<p>Why is it that during the week we get to study for finals that all college students seem to decide that, that is the only time to study? It’s really not ideally wouldn’t reviewing material all throughout the semester be ideal? I don’t get it! So by the time finals rolls around, all one should really have to do is review new material and just spend a little time reviewing review sheets or practice tests or something I don’t get how people can expect to review a semester of chem in just a week or even two weeks unless they had been studying all semester? Is it just a time thing…that there just isn’t time for this?</p>
<p>I wanna know the absolute best way to study for my classes. I studied for chem 3 weeks in advanced and did not feel like it was enough. </p>
<p>But some classes are so easy to grasp that reviewing once every two weeks is all that is needed, any extra time spent isn’t necessary I just don’t know how to approach studying anymore!</p>
<p>Then people have test back to back to back. Finals week is just a week people take tests I don’t get why everyone chooses then to study?</p>
<p>At risk of stating the obvious: because they procrastinate.</p>
<p>If you’re asking why people procrastinate, well, it’s much easier to say I’m going to go out with my friends now and study later, then to say I’m going to study now and not go out with my friends.</p>
<p>I’m sure time is part of it. Sometimes people are involved in a lot of activities or have jobs or have homework assignments or projects or papers, and they don’t necessarily have time to study for every class every day. The free time they do have, they probably would rather spend with friends or relaxing or decompressing from everything else that’s going on. And people procrastinate.</p>
<p>Sure, logically, it’s better to study throughout the quarter. But it doesn’t always happen, and then all of a sudden it’s finals week and everyone has to catch up on what they put off before. For some people, it’s because they’re busy during the rest of the term keeping up with all of their other work. For others, it’s because they’re lazy. Some don’t like to review the material until right before the exam so they won’t forget it.</p>
<p>As long as it works, I say do whatever you want. I learned all of o-chem in a weekend, and I still got an A. Don’t fix it if it’s not broken.</p>
<p>Because some people want the rest of the semester for more time to do other things? It’s a great idea, ideally, but I can imagine genuinely studying from the beginning of the semester can burn someone out and would also be really time-consuming. </p>
<p>And unlike some students, other students have other responsibilities such as work or leadership positions that’ll take up a lot of time too during the week too. </p>
<p>And on top of that, some teachers give study guides or “materials to focus on” guides only during midterm/exam week. </p>
<p>Basically, I think starting from the beginning of the semester = too time-consuming. Yes, I do want time to hang out with my friends, work, participate in clubs, do an internship, etc. rather than do nothing but study. I don’t want to be a robot. I’ve had no problem with cramming everything in the last week. Honestly, if there’s an uber difficult class, I self-study that a bit earlier. It’s a semester-by-semester basis depending on the difficulty of material and exams.</p>
<p>Probably depends on what you came to study. If you actually need to learn something and not just pass exams, you should keep up with your studies through the semester as cramming over a weekend will leave you with very little.</p>
<p>First of all me just say, people DO study all semester long for Finals. However, we would still need to know and study the present materials. Second, I don’t seem to have any problem reviewing a semester worth of stuff for 1-2 weeks. Mainly because I occasionally review the course throughout the year + one of my course “build-up” their exams.</p>
<p>If you’re wondering why people wait till the last possible week? Cause that’s the best time to do it. Some people tend to do well when feeling the urgency of what is to come. No doubt that this leads to some people to become quite stressful.</p>
<p>There are multitude of reasons why people choose to study at this point in time. I wouldn’t assume they didn’t studied all semester long.</p>
<p>I agree that it depends on the semester and that everyone has different things going on. Personally, I feel that I AM studying by giving my professor my undivided attention during class and reviewing my notes right before and after class. I don’t sit down for an hour and quiz myself and review everything throughly, but I do think about it, even if only subconsciously. </p>
<p>Of course you study a few days before regular tests throughout the year, and finals really aren’t too different. They’re just more involved if they’re cumulative, but in theory you should already have a good hold on the material you were already tested on. I agree that professors sometimes only give you good guidelines around finals week anyway, so that’s also an important factor in why people do it then. </p>
<p>Cramming works for a lot of people, so good for them. If studying throughout the semester works better for you, then good for you as well. There isn’t one right way to approach it. It completely depends on the person.</p>
<p>You’re studying for finals the entire semester by default, assuming that you study to begin with. You’re learning the material as you go along, and studying it as you learn it.</p>
<p>Personally, I don’t have time to go back and review the chapter 1 material when I have the chapter 4 test coming up. </p>
<p>I don’t really find studying for finals during the last couple weeks to be all that burdensome. Is it a little bit more stressful than any other typical week in college? Yes, but that’s just because it’s the culmination of what you’ve been working towards the entire semester. Most of my classes involve material that builds on top of old material, so it’s not really like I’m able to forget about the stuff from the beginning of the semester. </p>
<p>I started studying for my final for General Chemistry I about 3-4 days before the final and I aced it. If you’re actually learning that material, reviewing for the final should be little more than a refresher. If you’re actually having to ‘relearn’ the material, then you need to reevaluate your learning/study strategies altogether.</p>
<p>That’s a good point, comfortablycurt. Subjects that build off their formerly-learned material are hard to “relearn.” I’m sure this is the case for math, and I know personally that it’s true for languages. When you get down to the more advanced grammar, they actual use endings and contexts similar to simpler ones, so you already “studied” by learning the simpler tenses.</p>
<p>I think most students do study all semester long for finals - or rather, they study for the class. The studying that takes place during or right before finals week is mostly review. If you haven’t been studying the material to some extent all semester, no amount of cramming is going to save you.</p>
<p>Technically you are studying all semester long for finals. In my opinion, doing homework, reading the material, taking quizzes and tests is considered studying. Then for finals week, all you really need is a refresher of the material; read over stuff or do problems that you don’t quite understand to help a little more.</p>
<p>Also, why would someone want to study 24/7? People have more things to do than study. People have jobs, families, recreational activities that they also need to attend to.</p>
<p>To answer the OP’s question, because I would forget the material. I have to study non-stop starting 3 days before the final. Any earlier than that I would forget and it would not help. I do, however, listen in class and do all my reading assignments. It is easier to recall and grasp material I am being exposed to that I have previously been exposed to once.</p>
<p>I do study throughout the quarter. Not intensive review as I do before finals, but I make sure to spend time going over things in classes that I know I have to do that. The studying before finals and midterms is just what I said before: Intensive review to make sure I remember everything I need to.</p>
<p>That said, I have been guilty of not putting any time into a class and then cramming at the last second before an exam. However, when I do that it’s when 1) it’s a class I really don’t care about remembering anything from (e.g. a GE) 2) it’s a laughably easy class that doesn’t require much (if any) regular work to do well and 3) I know for a fact I can get away with doing that and still ace the class. Sure enough, this has worked for me in any class that meets those criteria.</p>
<p>And just another reason why someone might not study until just before finals: I’ve had a couple professors where the final is based solely on the material from a few weeks before the final. You can’t study the whole quarter for something that’s testing material you haven’t learned until the end, so your only real option is to wait until just before the final.</p>
<p>Time constraints. People push things off until they absolutely need to do them. Can you blame them? Faced with tough course loads at times, working a job, and the stress of everyday life its perfectly reasonable that things are put of. However, if you keep up with course material throughout the semester then in sense you ARE studying for finals soon as you take the first note. I don’t advocate procrastinating but I do understand why people choose to do it.</p>
<p>It is time management though. There is no way you can study everything in the last week. I’m like you, OP. Finals week wasn’t stressful for me (like how everyone made it out to be). I didn’t study much, just the same amount I usually do any other week.</p>