IB Study Techniques: History & Psychology

All students strive to find the way that they absorb all the information they study as best as possible. But when you're hearing information from everywhere and how everyone studies in completely different ways, it can get confusing and make you feel worried that you're not studying in the 'correct' or best way possible. Believe me, I had the exact same confusion when I started to properly study and had no idea which techniques would actually be worth my time. Well, as it turns out, I want to talk about the way I study for my different subjects and the types of notes I write to ensure I remember the material as best as I can. On top of this, I'll be giving a rundown of the 2 very well known 'ways of learning': through visual and auditory means. Identifying which type of learner you are is super important. Ever since really understanding the best technique for me, I feel I understand myself a lot better and know what to expect when I study.

So, with that being said, here's a little run down of the 2 broadest and most famous studying techniques:

VISUAL:

Using the visual study technique means writing notes in the forms of drawings and images with your written notes so it looks a bit like a jumbled story line of sorts. From personal experience with using this technique, I feel it draws heavily from your imagination and really forces you to understand the material your being given, while easily grouping together related ideas and making your notes more visually appealing. It can be super fun and entertaining and barely makes the process of studying actually feel like studying!
A rundown of what visual studying looks like:

• mindmaps/brainstorm webs
• timelines 
• pictures accompanying events
• colours/highlighting

AUDITORY:

If you remember conversations with people very well, then auditory learning might be up your alley! Auditory learners are able to focus in class on exactly what the lecturer is saying and, with a few notes, a few recordings of classes and possible revision of the text book, do super well on the exam. I've tried this technique, and while it works to a certain extent for me (especially when I have conversations with the lecturer about the topic in class, I remember the material very well afterward), I still have to write down plenty of notes to really remember everything. However, there was a boy a year above me that said that he never wrote notes in his classes as he simply focused on what the teacher was saying and he always initiated some type of conversation with them to remember the material better. That was all the study time he needed, and he felt confident about walking into the tests with that knowledge. So, as you can tell, this is a completely different studying approach to the visual technique, for example, and that just goes to show how it doesn't matter what others are doing, as long as you find the best way for yourself to absorb info.
A rundown of what auditory studying looks like:

• writing minimal to no notes in class
• continuously engaging in discussion with peers+teacher
• recording audio from lectures

After reading my short introductions on both studying techniques, you can probably guess that I'm more of a visual learner than an auditory learner. However, it's not like I fit into a black and white box where I am either or. I am both a visual and auditory learner, but lean more towards visual study techniques. Because of this, a lot of my notes are written with scribbles and drawings and usually indecipherable text to anyone other than myself, but to me it makes sense. I also use conversations and recordings to understand material and really remember concepts, so I wouldn't say I keep strictly to scribbling in my notebook.

How do I study history or psychology?

I study for history and psychology in very similar ways, just because both of them deal with names, places and dates (along with other information, of course). In fact, I've found that studying the different humanities subjects has always ended up using similar techniques.

• Flashcards

I've found that using websites like Quizlet and making online flashcards (or even physical if that's your preference) has been a lifesaver when I've been studying. Visual queues have helped me remember information much better than rewriting the same text again and again, and has prepared me for anything that could possibly pop up on the exam at hand.

• Memory palace

I remember just before my history exam in the second term of PreIB, I was frantically trying to jam in as much information as possible into my brain the night before it. I was super anxious and really couldn't keep any of the information in my head when I tried to quiz myself, hence the panic. At 10pm the night before the exam (after having essentially rewritten the whole textbook and genuinely not being able to remember almost any of the information), I did some mighty fast research online on unique, weird ways of memorising material. I found a very strange sounding technique called the 'Memory Palace'. 

For those who haven't heard about the memory palace, I'll give a quick explanation. 

