Category Archives: Stress

Reduce test anxiety – with help from Amy G Dala

Posted on by

Whether you call it test anxiety or exam stress, they are both terms used to describe a combination of physical symptoms and emotional reactions that can impact your ability to do well in exams. It’s hard to measure how many people suffer from it, although there are estimates of between 10% and 40%, with some correlation with the increased testing in schools.

The physical symptoms include headache, nausea, sweating, shortness of breath etc, whilst the emotional ones are fear, helplessness, disappointment and negative thoughts brought on by self-doubt and the reinvention of past failures. Both of which contribute to an inability to concentrate and think clearly which fuels procrastination. It’s a condition that can result in someone failing an exam which in turn may significantly reduce their career options, my point, it’s a really important subject.

Amy G Dala or Amygdala (uh·mig·duh·luh)
Not a person of course but a group of nuclei found deep in the brain’s temporal lobe and part of the limbic system. The amygdala was initially thought to be responsible for fear and negative responses that feed the fight or flight reaction, but work by Professor Lisa Feldman Barrett who specialises in affective science (The study of emotion) suggest this is not the case. She argues that the Amygdala sends signals of ambiguity and novelty which are then combined with past experiences, information from your body, such as a pounding heart and context to construct an emotion, such as anxiety. The context here might be sitting in the exam room in complete silence waiting for the invigilator to say, “you can now turn over your paper.”

You are not born with emotions; they are constructed by the brain based on a prediction as to what might happen next. For example, if you were walking down the road and a group of young adults are coming towards you, the amygdala will signal this as something ambiguous and novel, your body will respond by increasing your heart rate and the brain will then attempt to find out if this has happened before. If it has and you had your mobile phone stolen it might trigger the emotion of fear. If the group simple walk past chatting and laughing the emotion will fade.

“Emotions are not reactions to the world – they are your constructions of the world.”
Professor Lisa Feldman Barrett

Although it may not be obvious at this point understanding how emotions are constructed is going to help reduce our feelings of anxiety.

You have control over your emotions
Many people believe emotions are uncontrollable “arriving unbidden and departing of their own accord”, but this is not the case as Professor Barratts work has identified. There is a point where the brain has to predict what will happen and create an emotion to match that prediction. If we can effectively step in at the point of prediction, we can change the emotion.

“Emotions that seem to happen to you are created by you”
“You are the architect of your experience”
Professor Lisa Feldman Barrett

If for example you are about to take a test, your amygdala will sense uncertainly and ambiguity, you might start to breath more deeply, and at this point your brain will begin to race ahead so that it can make a prediction and offer up a suitable emotion. But if you step in and interpret the emotion ahead of the prediction you can change the way you feel. In this example just tell yourself that the deep breathing is helping you get sufficient oxygen into your lungs which will help you think more clearly, or maybe the slight shaking of your hand is an indication that you are not too relaxed, you are just at the right point to take a test. This is effectively a reframe or reinterpretation that turns a bad situation into a good one.

This gets even better, the next time you take a test your brain will once again race ahead looking to make a prediction and find the experience that happened last time, e.g. that the heavy breathing was perfectly normal and made you feel calm and motivated. As a result, it will take this as the prediction and replicate the emotion. But like so many things, it can take time, building neuroglial pathways is not always easy, so don’t lose confidence if it doesn’t immediately work.

People already use this technique but don’t realise it, have you ever heard someone say that they like to feel a “little bit nervous” because it helps them perform better.

And this is all made possible by a better understanding of two small almond-shaped regions deep in the brain, thank you Amy G Dala.

Want to know more, listen to Lisa Feldman Barrett – How Emotions are Made. The theory of constructed emotion. And her TED lecture – You aren’t at the mercy of your emotions, your brain creates them

Chatter – why talking to yourself matters

Posted on by

If you are reading this, think for a moment as to what you are doing……… are you sounding out the words in your head or did you pause, reflect and ask yourself “what exactly am I doing?”, either way you have been using your inner voice, your internal dialogue or have been experiencing what Ethan Kross calls Chatter.

Ethan is the Professor of Psychology and Management at the University of Michigan and author of a book called Chatter, the voice in our head and how to harness it.

On the one hand this might all seem a little strange, how many people would you ask what they have been talking to themselves about today, perhaps you wouldn’t because it’s too personal a question or maybe you don’t want to admit you do it all of the time. The good news is its perfectly normal and the vast majority of people talk to themselves. It’s worth adding however that not everyone has an internal voice, with some suggesting that this might be more likely for people with dyslexia.

Where does it come from?
Evolution would suggest that if we have this ability, it must serve a purpose. Mark Scott from the University of British Columbia has found evidence that a brain signal called “corollary discharge” plays an important role in our experiences of internal speech. Corollary discharge arises when the brain generates an internal copy of the sound of our voice in parallel to the external sound we hear. Its purpose is to prevent confusion between a self-caused sound or sensation for example, a dog growling noise inside our head and an externally-caused sound, for example a real dog growling who is about to bite. If both are the same, we run pretty fast, if not the brain will cancel the internal sound. This is the reason we can’t tickle ourselves; the brain sends a signal that we are going to tickle ourselves before we actually do, effectively cancelling the sensation.

