Features: Pulling It All Together

Last year I introduced The Straight-A Method: a general framework for all of the tactical studying advice that appears in the red book and on this blog. A lot has changed since then, so in this post I describe a new and improved version of this key piece of the Study Hacks canon.

The Straight-A Method

The Straight-A Method is supported by four pillars: capture, control, plan, and evolve. Each pillar is associated with a high-level goal you should strive to achieve as a student. Here’s the promise: If you can satisfy these four goals — regardless of what specific strategies or systems you use — you will ace your courses. All of the study advice presented on this blog (i.e., any article in one of the tips categories) and in the red book support one or more of these four pillars.

Below I describe each pillar, and provide some sample advice to get you started on the road toward satisfying their goals.

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A Cry for Help

The most common e-mail I receive takes the form of a plea for help. Typically, the student has done poorly on one or two tests, or perhaps got a ‘C’ on an important paper, and is desperate to know what she can do right now to save her semester grades.

In this post, I highlight five articles — selected from the more than 340 that populate the Study Hacks archive — that can provide fast results for students who need immediate help. These articles, on their own, won’t make you into a low-stress, student superstar, but they can help stave off a disastrous end to a tough semester.

Conduct a Mid-Semester Dash
This simple strategy helps you pull yourself out of a muddle of forgotten deadlines and soul-devouring small tasks, and prepare a clean attack for the second half of the semester.

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A New Year

Making New Year resolutions proves a tricky business. We all know that setting too many goals is a recipe for disappointment, so it’s important to choose a small number of changes that will have the maximum impact.

In this post I describe three simple resolutions that I’ve learned from experience to be incredibly effective. If you’re unsure where to direct your resolve in 2009, forget the cliched crap about going to the gym more or “studying harder.” Give these three habits a try — they’ll completely transform your entire student experience.

Resolution #1: Commit to Full Capture

It’s the oldest trick in the proverbial productivity book, but it’s also the most essential. Without it, you simply cannot eliminate copious stress from your life. I’m talking, of course, about capturing every task, date, and deadline in a trusted system that you review regularly.

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Post-Thanksgiving Scramble

It’s the week after Thanksgiving. For most students this means finals are rapidly approaching. If you haven’t begun thinking about how to tackle this upcoming challenge, now is a great time to start. With this in mind, I want to review 5 common mistakes that students make during this period.

Read what’s below before diving into your own final-driven scramble and you’ll increase your odds of making it to Christmas vacation unscathed by an academic disaster.

Mistake #1: Not Having a Clear Schedule

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