Vermont Republic Second Vermont Republic
There comes a time in your life where you just have to sit down and start studying for your SAT. That can be really stressful and keeping your mind focused is not an easy task. Whenever you have to do something it is hard to just put your whole energy into it and the tips your friends give you don’t always work.
If you want to do your best on your exams and SAT, you need to change your habits and follow a simple guideline that will keep all the distractions away.
These tips will help you relax and focus, not just for your exams, but for everything you need to do in life. They can be used when you are studying when you are preparing your SAT when you have a huge pile of documents to sort out when you work or even for reading your favorite book.
Prepare the Environment
Let’s start with the most obvious one. Some people remember things better when there is some background noise and some people want to read and study in complete silence.
Both options are okay as long as you can keep yourself focused. If you prefer a quiet environment, go to the library or make your room the study space. If you want some noise, then you can go to your favorite coffee shop.
Make sure there is enough room for all of your books, laptop, and coffee or snacks. Things should not be on top of each other so you don’t waste time moving things around.
Limit Distractions
The biggest distractions are our phones. We get notifications, messages, updates and we have to check and see what’s the notification. While you are studying for your SAT, try and keep your phone away.
Everything you may need is already on your laptop and you can check all the notifications when you take a break. Put the phone in your purse or backpack and forget about it.
If you are a type of person that can forget about the time when they open their favorite website, you can use a website blocker that won’t let you check things that are not a part of your studying plan.
Take Regular Breaks
Learning everything in one sitting is impossible. If you want to learn things and remember them, you need to give yourself enough time. People who say that you should study for 8 hours straight are not right. You may learn something and that information may stay in your brain for the exam, but you will not remember anything after a week.
Because of that, you need to take short and longer breaks. Get up and move around every 45-60 minutes, get a cup of coffee or tea and continue preparing for your SAT. Take longer 30 to 60-minute breaks every 3 to 4 hours.
With regular breaks, you will be able to maintain focus for a longer period of time and you will be able to spend more time studying. If you start preparing for your exams at least a month before the test you will be able to divide the time, spend fewer hours studying every day and still get the results you wanted.
Listen to Relaxing Music
Did you know that the right type of music can help you focus and boost your memory? Studies show that people who listen to music while learning new things are more likely to remember them.
Depending on the type of music you like, you should make a playlist that will play in the background and that will help you relax. Stress makes us less focused and when you are too stressed you cannot remember new things.
The easiest way to remove at least part of the stress you are feeling while studying is to listen to music. You can opt for rap music, classical or chillout tunes. You can even choose your favorite songs as long as the lyrics don’t distract you.
You can sit down and create your favorite playlist, but if you don’t want to spend too much time choosing songs, you can use websites like this Chillout radio station that already has their own relaxing songs playlists.
Pro Tips
After you’ve found the right spot and the right music, now it’s time to sit down and really tackle that material.
For your overall SAT studying you need to eliminate the wrong answers. That way you won’t get confused by them and you will only remember the correct stuff. When you make a mistake, try your best to understand the root of it and why you made the mistake in the first place.
When you start reading section, pay attention to connotation and context and use the find the evidence questions to your advantage.
There are several strategies you can use to read the passages. They include:
- Skim the Passage First
- Skip Straight to the Questions
- Read the Passage in Full
No matter what you are reading or for what kind of exam you are preparing, don’t ever ignore the passage instructions. There is so much valuable information there and if you just skip it, you will have a harder time understanding the text.
Get your pen next to you and underline key parts of the question. This goes for every question and every subject, even math. That way it will be easier for you to remember things and you will focus on what is important.
Take your time to understand the question and to understand the answer. The easiest way to understand something is to try and explain it to someone else. You can study with a partner for this, tell your parents to listen to you or if you don’t want to include anyone else, you can try and explain things to your dog.
When you say things out loud, you will realize what you know and what you don’t know. That way you will focus on the things you don’t really know and you can just skim through the material you are familiar with.
Follow these tips for everything that you need to learn and for every exam you should take, SAT included. Take your time, relax and everything will be fine.
