These are my notes from Marty Lobdells hour-long Study Less, Study

Smart lecture, which is on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=IlU-zDU6aQ0

Lecture is broken down into 7 main tips:

1. Break studying down into chunked sessions
2. Create a dedicated study area
3. Study actively (and sleep well)
4. Take smart notes and expand on them right after class
5. Summarize/teach what you learn
6. Use your books correctly - SQ3R method
7. Use mnemonics to study effectively

Break studying down into chunked sessions

How long can a typical freshman read and retain what theyre
learning?
o Med students reported 4-5 hours - not typical
o Avg of UMich study: 25-30 minutes for both

Reading
Lectures
o Classes are 50 minutes, but most learning will only happen in
first 30
Study more is not helpful advice
Efficiency tapers off after 20-30 minutes
o After that, its just wasted time
The fix? Take breaks.
o The moment you start to slide, youre shoveling against the
tide."
o Taking a 5 minute FUN break resets the session and brings your
efficiency back up
We tend to do more of what is reinforced and rewarded
o Less of what is punished, ignored, or ineffective
Reinforce study sessions with breaks and FUN REWARDS once
the whole thing is done
o As you do this, youre training yourself to study and your
sessions can start becoming longer.

Create a dedicated study area

Who has a true study?"
o Most students study in bedrooms, kitchen or dining tables, or
common areas
o In bedroom, bed starts to call like Greek sirens
The context/environment largely determines the action youll take
o example: questions asked in class

If asked to group, you raise your hand

If asked to you, you respond verbally
This response is pretty much automatic, because youre
conditioned to do it
University of Hawaii study

o Biggest study problem: We cant get into it."
 o Experiment - lamp in dorm room gets label, Study lamp"

desk turned away from bed

That desk, and lamp, is now only used for studying
When studying, lamp goes on.
At first sign of distraction, lamp goes OFF and student
walks away
Those who did this had an avg. 1.0 GPA increase over
control group
Music - should be truly background noise.

o Dont be trading your attention between studying and singing
along

Aside about application

If it doesnt change your behavior, you havent learned it"
Try at least 1 or 2 things you learn from this, else its useless

Study actively (and sleep well)

The more active you are in your learning, the more effective youll
be."

o Studying is NOT reading over and over - rote memorization can
work for some, but for most of us its ineffective
Best way to study - ask yourself, What am I learning?

o Concepts - What does this bone do in the body?"
o Facts - Whats the name of this bone?"
Most professors are concerned that you learn concepts.

o Once grasped, they stay with you forever
o Facts can fade away, by contrast
o
But we have Google to look them up again
o Martys daughter knew all the lyrics to a song, but didnt know
what it was about. Facts vs concepts
However, teachers test over both facts and concepts

o To learn both , put the concept IN YOUR OWN WORDS
o If you cant, you dont understand it!
Martys memory test - which string of letters can you remember
better?

o YTHURSPHDAAYP
o HAPPYTHURSDAY
o Same letters, different order - one has actual meaning
Deep application vs. superficial thinking

o Marty asked one group to count number of vowels in each of 30
words
o Other group was asked to evaluated usefulness of each in a
survival situation
 o Short-term memory (about 20-30 seconds) was then dumped
with name/date/phone number exercise
o Afterwards, students were asked how many of the 30 words
they recalled
o
Vowel-counting group: 5/30
Survival-usefulness group: 10/30
What is the meaning of meaning?"

o Something is meaningful if it relates to something you
ALREADY KNOW
o
Its like a file system or database - new entries are easier
to find if they have data that links to already existing entries
Teachers try to add meaning to concepts through:

o Stories
o Examples
o But these dont always work for you, so you must work to tease
out meaning for yourself
How to tease out meaning

o Study groups
o
multiple people = seeing problems from different angles
o Dont make highlighting mistakes
o
Highlighting can be dangerous. You highlight when
reading, then come back and see the highlighted sections and
say, I remember that!"
Recollection vs. Recognition

its very easy to confuse simple recognition for
actual recollection.
Look at an old magazine youve seen before -
youll probably recognize the ads and picture
but unless you can PREDICT whats on the next
page, you dont actually recall whats in the mag
Same with highlighted text - you recognize it from
before, but can you recall it truly?

this is the danger of highlighting - if you
confuse recognition for recall, and youve highlighted
the most important facts in the text, then YOU DONT
STUDY THE MOST IMPORTANT FACTS!
A better way - test yourself. Challenge your recall

This is active learning
You also need to sleep well

o Brain science is revealing that REM cycles are crucial for
consolidating and storing memories
o
 Lack of sleep = studying sabotage

Take smart notes and expand on them right after class

Taking notes is vital, but...

o ASAP after class, you should try to expand on them so theyre
more efficiently encoded.
o
This puts things in your own words
Only takes about 5 minutes per class, and you save so
much study time later
This can be considered increasing Learning Efficiency in
my study time equation
If youre fuzzy on a concept, ask a classmate to see their notes, or ask
the professor

o Go to office hours, or ask for clarification at the start of the
next class

Summarize/teach what you learn

Best way to learn is to teach others

o reinforces learning
o true test of whether you understand material
o
will reveal gaps in your knowledge
No person to teach? Record a podcast or video! Or speak it to an
empty chair
Or summarize by writing it.

o Your own words = effective summarization
80% of your study time is best spend reciting - only 20% should be
spent reading."

Use your books correctly - SQ3R method

Textbooks are a powerful tool

o Designed for pedagogy - helping you learn
Martys recommended reading method: SQ3R

o Survey
o Question
o Read
o Recite
o Review
I (and Cal Newport) dont think its necessary to stick to this system -
its time consuming

o However, individual pieces can be useful
o
Survey - also can be known as read backwards - go
to end of chapter, note vocab and review questions
 This primes your brain to pick these things out when
reading or scanning

Use mnemonics to study effectively

Mnemonics are great for memorizing facts - better than rote
memorization

o Acronyms
o
ROY G. BIV
Radeo - right deoxygenated"

Right atrium of heart pumps deoxygenated blood"
o Coined sayings
o
In 1492, columbus sailed the ocean blue"

Rhymes are memorable
o Interacting images (Martys favorite"
o
The weirder or more emotionally evocative, the better
Sinkhole to hell with weird demon fish popping out of it -
Helsinki, capital of Finland (fish have fins)

This is one of mine
Car has 4 wheels, and pro circuit cars still have 4 wheels

Car - carbohydrate and pro - protein - each
have 4 calories per gram
Cat has 9 lives - rich dude is a Fat cat - fat has 9
calories per gram