at university i implemented a six step system  that i used for every single one of my exams  

in my second and third year i never had  to pull an all-nighter and i never had to  

cram all my studying in the night before an exam  because i had a system in place that prevented  

that from happening in fact i'd even go as far as  saying pretty much all of my exams were relatively  

stress-free i went into the exam hall pretty calm  because i was well prepared and i was confident i  

would do well i had confidence that the system  that i had implemented would work for me again  

this time just like it did the exam before and the  exam before that and the system involves starting  

off very broad at the beginning it's more about  carrying out background research but keeping it  

fun is so important that when you first start a  new module you keep it fun and there's techniques  

you can implement to do this that i explain later  on in the video so at the beginning of the module  

your studying starts off researching a broad area  of the subject but as we work through the semester  

the research area gets smaller and smaller until  we arrive at the very last stage of the system  

which is the revision stage and this is where  you focus your studying on a very narrow  

research area essentially you're only studying  specifically for what you're predicting will  

come up in the exam and the week before the exam  is extremely important if you're aiming to achieve  

incredibly high grades so it's essential that you  use your time during this week ultra efficiently  

so make sure you stick around to the end of the  video because that's by far the most important  

part step one download past papers i talk about  them quite often on this channel but i bring them  

up so much because they really are an incredibly  useful revision tool so the first step of the six  

step system is at the beginning of the year i'd  download the exam pass papers on my course some  

subjects there would be past papers going back six  or seven years but other subjects they would only  

have the last year's past paper and i did this  the first thing at the beginning of the semester  

for two reasons firstly i could scan through them  all and kind of see what topics would be taught  

and secondly it would ensure that i would have all  the past papers downloaded and printed off ready  

for when i started my revision in a few months and  i can't stress how important this first step is  

if you have access to exam past papers it  was one of my biggest mistakes at high school  

not using past papers in my revision strategy  so don't make the same mistakes that i did  

step 2 carry out background research on the new  subject this stage of the system can be quite fun  

let's say the module you're just starting at the  beginning of the semester is macroeconomics your  

aim is to get a general idea of what the subject  is about while at the same time growing your  

curiosity and hopefully sparking more interest  in the subject so we're keeping the research  

area relatively broad and most importantly at this  stage we're not opening any thick boring textbooks  

at this stage we stick to more interesting forms  of media such as documentaries youtube videos and  

inspiration and interest in your subject matter  so for example if your subject is macroeconomics  

then you might watch documentaries on netflix  such as panic the untold story of the 2008  

financial crisis trump's trade war or dream empire  china's real estate bubbles all incredibly good  

documentaries and so what i particularly like  about documentaries is that it brings alive  

a subject that textbooks and even lectures they  just can't do they are one of the most fun ways to  

learn new information we're far more likely to pay  attention to a one-hour documentary than listen to  

a one-hour lecture right they also allow you to  develop a more well-rounded base of knowledge  

rather than focusing in on just one area and  that's why documentaries are really useful at this  

early stage and i talk more in depth about this  in the transform your grades in 30 days course  

that i'm launching on the 29th of march and as of  this video more than 1 000 students have already  

enrolled onto the waiting list and those students  will be getting a 50 discount from the limited  

promotional launch offer so don't miss out click  the link in the description for more information  

it's a 30-day course that i created because i  realized that so many of you are watching my  

videos but not actually implementing what you're  learning and so i designed the course specifically  

to help you implement what i teach you to level up  your studying and completely transform your grades  

and i personally hold you accountable you'll get  personal support and guidance from me click on  

the link in description for more information  step three study every day now that we passed  

the introductory stages of the new module we get  to the main part so if you think of it like this  

there are three parts to a module we first have  the introduction period of the module then we have  

the main body and then the exam period and right  at the beginning of the module it's important  

that you start studying with 100 commitment right  from day one a lot of students at the beginning of  

their course they don't study that much and then  in the middle of their course they'll increase  

their studying a bit more and then at the end  of the course when it comes to exam period  

that's when they fully commit to their studying  and go all out but at least in my opinion it's  