Steps to use the memory palace:

1. pick a location you think you know very well
2. compile a list of the most important things you need to know, such as events/phases/people/beliefs
3. imagine these 'events' as objects
4. Place these objects in your imaginary backpack
5. place each object down in the order they should be remembered in

I'll give an example of how I used this with my history exam. My history exam was about Finnish history, all the way from the year 1000 up until now. For me, this was a lot of information, years and dates I needed to remember and I specifically had to remember the correct order of eras. For example, the most important thing I needed to remember were the 5 distinct phases of grave digging techniques that Finnish people went through and I needed to know which order they went in. Here's how I implemented the memory palace using this example:

• To start out, I picked out which place I knew best: my old middle school. 
• I drew out an object that I felt represented each phase of grave digging (so 5 objects had now entered my imaginary backpack).
• Next, I picked out the room I would begin my route through the memory palace. This ended up being in the front corner to the left of my mathematics classroom. 
• specifying exactly where my route started in the palace helped me massively
• I took out the first object from my backpack: the first grave digging technique object (a pile of rocks).
• I placed these rocks on the table directly in front of me.
• I walked onward through to the middle aisle of the classroom and placed down my next technique object: red ash
• I continued onwards and placed objects down quite evenly spaced out across the classroom until I reached the door and exited.

To really solidify my memorisation of where things were and what they were meant to represent, I drew the route of the school and the rooms I would be entering very roughly with an equally rough drawing of the objects I used. I went through nearly all the classrooms I used during my time in middle school (even including the staircases) and placed all sorts of objects down. Honestly, if anyone else were to hear what my objects were meant to represent, they would think I'm nuts. But, that just goes to show that it really doesn't matter what makes you remember certain events and people as long as YOU remember them!

In any case, to make sure the palace had really stuck into my head, I walked through the same route again and again and again (the whole process of trying to remember the whole palace took an hour max.). By 12pm that night, I knew the whole route, the objects, and the events for the test tomorrow. I ended up not only acing that exam, but I still remember all the rooms in the palace even today (2 years later!). I think that for super important exams that require you to remember events/people/etc., this is probably the most unique yet one of the most effective I've ever used. Plus, it makes the process of understanding and studying material SO much more interesting and fun!

• Transcribe in-class notes into pictures + maps + timelines

While this is pretty self-explanatory (especially for those that already know that they're more of a visual learner), I think that everyone that doesn't really know what works for them should take the time to try all three of these out at some point in the IB before final exams. Branching out information into visual pieces sometimes takes different forms, and these can be completely full of text (like timelines), and others are purely just an image that you associate with the information (like I made a drawing of a lightbulb to represent an idea that Napoleon came up with when planning a battle, and I still remember it many, many years after having drawn it lol).

• Setting limits to highlighting

When it comes to subjects that require remembering massive chunks of text from a book, for most it's bound to be boring and difficult to deduce what's important and what's not. However, if you quickly skim through your textbooks in preparation for your exams and highlight some key things you need to remember, you're bound to at least retain the most important things (like not remembering which battles Napoleon was in, but remembering that he was apparently a very short man). 

I like to set a limit with how much I highlight, after seeing other friends trying to highlight and them progressively starting to highlight everything because (and I quote) "I swear that everything in the book is important!" My highlighting limit is at most 1 full line of information per paragraph, or up to 10 words across the paragraph if the most important things are scattered across the paragraph. This is totally up to you, though, because everyone understands their material differently and you are the one responsible for finding out what your limit should be.

• Have conversations with others about the material

When I try to engage with genuine conversation with people about what I'm studying and debating the different topics I study, I find I remember all the material 100x better than I usually do, because I'm analysing the information I tell others while also listening to their perspective on the topics. Not only does this help you remember your material (because you really need to understand what you're studying to be able to discuss it), but you actually learn so much more about the subject itself when you get input from others. These 'others' can be people that take your class, but also the people that are much more advanced than you (such as those in grades above you), as well as those that don't study your subjects as in-depth (such as lower grades). When you do this, you get input from people that know more about the subject, and you also need to explain certain concepts in a very basic way so that people that don't know your topic too well can also grasp what you're talking about. By doing this, you have to thoroughly think about the material you're dealing with and you'll end up remembering the conversations themselves as well as the textbook information!

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Sources for pictures:
https://sachachua.com/blog/2013/05/sketchnote-visual-thinking-patricia-kambitsch/