I have several rules in my life, few of them specifically for studying. I am sharing them below, hoping you will benefit from the same:

 

# 1 Study while you study, play while you play

• Don’t mix your studies with chatting with your friend, or listening to a song, or watching a viral video.
• A study has confirmed that it takes an average of about 25 minutes (23 minutes and 15 seconds, to be exact) to return to the original task after an interruption.
• Don’t let your focus break by the notification on your phone.

# 2 Take notes wherever possible

• Your brain is not like a hard disk where data remains intact once you have stored it. Within an hour, you forget an average of 50% of the information you received, which increases to 90% by the end of the week.
• During the exams, the notes you have taken during class are going to be your savior. And it is not just for the exams; it will remain with you forever.

# 3 Revise the concepts often

• If you are studying for an exam, revision is the most important thing.
• If you have revised the concepts in 5 repetitions (first repetition – Within a day, Second repetition – After a few days, Third repetition – After a week, Fourth Repetition – After a month, and Fifth Repetition – After a few months), you will permanently remember 95% of the information

# 4 Practice different types of questions

• Your learning actually completes when you can apply a concept to a real-life problem.
• Don’t just learn the formula; try to understand the logic behind it.
• Practicing a variety of questions not only reinforces the learned concepts, but also you remember the concepts for a long-time.

# 5 Don’t just depend on coaching

• Coaching institutes will help and guide you, but you will never learn until you study and practice on your own.
• Don’t spend your entire day making trips to the school and coaching.
• Keep a good chunk of time for your self-study, and you will realize you might be going ahead than coaching students.

I am not boasting when I am saying that I qualified IIT-JEE (AIR 2752), GATE (AIR 21), and CAT (99.19 percentile) based on self-study. I bought coaching materials and joined their All-India Test Series but never enrolled in their classroom programme.

It is not true that you can’t crack competitive exams without coaching. With a proper mindset and strategy, and self-study, it is definitely possible.

Be confident and apply these golden study rules, and you will succeed in every exam of your life.

  -Krishna Khandelwal,IIM,IIT