Factors that help you study

EXERCISING: It helps to fight the harmful effects of sitting down for too long. Some studies say that over 50% of students don’t do enough exercise.

Besides, it’s been proven that there’s a correlation between physical preparation and academic grades. This means that students who are physically fit tend to get better grades than those who are not.

Lastly, if sports are not your thing, you should know that there are many other activities that help you exercise: hiking, walking, cycling, dancing, etc.

 

SLEEPING: It’s very common for many of you to still be tired when you wake up in the morning to go to school. Maybe you didn’t sleep enough the previous night, or maybe you went to bed too late. If this is the case, it’s very likely that a TV show is to blame.

TV steals many hours of sleep from students. However, sleeping helps the body relax, making it ready for the next day.

You might remember a time when you had a bad night. Surely, the next morning you didn’t feel like doing anything, and it was very difficult to focus on an intellectual task. So it’s important to have a strict bed time, because sleeping is a basic necessity for the human body.

You might be wondering how many hours you should be sleeping. It’s true that each individual person needs a different amount of time, but someone your age should ideally get between 8 and 9 hours of uninterrupted sleeping time.

 

BALANCED DIET: It’s important to get a varied diet, rich in minerals, vitamins and proteins, because these are the things that get used the most when doing intellectual tasks. So, it’s important to consume: milk and dairies, rich in calcium and phosphorus; dry fruits rich in magnesium; meat, fish and eggs, rich in proteins; vegetables and fruits, rich in vitamins and minerals.

But, apart from your diet, there are other aspects to consider:

  • Don’t eat food that can give you digestive problems, because then you’ll be indisposed when it’s time to study.
  • Chew thoroughly to facilitate digestion, so you can be ready when it’s time to study.
  • Take care of your oral hygiene after meals. This helps avoid certain physical pains.
  • Take a break during digestion periods: don’t do anything that requires you to focus or to do a lot of thinking.
  • Have a good breakfast, eat well, have a light lunch and a small dinner.

 

NO STIMULANTS: Any product that’s detrimental to health hurts studying, directly or indirectly.

We’ll analyze some products:

  • Alcohol: reduces all psychological functions and overall performance. Even in small doses, alcohol reduces performance in intellectual tasks.
  • Tobacco: tobacco contaminates and consumes the oxygen that activates brain cells.

 

RELAXATION: Usually, when we breathe, we only use a small amount of our lungs’ potential power. So, we are losing some concentration potential, because deep and slow breathing has a positive effect on the mind, thanks to the larger amount of oxygen that’s passed on to the brain.

So, it’s advisable to do slow and deep breathing exercises, especially after waking up, when going to bed, and during breaks. Three or four minutes of breathing exercises while studying are enough.