Interestingly children don’t develop this skill until around 6 or 7 although its gradual and starts much earlier. This is the reason a young child will just say what they think, regardless of the consequences!

“Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice.” Steve Jobs

Why it matters and what you can do?
One of the most powerful tools to help manage stress, wellbeing and self-esteem is your inner voice, and examinations provide a rich environment where without support all of these can bring you down. Heightened dialogue is not of course just experienced when studying or in the exam room, how was it possible that Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bukayo Saka missed penalties in the Euros. Maybe it was the result of too much chatter, telling themselves that they must score, they have to score, the country is relying on them?

“Non-judgment quiets the internal dialogue, and this opens once again the doorway to creativity.” Deepak Chopra

And this is where Ethan Kross offers a whole raft of advice. He talks about having the ability to step back from the Chatter by adopting a broader, calmer and more objective perspective. You also need to listen to what your saying, low self esteem for example can easily develop if you are continually criticising yourself, perhaps as a thoughtless parent might do, always finding fault no matter what.

Here are a few of the practical tools in the book.

  1. Use distanced self-talk – rather than saying “why can’t I do this”, use your name in the second person “why is it that Stuart can’t do this”. This results in reduced activation in brain networks associated with negative thoughts.
  2. Imagine advising a friend – this has a similar impact in that it helps you view the experience from a distance. “I know this is a tricky question but you’ve been in a similar situation before and you figured it out”. This is also an example of what Kross calls time travel, (temporal distancing) either going forward in time to look in the rear-view mirror at the problem, effectively leaving it behind or travelling back to a time when you were successful.
  3. Broaden your perspective – in this situation, compare what you’re worrying about with other adverse events or ask what other people would do in the same situation. A variation on the “what would Jesus do?” question.
  4. Reinterpreted your bodies chatter response – when you experience stress its likely your heart rate will increase and you will begin to sweat. Becoming aware of this can lead you to conclude that you are stressed which in fact makes the situation worse. Kross suggest you tell yourself that this is not bad news but the body doing what it has to in order to help you.

And finally, if you want to find out more, check out this video, Do you have an inner voice?

COVID Time – spend (£) it wisely

Posted on by

If you asked a group of students what was one of their biggest problems, many would say – lack of time.  

Now it’s unfair to highlight this as something unique to students, we all suffer from a lack of time. A look across the virtual bookshelves for titles that make reference to Time Management will give you some idea as to how many people are looking for solutions to this problem.

Life in the UK and across the world has changed as a result of Covid 19, one of those changes has been a disruption to normality. No longer does your alarm go off at 7.00 am, which is essential if you are to have a shower, grab some breakfast and be at your desk for 9.00 am. No longer do you have to leave the office at 5.05pm to be on the train for 5.30 pm, which will give you a fighting chance of being home for 7.00 pm. If your studying on the evening this strict time management regime will permit an evening meal and provide two hours of effective study before you go to bed.

Of course, your day may not be anything like this, in fact it’s possible you are busier than ever, but for many Covid has reset normality, effectively putting a line through what you were doing and replacing it with……time. The secret of course is not to waste it, reflect on what you were doing and think carefully before you fill the space with other activities, spend this time wisely on what is most important to you!

“The key is in not spending time, but in investing it.”   Stephen R. Covey

Thinking about time – it doesn’t really fly
Time is in itself an interesting concept, the Greeks had two words for it, Chronos which refers to the more traditional understanding as with a clock or calendar, it is measurable and predictable. Kairos on the other hand considers the human perspective, how we experience time, the quality of time, finding the “right time” to start studying perhaps. This perception of time is explained neurologically by the way the brain changes, impacted by neurotransmitters and chemical stimulants. When neurons are fired more quickly time will go faster, fire them slowly and time will drag. See also Circadian rhythms. This might help explain why there is never enough time for interesting subjects but too much for boring ones.

Impact on studying
Several studies indicate that students who manage their time not only perform better in the exam but experience less stress. There is also evidence that students are not good at managing their schedules, finding it difficult to strike the right balance between studying and the other demands on their time. This lack of balance often leads to disrupted sleep patterns and higher levels of stress. It may well be that “pulling an all-nighter” a common solution to running out of time is in effect a coping strategy to compensate for the lack of good time management skills. Interestingly, students are well aware of the problem, Ling, Heffernan, and Muncer (2003) found that time management was often stated as being a factor in poor exam performance.

