Midterms were a slap in the face. Simple as that. I’m a sophomore in college, and this is the first real midterms week I’ve had since my senior year of high school (thank you, COVID-19). They were definitely much harder than what I was used to. On the bright side, I got my grades back this week, and I actually did pretty well, so I’m going to share some of the methods I used to keep myself motivated while still having fun-it’s college after all.
The first and probably the most important thing I did was keep myself accountable. It also helps if you have a study buddy in class, and in this case, I did. We made it a priority to understand the subject and told ourselves we could have fun after. Not only did this help me learn the class material, but I could also let loose and have fun afterward, knowing I had put in the work.
Studying right after class helped me as well. I actually learned this from my professor, and it’s an efficient method to remember class material. After class, my friend and I would work on practice problems or homework we had due for at most an hour, and of course we treated ourselves to coffee. This really helped us commit what we had just learned to memory. By the time the midterm came up, we both had solid foundations to work from.
Don’t cram!!! Studying for an hour after class twice a week was so painless compared to a late night, or should I say early morning, driven by an obscene amount of Red Bull. After doing all of these things, I walked into my midterms pretty relaxed, and I didn’t have to go in sleep deprived either. Oh, and I still did everything else I wanted to this semester, so don’t worry!