Study Skills For Dummies aims to help every student get the most from themselves and their studies. Not by burning the midnight oil in a garret and forsaking everything and everyone else – far from it. This book explains some of the reasoning behind how things work in the academic world, the duties and responsibilities of students and their tutors and how and where to seek out answers when something is not clear to you.

Knowledge is power and helps to put you in charge of your learning. The book offers practical strategies to help you use your time effectively and avoid stress, with suggestions for particular tasks like understanding essay titles and taking notes. Regular preparation, followed by discussion or self-reflection on what you’ve learned or how your views have changed in the light of these experiences, are the bedrock of your learning experience. This process of revisiting what you’ve learned strengthens not only your memory for information – a great help later on, when the exams come round – but also your own ideas and views. It also helps you construct your arguments in favour of your views: this process is central to your academic development.

In other words, wherever possible, this book shows you how to kill at least two birds with one stone, but you can dip into any chapter and find practical suggestions for solving the problems or tackling the tasks at hand.