As much as we would like to deny it, finals are right around the corner and the fall semester is coming to an end. As we struggle to pay attention in class with the help of caffeine, we sometimes rest our heads down in our textbook to take a nap. This article, from the online site artofmanliness, stated that individuals who can keep their attention for longer periods of time would perform better on all kinds of cognitive challenges than people who can't. Think of your brain as a muscle that you want to work out in the body. There are no shortcuts to getting that six pack or to get those huge biceps. There are 11 exercises that are given by Brett and Kate McKay. Let's use them to chug through the rest of the semester and finish our finals with a flourish!
1) Increase the Strength of your Focus Gradually
The “Pomodoro Method” is to study for 45 minutes straight and then having a 15 minute break. This is repeated as long as needed. If this is too hard, however, you can increase the strength of your focus gradually. First start off with five minutes of straight concentration. Take a two minute break and repeat this process. Everyday, you add another 5 minutes to your focused work time and 2 minutes to your break time. This helps build up your stamina and ability to focus for a longer period of time.
2) Distraction List
The hardest part of studying is when your mind starts to wander and you want to look up the information on your phone. However, once we get distracted, it takes on average 25 minutes to return to our original task. This article recommends that the best method to maintain your attention is to write down your question on a piece of paper and form a list. This will keep your attention and drain less of your precious brain energy as there’s less shifting of your attention.
3) Build your willpower!
Form a goal and finish it! For example, write out a realistic schedule of what to do during a short amount of time. If you know an assignment will only take 25 minutes, finish it within that time! Don’t extend the time required to finish it by 45 minutes just because you’re distracted.
4) Meditate
Meditating can keep you calm and collected. It will boost your attention span significantly and it only takes about 10-20 minutes of your day to change your mindset.
5) Practice Mindfulness throughout the day
Take time to focus on the things you take for granted throughout the day. Take time to chew and taste the flavors of the foods you enjoy. Smell the fragrances and odors of everything around you. Push back the distractions and focus all your senses on one task at hand. This activity will help you increase your attention and decrease all distractions.
6) Exercise your Body
Although it may be tempting to take a nap or watch Netflix and binge on snacks before studying, it may be better to take a couple laps at Halas! Research showed that students who engaged in moderate physical exercise before taking a test that measured attention spans performed better than students who didn't. Exercise your body before exercising your mind!
7) Memorize Stuff...Other Stuff!!
I know college students can be overwhelmed with the amount of concepts and theories to memorize and a tip to memorize more can seem counter-intuitive, but it’s not! Make it a goal to memorize one poem or a verse of text per week. It’s a great way to exercise the muscles in your brain.
8) Read Long Stuff Slowly
Although it may be tempting to skim through documents, slow down and read them slowly. This trains your mind to pay attention to long articles. Try and read one or two long articles a week!
9) Stay Curious
The more curious you are, the great your stamina of concentration will be. While reading your textbook, try and do active reading. Ask questions while you’re reading the textbook so it pushes you to read the next section.
10) Practice Attentive Listening
Get your information from lectures that your professor gives out! Put away your phone and listen as attentively as possible. Not only are you increasing your concentration but you’re learning the material from the professor who is the one that writes out your exam!
11) Perform Concentration Exercises
Boost your focus by performing concentration exercises. Commit to solely increasing your brain’s concentration by doing exercises. These can be found online or there’s a ton of apps!
Let's take a step back and look at the bigger picture. We only have a month left of school. Three weeks if we don't count finals. Two weeks and a half if we don't count Thanksgiving Break. Let's use the concept of selective attention we learned in class and turn up our signals for lectures and assignments and turn down the noise for our phones, TVs, and forms of social media.
I cannot believe how fast this semester has passed! In two weeks and a half, not counting Thanksgiving Break, we will be going through finals, and then before we know it, we will be celebrating New Years. Although I have not yet done all eleven of these exercises, I have done most, and they do help. With all of the technology that is now available to us, the amount of distractions has increased tremendously! I watched this video on TED talks the other day. It is a talk given by Ariel Garten, a psychotherapist who wants us to "know ourselves": she believes that with all this technology, we lose ourselves in the midst of it. In order to do this, she came up with an app that helps us understand ourselves (i.e. patterns of stress, relaxation, and focus). It would not surprise me that in the future these types of apps will be used to help us concentrate better, and to better understand our stress patterns as well as our attention/ focus patterns. Of course, exercising should always be part of our schedule, though it may be difficult because of school and work.
ReplyDeleteTED Talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/ariel_garten_know_thyself_with_a_brain_scanner#t-882875
Great tips! The topic loosely reminds me of a study in my Cognitive Psychology class last semester that involved color and word meaning. I think it may prove useful to some! My group applied the findings in the small sample experiment to a method of studying where people highlight their notes. We concluded that highlighting text in different colors is helpful only if there is a coding method at work with the coloration. In other words, color will become a distraction to memorization when several colors that have no relevant, assigned meaning mark up a large portion of the page. However, when practiced properly, highlighting your notes is helpful and can serve as a visual aid to organizing information.
ReplyDeleteGood luck on your finals everyone!