“Learning is not attained by chance. It must be sought for with ardor and attended with diligence.” — Abigail Adams.
If you want to know the secret to how to memorize your lesson quicker, then don’t look for
ways to memorize faster. Instead, focus on learning faster and imprinting it in your memory
for longer. Remember that when you memorize things word-by-word, you only retain them
for a short time, but when you learn them by heart, you memorize them forever. So, focus on
how to remember what you read.
The key to success lies in learning the art of how to study faster and remember more!
Being a college student can be challenging in more than one way, but it is no rocket science
that walking the path toward academic excellence can be unnerving at times. While the
pressure to be a consistent student and maintain a balance between the academic-
extracurricular dynamics can be pretty taxing, there are ways to make life easier. Once you
ace the technique of how to learn effectively, then the journey becomes smoother.
How to remember what you read:
“Remember” and not “Rote”
“Don’t byheart your lesson, learn by heart.”
― J. Tisa
Do you recall the time when you mechanically repeated your tables, one after the other, until
it got into your head and made your parents proud? Well, it worked for the little child whose
curriculum involved a limited range and did not require comprehension. However, rote
learning won’t help a college student cope with multiple topics and homework. Also, there is
always a threat of becoming blank if a sentence of your “byhearted” lesson goes off. This will
not happen if know how to remember what you read.
Rote learning can be helpful for young children where thought, exploration, and
conceptualization aren’t necessary. But for a college-level adult, launching oneself into the
real world requires real-time learning, which cannot be very healthy and sustainable with rote
learning. Therefore, your emphasis should be on how to study fast and remember everything.
Studying needs to be a thoughtful process involving freedom and not pressure. When you
constantly repeat to memorize what is written in your textbooks, you pressure your brain to
remember lines in an exact manner as they are supposed to be. This is not only dull but also
tedious, both physically and mentally. Instead, it would be best if you combined what your
textbook offers with your class lectures and your professors’ examples to create a
comprehensive learning process that is free from compulsion.
When you understand concepts and apply your knowledge to practical settings or methods in
a way that is not limited to definitions and theories, you evolve in a wholesome manner.
When you learn how to remember what you read instead of rote learning, you prepare
yourself to answer not just the familiar questions but also the unfamiliar ones.
Train your brain how to remember what you read
Start training your brain if you are wondering leor looking for ways to learn quickly. If your
brain is trained on how to remember what you read, then it will not struggle to remember
study materials. Instead, it will act like a storehouse of information that can be processed at
ease, irrespective of what the circumstances are. Create a learning strategy where your brain
is customized to conceptualize using different information or concepts your brain stores.
It is crucial to understand here that if you only focus on how to memorize your lesson quicker
in order to pass your exams, you will only remember your learning till the end of your paper.
Your aim shouldn’t be just passing your exam but also becoming ready for the practical
world, and for that, you have to learn how to learn effectively.
You should know how to memorize faster and better to clear your exams efficiently. But you
must also understand that it is equally, if not more, important to learn how to remember what
you read, as this will help you unlock the future you are going to step into after college.
A famous philosopher, Jiddu Krishnamurti, once said, “There is no end to education. It is not
that you read a book, pass an examination, and finish your education. The whole of life, from
the moment you are born to the moment you die, is a process of learning.”
Therefore, you need to learn in a way that ensures your knowledge does not disappear after a
few hours or days. Let learning be an enjoyable process to understand different theories and
laws in a way that becomes integrated with our system.
How can I learn anything quickly?
If you have repeatedly been asking yourself this question, then it is time that you introduce yourself to some tips and tricks on how to study fast and remember everything. Numerous ways can help you memorize faster, but the results won’t be productive unless you find what fits you the best. Also, only memorizing won’t work unless you pair it up with retention, as that will take you further. While some can retain information better than others, one thing is for sure- if you create the proper process, your brain will function better and become your partner. Once you are clear on your purpose, you will find a more reliable way to figure out how to remember what you read.
Check out some of the tried and tested ways to learn quickly and understand how to remember what we study for a long time:
Create your suitable environment and stick to it
Everyone has a distinct learning style and diverse comfort zones where they find maximum peace conducive to learning. While someone can find peace in a place with abundant greenery or in their room, some can find the most suitable environment when they listen to music or practically study anywhere, irrespective of decibel ranges. It is wise to find your comfort zone and choose it to explore in peace every time so that you can figure out how to remember what you read.
When you focus on how to memorize faster and better in the same comfort zone over and over again, you develop a habit of learning quickly and more efficiently. You not only remember better what you have learned but also store it in your brain for a longer duration, not limiting it to only your exams.
The mind should be relaxed so that it helps to focus your full attention on what you are learning. This will help you train your brain into a learning style where you can crack how to learn fast, along with retaining what you learned. Being at peace will also ensure that you will not just memorize lines but instead understand the different concepts in depth.
“Learn continually. There’s always ‘one more thing to learn!” — Steve Jobs.
The writing it down-creating visual stories strategy
How to remember what you read without burdening your brain?
