Table of Contents
Becoming a straight ‘A’ student is a goal that many aspire to achieve, and it’s entirely attainable with the right approach.
Are your grades seeking for redemption?
Do you read but it still isn’t evident in your grades and you are wondering what’s missing?
Are you wondering how your straight-A classmates do it?
Are you Looking for how to jumpstart your G.P.A?
Then walk with me, as we go through:
A breakthrough approach to acing assignments, from quizzes and exams to essays and papers and becoming an A student.
Academic Excellence is not impossible for anyone that truly knows what took him/her to school.
The reason why a student fails is not that they have dull brains but they lack simple knowledge on how to make good grades and are sometimes, too lazy to apply simple learning principles.
These principles are the Unconventional Strategies Real College Students Use to Score High While Studying Less.
Most college students believe that straight As can only be achieved through cramming and painful all-nighters. But that’s not true, real straight-A students don’t study harder—they study smarter.
I can authoritatively state that the rules for making excellent results are not difficult and are still the same.
However, this article is going to reveal these rules and proven study secrets used by real straight-A students.
16 SECRETS TO BECOMING AN “A” STUDENT
Be Present in Class
Always try to be present in class for lectures and ensure your mind joins you to class. You can be in class and your mind is somewhere else. It is as good as you not being there.
Focus and pay proper attention while learning. Some people ace their exams by just being present in class even without reading so much.
Sometimes the lecturer even gives out A.O.C and some of his potential questions in class and if you miss it, you’ve missed it.
When you are present in class, it enables you to assimilate faster while reading or going over it again during your study time.
If you can recall your lecture experience while reading or writing exams, you can easily integrate, understand and remember what a lecturer teaches you.
Take Notes
Even while you are in class with your rapt attention, your hands and pen should learn to be working as well.
They say the pen enables you to recall better than the brain. Do not rely on your brain. Learn to jot things down and take note of certain key points.
There are vital points a lecturer may give while explaining a topic that may not be in the material for the course.
Often times the lecturer’s questions come from these key points. If you can record the lecture, where it is allowed, you can go ahead as well.
Extra tutorial for difficult courses
You may not be good in every course. Some courses would definitely be more tasking for you that some others. Look out for the courses that are tough.
Pick out those courses and get someone to teach you how to conquer those courses. Get some extra tutorial from those who ace the courses.
This may be your coursemate, senior-level student or a tutor. Better still it could even be online video lectures.
Forming a serious study group where you all share ideas with your group mates would also go a long way for you.
Understand your lecturers and courses
Every course should be taken seriously but courses with higher units can easily increase your cumulative grade points so give them the necessary attention.
Don’t take your lecturers for granted and don’t become too familiar and disrespect them. Learn to understand your lecturers and question style.
When you do, you can easily tell where their questions would most likely come from and this would always give you an edge.
I am sure you have some classmates whose predictions about the exam questions are always correct. Well, they have studied the courses and lecturers.
Prepare for the grades you want
Plan and prepare for the kind of grades you want to have in every course. Like I said- plan and also make sure to prepare
Because you can plan to get an A from now till tomorrow but if you don’t prepare for it, you’re only deceiving yourself. If your mind is planing for a “C”, your performance cannot be ” A”.
In fact funny enough you would probably not even get that C but end up getting a D. That’s what happens when you place your mind and preparation on settling for a C.
If you also have the intention of copying from others, the things you study cannot get into your head. Prepare like you have no one else but you.
Get necessary learning materials
Buy necessary learning materials, practical and non-practical tools for learning. If your learning materials are always available, you will always learn with rest of mind.
Don’t waste your cash on frivolities. There is nothing like ‘too many textbooks’. Make use of all of the materials needed to ease your understanding.
Do not rely on lecturers materials and your notes alone. With other learning materials, you can try to be ahead of the teacher and have a better understanding of topics taught.
Be committed to a personal reading time table
Have a personal reading time-table and be committed to it. Make personal notes while studying.
Do your assignments early and properly. Don’t start preparing for exams only when it’s close. Have a personal reading time table at the beginning of the semester.
Start preparations early and try to follow examination instructions and submit your script immediately you are asked to.
Avoid Procrastination
You’re also going to have to overcome your urge to procrastinate because scheduling your work is meaningless if you don’t actually work in the time you set aside.
Carefully check your friends that are straight-A students you would realize they do not procrastinate like you.
They do their assignments, project work and seminars just in time and read what they plan to. You can’t be a straight-A student if you keep on procrastinating all the time.
