Maintaining Classroom Knowledge From One Year to the Next
When you graduate high school, the summer that follows is simultaneously extremely long and short. Here’s why. The summer is short because before you know it, you’re back in school again. However, the summer is long because by the time you’re buying notebook paper and sharpening your pencils, just about everything you learned the year prior has flown out of your head.
Maintaining what you know from one year to the next, or even from one semester to the next is vitally important to your success as a college student. In order to do this, you can follow these tips:
Pursue Related Interests
One way to maintain knowledge from high school prior to the jump to college is to engage in related learning activities. For instance, if you were studying playwrights at the end of your senior year, why not continue that education on your own? Was there a particular author that you enjoyed? If so, read more of his or her works on your own. Was there something from the textbook you thought looked interesting but were unable to read? Read it during the summer!
If there was anything that piqued your interest during the year, further your studies in that area to maintain that prior knowledge or to develop new knowledge. The point is, don’t let what you’ve learned go to waste.
Don’t Let School Leave Your Mind
Even though it’s tempting to banish school from your thoughts completely during the summer months or even on winter break, it is important to not disengage from the school environment entirely. Now, this doesn’t mean you have to crack open the school books everyday, but it does mean making a concentrated effort to keep what you’ve learned alive and active in your mind. So, if you come across an opportunity to delve into a favorite subject, do it. Or, if you’re having a conversation with someone about a scientific topic and you need clarification on a fact, refresh your memory.
Stay Active
Another way to keep that knowledge you’ve acquired during school solidly in your brain is to keep physically active as well. Exercise keeps your brain working well and your senses heightened. When you keep your body in prime condition, you help to improve your memory and overall brain function. So, when it comes time to recall those facts from last year, they will come back much more easily than they would have before.
Besides physical activity in the summer, you can also get up and about in other ways. Pursue what you are interested in. If you enjoy painting, take an art class over the summer. If you want to improve your foreign language skills, take a class at the local community college during the summer months. Anything that you can do to stimulate your mind and maintain a sense of connection with an educational environment will make retaining information from class much easier.
The process of maintaining knowledge from one year to the next can be difficult, especially if you just let time pass in between the end of one session and the beginning of another. All of that free time and down time kind of makes your brain get lazy. After all, the brain is like a muscle—if you don’t use it, you’ll lose it!
Now, that might be a gross exaggeration, but it’s important to recognize how important it is to take time over the summer to review what you’ve previously learned and to prepare for the upcoming semester. And, if you are beginning college, it is especially vital to keep your latest high school knowledge fresh in your mind. Otherwise, your first few classes might be a bit rough when review time becomes the time for you to learn things all over again.