How to prepare an effective study plan that you will actually follow!

Hello everyone! This is my first post here, and I am SO excited to share with you some helpful tips on how to study smart in Canada.

As newcomers to Canada, I know many of you struggle with finding an effective study plan that will work for you. While the education system in our home countries may be different from Canada’s, absolutely everyone can succeed in the Canadian education system.

At UCW, we often struggle with the number of assignments we have to complete on top of studying for exams. In order to succeed in your journey, the most important thing is to be organized. I know you will think, “okay, I’m organized, but I still can’t follow a study plan.” This is probably because you are not considering personal factors in your plan.

You have to be realistic with your lifestyle and what you can do in a day, week and month. Therefore, the first thing you need to do is draft what and how many things you can accomplish in a day/week/month. Don’t forget to consider that you have a life, too, so factor in the time spent on transit, work, exercise, leisure and so on. After you have an idea of how much you can accomplish in a day, you can prepare a much more realistic study plan.

The second thing to do is to go through all the course outlines right at the beginning of the term. For each course, take notes of when assignments are due. For each assignment, read through the requirements to complete it. I usually analyze each assignment closely to find out how difficult and time-consuming it will be to complete.

For easy assignments, you could probably finish them in a week or less. You should probably take around a month to complete challenging assignments. For example, if you have a very extensive paper to submit by March 1, you should consider starting to work on it on February 1. Therefore, you should put in your agenda that on February 1, you should start working on it. When it comes to exams, you also have to analyze how difficult that course will be and do the same thing: maybe begin studying for a specific exam a week before or two weeks before if it’s a hard exam.

When you break down tasks in this way, you will be MUCH less stressed at the end of the day and feel much more productive. It is crucial to take care of your mental health while at university because it can be very easy to fall behind and panic. By following this method, I promise you it will be much easier to complete everything throughout the term.

I hope these tips helped you prepare a perfect study plan for you!