You have to get a hold of your lifestyle and avoid procrastination and it would help you not just academically but all round.
Self-discipline
You can’t stop procrastinating if you lack self-discipline. So, to deal with procrastination which is the thief of time, you need to imbibe a good level of self-discipline.
Human beings are creatures of habit. Therefore, form a habit of doing what you believe you should do.
Is it not foolish for your behaviour to contradict your own reasoning? And what could be more harmonious than finding yourself wanting to do what you know you should?
So, discipline yourself and do what needs to be done when it needs to be done. Discipline yourself to stick to your personal time table.
Discipline yourself to read every day. Train yourself so there is an immediate reaction-mechanism within you.
Know what works for you
Different reading styles work for different people. We all don’t assimilate the same way. Some people can study with music, some can’t. Some prefer using the writing method.
Some prefer memorising and talking, some prefer explaining or teaching someone else(you would think they are trying to help you but they are just helping themselves).
So, understand yourself and Study in ways that are suited to you. Study with a group or alone based upon which is really best for you.
Do your most strenuous and important work during those times of the day that you work best.
Manage your time
Time management is critical-it’s a skill that you absolutely must develop over the course of your time at college.
A common complaint of students is that they never seem to have enough time to finish all of their work.
They vent about how many hours they spend-late nights reviewing in the library, the weekends sacrificed, but no matter how hard they try, there always seems to be something else due.
This is often caused by pseudo-working. Learn to manage and use your time wisely. When you do, you would begin to do much more within the same available time.
Avoid pseudo-working
Pseudo-working is the most common approach to studying where the student spends long stretched hours and extra hours into the night studying.
But, because of a lack of focus and concentration, doesn’t actually accomplish much.
It’s not who spends 20 straight hours reading that ends up being the best student. If you check well you most likely read more than many straight-A students.
The problem here is not the number of available hours, but rather how each hour is spent.
Pseudo working only burns you out and cripples your brains focus and understanding capacity thereby wasting your time.
Increase the intensity of focus
You can manage your time and avoid pseudo working by increasing your focus intensity. You would gain efficiency by compressing work into focused bursts.
The straight-A approach maximizes intensity in order to minimize time. You can read for 10hrs but only assimilate 3hrs out of that 10 because that’s when your brain was able to focus.
The work that took you all day to complete could instead be finished by studying an hour after breakfast, an hour after lunch, and an hour after dinner. The rest of the day being free for you to relax.
Only when you know this would you begin to understand why many straight-A students actually study less than their classmates.
They replace long, low-intensity stretches of work with a small number of short, high-intensity sessions.
So learn to spread out the intense work sessions so that you have time in between to recharge. This requires basic time-management skills.
Plan carefully & choose good study locations
We all have the time and place where we assimilate better. I for one assimilate better at night and in a quiet environment.
Some others might prefer during the day or a rowdy environments as a quiet environment can probably bore them up.
To obtain the highest possible levels of intensity, you need to choose the right locations, times of day, and durations to study.
If you aren’t careful about how you select these three factors, you can unintentionally sabotage your ability to focus. This requires a smart planning strategy.
By placing yourself in distracting environments and insisting on working in long tedious stretches, you only cripple your brain’s ability to think clearly and efficiently accomplish the task at hand.
The result is fatigue, headaches and lacklustre outcomes. So make sure you study in a place where you can actually study and be focused.
Read to Understand
Overall, there is one basic trait that distinguishes “A students” from those that are not and that is:
Successful students force themselves to understand. They just don’t read to pass but read to be able to understand fully.
With the use of an internal barometer formed from experience, they try to detect the slightest lack of understanding, be it ignorance or confusion.
And, if they realize they do not, then the situation is viewed as unacceptable, and more effort is the response.
Summarize or outline the course or text material in your own words because being able to pour out the same knowledge in your own words often shows that you understand.
More so, writing a summary not only forces you to examine the subject matter in detail but provides a compendium to review just prior to the exam.
Pray
Finally, commit your academics to God’s hands. Always pray as if you can’t help yourself to make it and read as if you have not prayed.
Whether you work hard or smart, you need an element of grace and favour to get ahead in life.
No matter how much you read you need God’s help to enjoy man’s (lecturers) favour and good faith.
This is very important. So, understand that your prayer is as good as your work and vice versa.
ALSO READ:
USA Short Courses for International Students 2023/2024
Effective Time Management Strategies for Students
Top 9 Educational Websites and Blogs for Indian Students
Leave a Reply