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4 Steps to Getting the Most of Your Study Sessions

This is a sponsored feature. All opinions are 100% from Her Campus.

We all know studying can be a pain. So why not make your study sessions as efficient as possible? McGraw-Hill Education’s new SmartBook, a product that takes your e-textbooks to the next level, is about to make your study sessions much more productive, efficient, and personal! This is a great product for you, a busy collegiette who has to balance studying along with lots of extracurricular activities and a social life. With SmartBook, you’ll have a high-impact study session that will ensure that you’re focused on the information that really matters. SmartBook maximizes the amount you learn by using its new four-stage technique:

  1. Preview: You’ll start off with a preview of each chapter and the key objectives you’ll need to learn. In this stage, SmartBook establishes a framework in your brain of the material you’ll need to know. This will help you retain the information better long-term.
  2. Read: While you’re reading, SmartBook will guide you to core topics that you should spend the most time studying.
  3. Practice: As you’re reading, SmartBook will give you questions to help identify what content you know and what you don’t know.
  4. Recharge: To make sure you really master the concepts and will retain them in your brain, you’ll complete the Read and Practice steps until SmartBook directs you to Recharge the important material you’re likely to forget at just around the time you’re most likely to forget it. This actually helps your brain move information from your short-term memory to your long-term memory. “I would want SmartBook because I won’t forget stuff,” says Karina Aguilar, a student at San Francisco State University. “I like how it would re-direct me to stuff I’m most likely to forget.”

If last minute cramming isn’t working for you, and you want real, long-term knowledge retention, then SmartBook is for you! When you use SmartBook for your reading during the semester, it’ll be so ingrained in your brain, it will make it that much easier to recall what you need during finals week.

One of the best features of SmartBook is that you can access it any time via your computer (and soon via your iPhone, iPad, and Android devices), so no matter where you prefer to study—in the library, in a coffee shop, or even just in the classroom reviewing a topic before a lecture—you can use Smartbook.

The best thing about SmartBook, and the reason we really love it, is that it gives you a personalized learning experience. Since what your classmates know is different than what you might already have down pat, your experience with SmartBook will be different than theirs. SmartBook adapts to each of you, so it’s smart enough to make sure you don’t miss that topic that you need a little extra help with. As Jalan Nored, a student at Northern Kentucky University, says: “It monitors your learning and makes sure that you know what you read before moving on. Can’t do that with a regular textbook.” With SmartBook, there’s no reason to have to cram any more, collegiettes!

Lauren is the President/Editor-in-Chief of Her Campus Exeter, as well as the Manager of UK Expansion and a National Writer for HerCampus.com. While she has worked with Her Campus Exeter it has achieved Pink Chapter Level status and has grown to its current status as one of the most successful chapters internationally. She's determined to grow Her Campus in the UK this year and so is looking foward to working on increasing the number of HC UK chapters and to helping the established chapters improve and develop. This summer she was lucky enough to intern in the Her Campus Head Office in Boston, and had the most amazing time -- any time she can go back, she will! In her spare time Lauren loves to play tennis, catch up with her friends, go for long walks in the Scottish countryside or to watch chick-flicks under her duvet. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram @laurenhudson25.
Quinn Cohane is the Product Manager at Her Campus. She develops new features for Her Campus's web properties, including HerCampus.com, HerCampusMedia.com, HerConference.com, and CollegeFashionWeek.com, from initial conception to final installation. She collaborates with the Client Services team to implement custom landing pages, content hubs and sponsored content for client campaigns. Quinn also works closely with the Chapter Development team, training new team members on using Her Campus's content management system and leading the onboarding of new Campus Correspondents, national writers and bloggers, and national interns. Additionally, she oversees technical support for Her Campus and the uploading of national content. Quinn first joined the Her Campus team as a remote intern in February 2010; her past roles include Production Associate, Digital Media Manager, Chapter Advisor, and Study Abroad blogger during her semester in Copenhagen, Denmark. She graduated Cum Laude from Bowdoin College in 2013 as an English major and computer science minor. A native of Scarsdale, New York, Quinn enjoys attending theater and dance performances, traveling the world, reading, the beach, and apple crumb pie. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram @quinncohane.