Choose When, Where, and How Long To Study

"Teachers open the door, but you enter by yourself."

When during the day should you study?
Where should you go to study?
How long should you study before taking a break?

The right answers to these questions will boost your productivity, allowing you to squeeze more work out of even less time. The wrong answers will slow you down and make this process more difficult than it needs to be. Straight-A students, I found out, devote a lot of thought to these questions; they recognize how these seemingly little details can make or break their study efforts and have experimented extensively to discover the most effective strategies

When is the best time to study?

You’re most effective between when you wake up and when you eat dinner. You should accomplish as much work as possible during this time. This advice runs counter to most students’ instincts. To many, the evening seems ideal for work. Why? Because the morning and afternoon are crowded. Classes, meals, meetings, and other activities take over these hours, leaving few continuous periods for really settling in and getting things done. Night, on the other hand, seems like one long, uninterrupted stretch of good study time.
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Night time is not as long as you think. By the time you finish dinner, gather your materials, and finally begin your work, you really have only a few hours left before it becomes too late and your desire to sleep hijacks your concentration.

Night time is not as free as you think. It’s prime time. Inevitably some can’t-miss TV shows and news; Night is when people most want to socialize. You see movies at night. You go to parties at night. Shows, speakers, and other campus performances happen at night. People gather back at their dorm rooms to gossip and distract each other. Few among us have achieved the required level of nerd-dom necessary to resist such temptations.

Night time is when your body begins to wind down. After a long day of activity, it’s ready to begin a slow descent into sleep. Even before it gets late, the energy available to your mind has already declined. By 7:00 or 8:00 P.M., your focus is weak at best. For these reasons, you must minimize the amount of work you do after dinner.

Where should you study?

Identify a number of isolated study spots spread out across campus and rotate through these hidden locations when you study. Any place in your dorm or house is off-limits, as are the big public study spaces in your main library. “If you stay in your dorm, it seems like no one is studying”. This atmosphere is not conducive to concentration. Look for less-visited libraries away from the center of campus, and search out carrels high up in the stacks or buried down in the basement.

The isolation of these spots is important for the obvious reason: It shields you from distraction. That little procrastination devil on your shoulder is an incredible salesman. If you give him even a glimpse of an alternative to your work, then he will close the deal. To neutralize this devil, isolate him. Don’t let him see your couch, the cute girls tossing Frisbees on the quad, or your friends chatting in your dorm room lounge. If you cut yourself off from the outside world during your study hours, then you have a much better chance of completing what needs to get done, and, as an added bonus, the resulting increase in concentration will help you get your work done faster.

Quarantining yourself in a study bunker seems to increase the importance of the work you are about to tackle. You can almost imagine the voice of a grave military officer saying, “Son, we’re all counting on you…good luck,” as you head off to your silent nook.

You need multiple locations for two reasons. First, as you move through your day, squeezing in study sessions between classes, it’s nice to always know of a nearby study spot. Second, changing locations prevents you from burning out at any one place

How long should you study? - No more than one hour at a time without a break.

When is the best time to study?

Your break needs to be only five to ten minutes, but it’s important that you take an intellectual breather during this period. This means you should find something you can concentrate on, for just a few minutes, which has nothing to do with the work you were completing right before the break. Read a newspaper article or send a few e-mails. That should be enough. Some students brought a novel or newspaper with them, and then read a chapter or an article at every break.

No more than one hour at a time without a break
Some cognitive science research concludes that about fifty minutes is the optimal learning period to maximize the material synthesized per time unit. “Studies suggest you should study in 40 or 50 minute increments for maximum retention. After approximately 40 minutes, take a short break (5 minutes) and continue studying. Without a break, retention is about 30% after 2 hours.

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