Strategies for Acing Your Finals

The time has come: the time to lock in and do whatever you can to get the grade you want. Many students have final projects, tests, and presentations coming up, and with GPAs on the line, stress levels are soaring. To help, I’ve put together a playbook for getting through finals season so you can enjoy the holidays, worry-free.?

Studying Tips?

Let’s start off by saying that the best way to study is whatever works best for you. Some people come from high school with a perfect system that has worked for years, while others have to figure out a whole new studying system, and some may even be building their system from the ground up. Frame these tips and strategies through the lens of your own proven studying success.

Study Guides

Occasionally, professors will make a study guide for the final or dedicate a class period to help students make a study guide. If you’re in that situation, make the most of it. Take the study guide and expand upon it, practice it, and use it to prepare. Add whatever you feel needs to be added and personalize it to your own needs.?

Not only will having a study guide help you focus more on certain subjects, but having most of your crucial information contained in a single document reduces anxiety compared to having to search through a series of textbooks.

Ask Questions?

Always ask questions if you’re confused. You can ask the professor, a tutor, or your peers, but always ask. If you don’t feel comfortable asking the professor during a lecture, send the professor an email or drop in during office hours. A good professor -- and all the professors in the Collins College of Business -- will be happy to help you study and learn.

Dedicate A Space to Studying?

Find a place where you can focus, but make sure to separate your space to rest from your workspace. If you don’t, not only will it be harder to focus but it also makes it harder to relax at the end of the day. For example, don’t do homework on your bed. Instead, dedicate that space to rest and find another place to fully dedicate to working -- perhaps your desk.

Time Management Tips

Managing your time wisely is crucial to a stress-free finals week. Good time management will not only help you better organize yourself, it will also help lower stress levels, get more done in less time, and as a bonus, people who have good time management skills have higher success rates when it comes to school and careers.

The process of time management consists of planning and controlling how much time you are willing to spend on a specific task. Here are some tips to help you get started with time management:

Prioritize Wisely

The most important thing with time management is being able to accurately divide your time amongst different tasks. First, figure out which tasks will require more time than others and which ones must get done first. After you do this, you need to...

Set Goals for Yourself?

Setting achievable and measurable goals will allow you to not only feel more accomplished as the day goes by, but it will help minimize the intensity of a long to-do list. Using something like the SMART Method will help you better prioritize the tasks at hand.?

...Also Set Limits for Yourself?

Try to do your tasks within a set time limit. Sometimes that is not attainable -- especially when it comes to studying or homework -- but you don’t want to invest all of your time into only studying for one of your five upcoming finals. Because of this, you should take a break from studying for one class and move on to the next. You might have to “force yourself” to get away from a certain textbook, but doing so will help your brain recalibrate when you return to it.

Plan Ahead?

The most important tip for time management is to plan ahead. If you know you have a certain number of finals coming up next week and that you need to study for all of them, plan accordingly. Allow yourself enough time to not only be able to get your work done, but enough time to take care of yourself, too.

Self-Care Tips

When a stressful time is approaching, you mustn’t forget to take care of yourself and prioritize your mental, physical and emotional health. Here are some steps to ensure that throughout this period you don’t lose your sanity:

Take Breaks & Refuel Yourself?

Part of time management is being able to allow yourself breaks in between tasks. Taking breaks has been found to improve attention; if you ever find yourself stuck on the same task in which you feel like you are not making any progress you should take a break: go on a walk, get a snack, do some stretching.?

Lead a Healthy Lifestyle?

You’ll feel more energetic and sharp during finals season if you find a healthy balance in your diet and get enough rest. Reach for an apple instead of a bag of chips, drink water, sit outside whenever you can, if you are able to walk places do it, there are little steps that we can all take to better our lifestyles. Pulling all-nighters might give you extra time to study, but your body will also regret it and your brain won’t be functioning as well as it would if you were well-rested.

Let’s ace the finals.

Finals might be coming, but so are the holidays and time with our friends and family. Work diligently so you don’t have to stress, and use these studying tips where applicable to help make the final weeks of the semester smooth sailing.?