Honestly, studying is pretty easy. It's not hard to whip out your notes and look them over, or do some flashcards on Quizlet between classes. The issue is knowing yourself well enough to study in a way that is optimized for you.
You'll first need to figure out your learning style; the manner in which you learn best. Don't just blindly guess at it-- and also, you are probably not a visual learner.
There are four big learning styles: visual, auditory, reading/writing, and kinesthetic. There are other factors too, like how well you work in groups versus being alone. (Note: not what you like to be doing, but what is best for your learning. I'm sure we would all love to be with friends.)
Almost everyone fits into one of these categories, but you don't have to pick only one! You cuold be great with multiple, or even all of them (sorta like me!)
Visual people like seeing diagrams, charts, and colours to learn. Try watching some videos and doodling visual aids!
Auditory learners are pretty rare. These people like to learn by listening, so try putting on a podcast or explanatory video.
Reading/writing learners like to, well, read and write! It's how most education is structured, even though most people don't learn best like this. Chances are, if you're a textual person, as long as you do classwork you won't have to study too much-- lucky you! Read up on the materials and try writing out a guide to help you remember (like this website!)
Kinesthetic people learn by doing. The key is to keep practicing what you're doing, even though it might be tedious. You'll thank yourself later!
Of course, there are a lot of strategies that are common to nearly all learners, mostly having to do with having the actual motivation to study.
A lot of students have to study a lot before tests or quizzes so they understand the material, but if you pay attention in class and make connections, you can spend a lot less effort studying
Connect new information to old information that you already know. In class, digest what the teacher is saying before writing notes of what you think you’ll need to remember. Have your old notes handy to annotate or add on to in class, and have paper in case you need to make new notes.
You've just got home from school, and you've got a test tomorrow that you probably should have started studying for two weeks ago--but you didn't. Here's what you do.
Once you get home, take out all the course materials you need to study, then do everything you need to do after coming home. Take a shower, eat a meal, take a nap if you really need it (but set a 30-minute timer). At this point you're probably pretty tired already, so drink some cold water and go for a 10-minute walk outside if weather permits.
Set up your workstation with water, a desk lamp, all your stationeries, coursework, and blank paper with flashcards. Make sure there are no distractions and set a timer for 25 minutes.
Read over readings, paying attention to the first and last paragraphs and marking up important topics. Write these parts down in notes.
Put those notes and notes from class together. You now have condensed, raw information you can study from. Then synthesize everything onto one piece of paper. If there is anything in there that you don't understand, immediately Google it. If that doesn't help, ask a friend and email the teacher as soon as possible.
Review your worksheets and look at some common mistakes you made. Make sure you understand why they were wrong and focus a little more on those topics. After that, use a technique called blurting. This is where you read your notes and materials, then write down everything you remember. Add what's missing and repeat. For larger tests, separate this into chunks.
By now it's around the 25-minute mark, when your timer goes off. Take a 10-minute break (again with a timer) and freshen up.
After that, teach a friend, real or imaginary, about your topic. Look at your notes from time to time but put things in your own words.
Then do some practice questions and make some flashcards as a way of taking a break. Quiz yourself or a friend.
If you're still not sure on things, repeat and focus on what you don’t know. Get a good night's worth of sleep and review in the morning.
So, you didn't study and you have a test right after lunch; here's what to do right after getting out of class. Let's say you have 35 minutes to do this.
Find a good spot to study. Ideally, think about this while you're in class, so you don't waste any time. Say you settle in the library.
Take out your notes.
Look over them and try to mark up the main points and unfamiliar points. (Unless the whole thing is unfamiliar. Don't bother.)
If you don't have notes but have a reading instead, read the first and last paragraph carefully and skim the rest, marking up. If possible, look online for summaries and notes. Then condense the main ideas into notes and read them over.
Then get out a line sheet of paper and vomit out everything you remember, leaving in extra whitespace.
Afterwards, look at your notes and fill in everything you forgot in a different colour. Take mental note of what you missed. Google anything that you don't understand. Now you know what to focus on, do this again. You should see a great improvement in your performance. This should take around 15 minutes.
If you have a friend, now try to give a lesson to them on what you're doing. Feel free to look at your notes but make sure to put everything in your own words. Keep it rather short, around 5 minutes.
You've taken up 20 minutes at this point, and you have 15 minutes left. If your understanding is shaky and blurting helped for you, try a few more rounds. Otherwise, look on Quizlet for some flashcards (I upload them sometimes!) to quiz yourself on course content. Again, take notes and review what you missed.