a very inefficient and stressful way of managing  your studying so i encourage right from day one  

to have a set number of hours to study for  some people it might be five hours a day for  

others it might be 10 hours a day whatever it is  keep it consistent don't get complacent right at  

the beginning of your course thinking the exams  are ages away so you don't have to prepare for  

them just yet right at the beginning of the course  that's when you can get ahead of your studying and  

start building that momentum up so when it comes  to exam week you're not stressing out because  

you've left all your studying until the last week  instead you've managed your studying appropriately  

and spread it out evenly across the last few  weeks and months step four consolidation of notes  

as we're progressing through the module we're now  coming to the exam preparation period and at this  

stage the idea is to collect all the notes  you have taken when you're sitting through  

your lectures and organize and consolidate them  so you have everything you need ready for the  

exam revision period and this step doesn't usually  take that long anywhere from an hour to a few days  

but it's a crucially important step and i'll tell  you why every time you organize your notes you're  

subconsciously doing the same thing with your  brain you're reorganizing the information you've  

learned from your lectures in your brain so you're  reinforcing the important information into chunks  

connecting it into your existing mental models and  this makes the information faster to recall during  

the exam period because you've packaged it all  far more efficiently step 5 recap lecture slides  

the lecture slides from your lectures  often contain some of the most important  

information in the module there's usually a reason  why your lecturer has included specific pieces of  

information into those lecture slides because he  or she wants you to learn it right but why do they  

want you to learn it often because there's a good  chance that it will come up in the exam so in this  

stage step five i download every single lecture  slide and go through them and make sure that i  

understood every single one often i download the  lectures and print them off and make notes on the  

printed off slides and make small annotations just  to help with understanding them and as you can  

see you're studying when the course began starting  off relatively broad a large subject area but it's  

getting narrower and narrower and the next step  is the narrowest stage and also the most important  

stage step six past papers go over past papers  so you can understand what type of questions are  

likely to come up now this is the narrowest part  of the whole system in this period you should only  

be focusing your studying on topics that you think  are likely to come up in the exam and even more  

specifically answering questions that you think  might pop up in the exam so pretty much every part  

of this step involves preparing you specifically  for the exam you don't want to waste your time  

studying things that probably won't come up in the  exam and this step is the single most important  

part of your exam preparation it's an example of  the pareto principle where roughly eighty percent  

of your results will come from twenty 20 of your  actions so 80 of your final grade will be as a  

result of 20 of your studying and this last period  the time when you're practicing exam past papers  

is the 20 of your studying that will make up 80  of your grades so it's absolutely imperative that  

you use the week coming up to your exam or the two  weeks coming up to your exam wisely and you don't  

procrastinate and your studying is lasered in it's  focused in on preparing specifically for potential  

exam questions that might come up and there  are several reasons why exam past papers are so  

useful and why i would leave them to the last  stage of the six step system to use them in my  

exam preparation they help you understand  the length of the exam they help you work  

out how much time you have for each question they  identify the style of exam questions for example  

short answers multiple choice or essay questions  you can practice exam techniques with them and  

they help you identify key subject areas to  focus on when you're revising and finally if you  

practice past papers in exam conditions and mark  them yourself you can identify the gaps in your  

knowledge and where your weaknesses are so you  know to focus your revision more in those areas  

and if you are still struggling with distraction  and procrastination when you should be studying  

there's a link in the description where you can  find out more about the transform your grades in  

30 days course that will be launched on the 29th  of march like i said more than 1 000 students have  

already enrolled and there's a 30-day money-back  guarantee so i'm carrying the risk completely  

on my shoulders there's nothing to lose for you  guys click on the link in the description to find  

out more but only if you're ready and committed  to levelling up your studying the course is not  

a magic fix there's no magic pill that will  completely fix all of your procrastination  

problems without you putting in any effort it will  take a lot of effort and it will take a lot of  

hard work it's called the transform your grades  in 30 days challenge for a reason because it's  

going to be damn challenging but i'll be helping  you and supporting you every step of the way once  

again click on the link in the description and  i look forward to working with you very shortly