Developing effective study skills will naturally promote and enhance your learning experience, and can lead to a impressive grades. Taking study breaks allows the brain time to order and organize the information you are learning in small manageable chunks that can then be located and recalled at a future date.
The Study Break Process
Breaks should be taken before we begin feeling overwhelmed or fatigued. Study breaks keep your body and brain fresh in ways that will improve long-term memory and help better categorize the information you are learning for more effective memory recall.
Study for 25 minutes
Studies have shown time and again that the human brain cannot fully concentrate on a specific topic for extended periods of time over 20 to 25 minutes. Even though throughout your study regime you may feel as though you are still within your learning zone – you may in fact be slowly moving out of your zone, becoming gradually less focused and productive as the minutes tick by.
We naturally tend to remember and recall most of the information we learn at the beginning and at the very end of our study chunks. If you extend your study chunks to over 60 minutes, the information studied within the middle of that time period is likely to be misplaced or forgotten.
Take a Break for 5 minutes
Your breaks should be no longer than around 5 minutes. You don’t want to distract yourself from your studies. Your breaks should be utilized in ways that will settle your mind and effectively allow you to integrate the information you have learned. Try to avoid television or other mind-consuming activities during your breaks.
Conduct a Review for 5 minutes
When you get back to your studies it is critical that you do a quick review of the material you studied during your most recent study chunk. This will further help to assimilate this subject into your long-term memory storage banks and assist you in creating strong associations to existing information within your brain.
