Online learning is new to everyone this school year, including teachers. With a change in the platform we use to learn, comes a change in how we learn and test our knowledge of our course material. Stress is a given with this new school year being online, and testing adds to that stress. But do not worry— there are a plethora of study tips and strategies specifically designed for online learning. Students this year will definitely have to put in as much effort as possible.

Before your test or quiz, there are a few things you can do to make study time a lot easier! During class, you should take organized and neat notes.

Keeping your backpack or learning area as clean as possible is also helpful. The more organized you are, the easier it will be on you when it comes to finding materials to study with. One simple way to stay organized with not much effort is assigning a color to each of your classes and using this color for your calendar in Canvas, your physical planner and your notes. This will allow you to instantaneously recognize what class you are studying for and will help you focus on that specific subject. For example, your English class could be red, your math class could be blue and your history class could be orange.

While you are studying, it is extremely important that you find what works best for you. No two people will ever have the exact same learning style. Once you develop a personalized system for yourself, studying will take a lot less time and effort. Some methods that are quite popular and useful are flashcards, with the color coding mentioned earlier; rewriting your notes into a personalized review/study sheet which helps with memory because you are rewriting the information; or trying to teach or explain the information to another person which helps you memorize the material quickly and in a deeper sense.

Our online learning situation is not ideal, but it is an opportunity for us to learn new ways of studying and learning material. We will get through this together and come out stronger if we all put in enough effort to encourage each other.