good, or should I just look at the solutions to all the exam problems and memorize?

My approach is slow. I took 2 exams out of 6. The test is in 4 days (thursday).

With the approach my clasmates are taking I could look at all 6 exams in a day since I'd just be looking at solutions.

BUT I feel like these problems are so tricky you could easily fool yourself into thinking you know how to do the problem since you 'see' the tricks in the solution without thought, then bomb the real exam.

[Anonymous No.8725324]

>>8725311
Your classmates are retarded and you actually have work ethic. Carry on.

[Anonymous No.8725325]

Assuming you have enough time and don't have to "cram", then using spaced repitition is best for memorization.

[Anonymous No.8725347]

>>8725324
>>8725325
Thanks. I appreciate the motivation to keep carrying on. I looked at the "solutions" to some of the problems I've missed (first pass) and though "oh yeah thats trivial" then re-did the problem again and would get stuck in a new place, despite finding the answer "trivial" a day or two ago. I reworked one problem 2-3 times until I perfected it and learned something significant each go around. Now I feel very confident I'd be able to figure out problems of those types now on the exam...

I feel like my classmates are simply looking through all 6 exams super fast, and thinking each solution is trivial/they understand it...

I'll ignore their post online and continue taking these exams. I have 4 days. I plan to complete 2 exams tomorrow (Monday) and 2 exams Tuesday. Then use Wednesday to look over everything well....

I'm reading through all my lectures for definitions, ensuring I ~really~ know the definitions well since they are important for our shit.

Anyways, thanks anons. I'll keep chugging on

[Anonymous No.8725736]

>>8725347
That's the way you actually get something imprinted in your brain. What your classmates are doing will fail them in exam because practice>>>>>>>>"review"

[Anonymous No.8725754]

>the best way to study
• study first, last, and always
• eat and sleep come next
• everything else (friends, party, social life) no longer exist
welcome to the Big League, boy

[Anonymous No.8725785]

If you have to study, you're doing it wrong.

[Anonymous No.8725786]

>>8725785
This guy's right. If you're on top of your course material consistently and work through it daily you don't really need anything other than a quick review and refresher to get yourself in the mindset of that particular course.

[Anonymous No.8725823]

>>8725786
OP here, I am constantly doing work in the course and I am on top of everything. If the professor releases 6 practice exams I am doing every single problem given. The problems given are different and difficult in ways the homeworks arent. So even if you know the material the exams are difficult enough that you still may fail. New tricks are presented on the exams that aren't in the homeworks and exam problems are ramped up to be more difficult than any of the homework problems. So it is to everyone's benefit to do these practice exams. Hear people make 50s and 60s on his test. Since there is only 1 test it is very much a benefit to do all practice problems.

[Anonymous No.8725855]

>>8725823
OP you're a fine man. Do everything but if you have a time constraint make sure to look at all questions and then just do the hardest ones