Have you ever had a class where all those long nights of (attempting to) studying just aren’t paying off for you? Well, at this midpoint in the semester, there is still time to salvage what’s left. An extremely helpful alternative to boring old studying in bed (which eventually leads to surfing social networks or sleeping) is a study group! It personally took me a while to figure out just how huge of a help it is, but the difference between learning and remembering by yourself and doing it with others can make quite the difference. Here is how to organize and execute a study group:
1. Find Out Who You Want To Put In Your Group
I know I can’t be the only one who lost all faith in group work during these college years. The truth of the matter is, people are lazy. They want you to do all the work, cancel nearly every meeting you have with each other and even have the nerve to want to take credit for all that work you did when it is finally due. But get those negative thoughts out of your mind! The beauty of study groups is that you get to pick who you want in your group. Aha, yes! It is not assigned. So if you decide you want to bring people who make awesome grades along with you, perfect. And if you decide you want people who aren’t doing so well in the class to study with you, so be it, what better way to come up than with others. It is super easy to connect with students through the class list online, it should include everyone’s emails. And if not, just ask for people’s numbers!
2. Set a Time
A good app for getting this figured out with your group members is GroupMe. With GroupMe it can be a super easy task to stay connected and it even has a calendar for the group that can send out notifications of when important dates are approaching. This way you can easily pick out a time and place that is convenient to everyone so you guys can take the next step towards an awesome grade.
3. Be strict
We live in a time when our cell phones are pretty much an additional organ attached to the outside of our bodies. Yes, they’re awesome and perfect for curing boredom, but a study group is not the time nor place to constantly be scrolling through your feeds or chatting through texts. Try to keep it to the minimum so that you guys can get as much studying in as possible. You can learn a lot more when you aren’t distracted,
4. Make it fun
There are a plethora of ways that you can make studying fun. Whether it be through matching games, vocab jeopardy or even plain old asking each other questions, having fun can make the group more interactive, After all, the whole point of the study session is for it to have a better outcome than studying alone gives you. So come up with ideas as a group, try to discuss it beforehand, and see where it goes. Maybe even plan to stop by Starbucks or your nearest coffee shop before the session as a group and get some delicious caffeine and treats. Either way, try your hardest to make it a successful experience that you’ll want to do again!
HCXO!