It is the end of the summer and school already started or maybe is starting soon for you. And of course, you want to be prepared. Maybe you want to be like Rory Gilmore, who actually liked to study for hours and get good grades. Maybe you want to go to a certain school and you need good grades. In this blog post, I am sharing my tips for a new school year. These tips are from personal experience and things I’ve actually learned from Rory Gilmore.
Tips for a new school year
Make sure you bought all of your supplies
Make sure you have the right books and other supplies like pens, notebooks, diary, highlighters etc. You don’t want to be too late with buying everything last-minute. Make a list of things you really need and think you might need this year and buy them. And you definitely don’t want to be that person who has to borrow a pen every day. This will annoy your classmates and your teacher might think you are not prepared.
Plan, plan, plan
Start planning as soon as you know you will have a test soon. You do not want to be the one who studies last minute. If you have to study last minute you might forget things more easily and you have to learn everything in one day or night. It is better to make a plan and spend maybe 30 minutes studying every single. This gives you more free time, you feel less stressed and you don’t have to do everything last-minute.
Do your homework as soon as possible
If you get homework, it is tempting to do everything the night before you have that class again. But wouldn’t it be better to do your homework as soon you get home? If you postpone it, it might happen that you will forget it or something else comes up. When you do it as soon as possible, you don’t have to think about it anymore and I bet it will feel super good when you start early on your homework.
Get enough sleep every night
As a young adult, you might not care about how much sleep you get. You want to stay up late and watch some TikTok videos instead of going to bed early. But the thing I’ve learned as an adult is that getting enough sleep every night is a game-changer. I feel energized in the morning, more focused and happier. The average person needs 7-8 hours of sleep every night, but everyone is different. So figure out how much sleep you actually need to feel energized and make sure you get those hours of sleep.
No distractions
When you have a goal and you want a good grade on your test/exam, you should eliminate all of the distractions. The biggest distraction these days is obviously your phone. So put it away. You can live without your phone for a few hours. But also try to avoid other things that can distract you from doing your homework and studying. So study alone, no music if that distracts you and no other things.
Take breaks
Studying for hours is good and impressive, but don’t forget to give yourself a break. You might lose focus when you study for too long. Take a tea break, go out for a short walk to improve focus or do something else. Doing the same thing for hours can get really boring, especially when you don’t like studying. Maybe you can use the Pomodoro technique, where you study for 25 minutes and take a 5-minute break and after your little break, you study again for 25 minutes. I think you can also make your ‘pomodoros’ longer. So if you want to study for hours, you can stop after 50 minutes and then take a 10-minute break or something. The most important thing is that you take breaks every now and then. Give your brain a break from studying.
Photo by Green Chameleon on Unsplash