It has been found that when you write things down, it gets imprinted better in your brain. The image of it stays put longer and more effectively than just reading it over and over again. It is advisable to make the actual effort of taking a notepad or diary and writing it down using a pen or paper. Writing points down facilitates better comprehension of different concepts, and the extra effort made to write acts like a translation of your theoretical knowledge into practical understanding. This would go a long way towards controlling what you have learned and crack how to remember what we study for a long time.
These are like little visual stories created through your notes to decode the success of how to study fast and remember everything. When you have visual inputs of what you are learning- it could be a mixture of words and images- your brain finds it more suitable to retain the multiple information you are feeding it. The clearer your notes are, the easier it will be for you to go back to them for revisions and future references.
You could use the following as add-on strategies:
- You could also create a routine with a dedicated diary or notebook, your favorite pen or pencil, blend it with your comfort zone (as read in the point above), and create your customized study tradition.
- Create sections and use colors to highlight different segments, as colors trigger a convenient memory pattern.
- Also, remember that your notes are like a study aid, so use phrases or keywords instead of complete sentences to unlock how to remember what you read.
Space out your learning
Like any organ in your body, your mind also needs time and energy to heal and remain energized. When you burden it with heavy study doses for a long time, there could be a possibility for it to break down. In your attempt to decode “how can I learn anything quickly,” you will end up torturing your brain and burdening it with too much information. Instead, if you space out your learning duration and fuel your brain with a distributed manner of information feeding, it will be easier to store and retain your knowledge.
Breaking down the different concepts into little manageable sections will help the brain process the information more conveniently. Consequently, your brain will learn how to memorize faster and better. Once you keep feeding your brain these little clusters of knowledge, repeated over a longer duration but at frequent intervals, it will turn into meaningful and constructive learning helping you understand how to remember what you read. This is in contrast to rote memorization, where you feed your brain a massive chunk of information repeatedly over a short duration, making it cram instead of comprehend.
Have recurring learning sessions repeated over time and beforehand instead of one long session the night before your exam. Studying everything at the last minute will neither help you ace your exams nor become an individual with in-depth knowledge. And remember, never stop learning because once you are too proud to know, you lose yourself! Being a comprehensive learner is essential for a sustainable career and future, as it gives you an edge over your peers and competitors. It takes you many steps further than just knowing how to remember what you read.
“Every act of conscious learning requires the willingness to suffer an injury to one’s self-esteem.
That is why young children before they are aware of their own self-importance, learn so easily.”
— Thomas Szasz.
Become a teacher
If you want to unlock the mystery of how to study faster and remember more, then become a teacher!
The easiest way to fasten your learning speed and absorb knowledge is by imparting it to someone. Of course, you could also act like a teacher in front of the mirror, but a more effective way will be to teach it in real-time to someone who needs to learn the same information. This will not only help you figure out how to remember what you read but also process and retain knowledge more smartly.
Having to teach someone would require you to put in extra effort to learn it yourself first, and in that attempt, you will end up how to remember what we study for a long time. Also, while teaching it to someone else, you could come across other perspectives or questions, which will help you familiarize yourself further with the concept. It will help your brain to look at different topics more meaningfully and show you how to remember what you read.
With this process, you will also be able to test yourself and the knowledge gained. It will not only ensure better retention of information but also act as proof of your learning. Either you know it, or you don’t, and if you don’t, while looking for the correct answer, you will ensure you never forget it again. That’s how most of our learnings from mistakes work!
Give your brain deserving breaks
As much as your brain is your powerhouse, you should remember to recharge it too. It needs to rest in a while to restore itself and process all the information that keeps coming in. Remember that it needs to process not only the college lectures and textbooks but everything that is happening around you. The right number of breaks can help boost brain health and retention. It can be your key to how to remember what you read.
Your brain deserves to rest, so combine it with a little reward for yourself too. You can set little challenges for yourself, and upon achieving them, you can reward yourself and your brain with a relaxing break. Rewards can include activities like brain exercise, general exercises, a quick nap, or engaging in some other activity where the brain is at rest. All this will help stimulate your brain cells, learn quickly, and result in greater concentration and knowledge retrieval long after study sessions have ended.
Also, it has been established through study that learning sessions before going to bed and sound sleep facilitate better learning and remembering information. It will work as a solution for how to remember what you read and also how to memorize your lesson quicker and create a sustainable learning journey.
Tying it all together: how to remember what we study for a long time
Cramming up for the exams or focusing only on how to memorize faster and better alone will not do. You have to create a learning process where your brain comprehends what you are studying and retains it for many years down the line in addition to learn quickly. The goal is to remember your learning long after the exams have been cleared and you have graduated.
When you attempt the “how to learn effectively” and not just memorize strategy, you become better at processing information and using it in practical settings. It will, of course, require training your brain in the right way and giving it the right environment to sustain. As John Dewey once said, “The most important attitude that can be found is the desire to go on learning” it is wise to value learning and respect it. You will be able to reach your goal of decoding how to remember what you read and also retain it for long.
Use the tips shared and create your ideal learning strategy and understand how to learn fast, but remember to learn it by heart and not cram up the lessons. When you focus on understanding how to remember what you read, you create a success story for yourself. Hence in order to master how to remember what you read and learn quickly save this article for future reference.0
