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Study Tip of the Week You can now receive the ACE Study Tip of the Week by e-mail during the fall and spring semesters. (The service is not in operation during the summer months.) Subscribe to Study Tip of the Week Maintaining Your Concentration
As the semester chugs along, you may find that your academic concerns have shifted a little bit from the beginning of the year. While you might have initially worried about settling into your classes and setting up a study routine, now the problem is staying focused and dedicated to your work when in and out of the classroom. But maintaining concentration requires mindfulness and discipline, two things that can be difficult to achieve in the middle of a long lecture or after a hard day. The key is staying active in your thoughts and behaviors. If you are fully engaged in a task, then of course, it is going to be much more difficult to break your concentration from it. So here are some suggestions to stay focused both in and out of class:
In Class:
1. Sit at the front of the room. With only the professor and blackboard or PowerPoint slides at the front of the classroom to look at, you will have a lot less to distract you from the lecture. (The middle and back of the classroom are rife with concentration-breaking activities like people snoozing, whispering, texting, or Facebooking.)
2. Be prepared. This goes without saying, but if you haven’t read the assigned texts, don’t have a notebook and pen, or haven’t written down questions to ask, you are going to lose focus in lecture very quickly. Being prepared provides you with the chance to more easily engage in the material, determine what’s most important to record and remember, and process the lecture in your mind more thoughtfully.
3. Ask or write down questions. Depending on how large the class is, you may not feel comfortable asking questions aloud, but whether you are willing to do so, or you simply writing down questions to ask later these are good methods of staying focused on the material at hand. Bonus: the more you ask questions, the more your instructor gets to know you as a motivated and engaged student.
4. Keep your body actively engaged. When you are tired or bored it is surely going to be much more difficult to concentrate, so try to engage all your senses to make sure your body is ready to focus. If you are running low on energy before class, grab a snack to refuel. In class, pop a mint or stick of gum into your mouth or drink from a cold water bottle to refresh yourself. Pull out your textbook to flip to the chapter the professor is discussing. Take out a highlighter or colorful pens and mark the most important notes in your book and notebook. Whatever you do, do not sit passively in class and hope that you’ll simply absorb the material. It won’t happen.
Out of Class (Study Sessions):
1. Choose a good study location. This doesn’t necessarily mean the most convenient one, rather the one with the fewest distractions and where you can be the most productive. For many students, this could mean somewhere other than home or the dorm room, but it is critical that wherever you work, your concentration will not be broken by noise or other activity.
2. Choose a good study time. Be sure you are studying when you are already at your most alert state. (Hint: This is probably not at 2 am.) Losing focus, getting easily distracted, falling asleep, or taking more time than usual to complete work are all risks for students who don’t study when they are the most alert. If you don’t know what your prime study time is, experiment a little bit to see when you are able to be the most productive.
3. Be prepared. Again, have everything you need to study and complete homework ready and available for yourself. Searching high and low for a pen or handout or stapler is just going to derail your focus.
4. Have a game plan for each study session. If you sit down to study without any goals, your concentration is going to be difficult to maintain. So create a list of things you want to get done during that study session. (Example: 1) read chapter 3 in biochem book, 2) make new Spanish vocab flashcards, 3) review today’s history lecture notes.) You will be more motivated to complete a “to do” list or study plan and give yourself fewer reasons to deviate from these simple tasks.
5. Change up your study activities and take regular breaks. Varying the way you study and work will allow you to maintain concentration in a number of different ways and engage you more wholly in your course material. Try to diversify each study session with unique tasks and activities. (See example above.) You’ll reduce your boredom and look forward to the next activity rather than dread another hour of staring at a dense textbook. And while you’re at it, be sure you’re taking regular breaks. For each hour you are successful at maintaining your concentration, reward yourself with a 10 minute break. Take a walk, get a snack, or skim a newspaper. And then jump right back into studying.
For more suggestions on how to maintain your concentration whether in or out of class, contact ACE!
Now is always the time to make positive changes. Have a great week! Academic Center for Excellence 2900 Student Services Building 1200 W. Harrison St. (312) 413-0031 |
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