Study distractions can have a major effect on the productiveness and quality of your study.
Here are some important tips to ensure your study time is concentrated and effective:
- Choose an appropriate study space that works for you and make sure you are comfortable… but not too comfortable! Can you control the temperature and the noise levels so they aren’t a distraction? If not, then shift and choose another study space
- Alerts and reminders – these can be useful tools for organising your time, however if they are not helping your study and breaking your concentration – mute them, temporarily disable them or switch them off
- Tiredness is a distraction and makes study inefficient – for example it’s better to take a 20 minute power nap and study effectively for 20 minutes – instead of spending 40 minutes struggling though your work and not remembering a thing
- Hunger is a distraction – grab a couple of Brazil nuts to power you through until it’s time to devote your mind to thinking about meals and food. Brazil nuts are an excellent source of healthy fats and protein – perfect brain food!
- Avoid multi-tasking – multitasking while you are studying doesn’t work. Multi-tasking is inefficient as it takes time and energy to switch between tasks and refocus your mind. While it can work for tasks that don’t require any thinking – it is a killer if you need to retain information afterwards or produce something of quality. If something pops into your brain that leads to another task, then write it down on a list for later
- Reward concentration – rewards can be really uplifting and motivating. Set yourself goals of concentrating for certain periods and reward yourself once you have achieved these goals. It will soon become routine
- Out of sight – out of mind. Minimising unrelated chat and games on devices is an easy one. Put them away and use them as rewards for concentration.
Happy studying everyone! Now get back to it!