One caveat, it’s possible that the research only shows a correlation not a causation, “good students” who would do well in the exam anyway just happen to plan, prioritise and stick to deadlines. These skills are not contributing to those higher grades, they are simply incidental behaviours. That said if “good students” manage time well and in the absence of anything to the contrary, maybe it’s worth doing anyway?

“The common man is not concerned about the passage of time, the man of talent is driven by it.”  Arthur Shoppenhauer, German philosopher

Making the most of your C time
But what can you do to improve your ability to get things done in this newly discovered Covid time? There are many tips and techniques that can help, below are a few of the best ones.

Planning backwards – this is probably one of the most effective. Start by asking the question, when do I want to pass the exam, if its June 2021, put that date in your calendar or planner. Then ask another question, how much do I need to learn before then? To give some idea as to how you might answer this, break down what you have to learn into chunks, looking at how many chapters there are in the book is one way of doing this. Then ask, if there are 10 chapters when do I have to start, assuming for example each one will take a month. Hopefully you get the idea, at each stage you ask a question breaking the larger activity into a series of smaller ones. This not only makes each task more manageable it provides a month by month plan that will lead all the way to the exam.

Using technology – often technology is seen as a problem, a distraction, when it comes to getting things done. But there are some very useful apps available these days to help better manage time.

  • Google calendar – other calendars are of course available but Google provides one of the most effective planning tools on the market. Not only is it free but it performs equally well across all devices from phone to desktop. This is the place to put those key dates and deadlines that came from the planning process.
  • Trello –  is effectively a project management tool or as some have described it “Post-it notes on steroids.” It can help capture ideas and organise thoughts with the added advantage they can easily be shared with others who can also contribute in real time.
  • Remember the milk – is extremely helpful for making lists and as with Trello can also be shared. It includes the ability to set reminders and integrates with Gmail, Google Calendar and Evernote.
  • StayFocused – is a blocking app, available on the chrome browser that temporarily blocks the internet except for the websites you give an exception.

Prioritisation – Choosing what you should spend time on is called prioritisation. One technique that many people have found useful is the Eisenhower decision matrix. So, called because Dwight D. Eisenhower is said to have used it to help him make better decisions by organising and prioritising his workload.

A simple 2 by 2 matrix that has the level of urgency on one side set against the level of importance on the other.

It’s relatively self-explanatory but one of the most important messages is the need to make time for tasks that are important but not urgent. If something is important and urgent you have to do it now but there is danger with some activities that they are never urgent, the result, they are constantly put off. For example, starting to study, this is incredibly important especially if you want to pass the exam in June 2021, but because it’s not urgent you can always start tomorrow.

I will leave you with one final quote about time from Bill Keane the American cartoonist which I have always found insightful.

“Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift, which is why we call it the present.”

Enjoy your gift…..

Time management skills have been shown to have a positive impact on student learning and student outcomes (Kearns & Gardiner, 2007; Kelly, 2002; McKenzie & Gow, 2004)
Many students find it hard to regulate both their studies and their external lives (Van der Meer, Jansen, & Torenbeek, 2010)

Dont worry, Be happy

Posted on by

It’s so easy for well-meaning people to say don’t worry, it’s not bad advice it’s just not very helpful. Firstly, as I have mentioned in previous blogs anything framed as a don’t is difficult for the brain to process. Far better to tell someone what to do than tell them what not.

Secondly If you look up a definition of worry it will say something like, “thinking about problems or unpleasant events that you don’t want to happen but might, in a way that makes you feel unhappy and or frightened.” What a strange concept, why would anyone want to do this?

Having started but I hasten to add not yet finished the second of Yuval Noah Harari’s bestselling books Homo Deus, it’s hard not to question the reason we might have evolved to hold such a strange view. What possible evolutionary purpose could feeling bad or frightened serve?

Don’t worry be happy, In every life we have some trouble. When you worry you make it double.

Worry can be helpful
The truth is worry can be helpful, it’s a means by which the brain can help you prioritises events. It’s not a nice feeling but ultimately humans have evolved to survive and reproduce, they are not meant to be vehicles for happiness. Think of all that goes through your head in a day, the words, the emotions, the noise. How can you possibly figure out what is important and what is not unless you have a little help? Worry does just that, it helps us think about an event in the future that might happen, this heightened focus puts it above the events of the day giving us a chance to do something about it.

Action is worry’s worst enemy – Proverb

Worry, stress and anxiety
Worry tends to be specific; I am worried that I won’t be able to pass the maths exam on the 23rd of September. Worry is future based, it anticipates a problem that has not yet happened, the main reason is to make you do something about it today. Stress on the other hand is relatively short term and arises when the gap between what you need to do and are able to isn’t enough. For example, I haven’t got time to learn everything I need to pass this exam, there is just too much to learn. After the event, the stress level will fall. Anxiety is the big brother of them both, it is far more general than worry, for example, I am not very clever and never have been. You’re not really sure what cleverness is, but you’re still able to be anxious about it. Both stress and worry can lead to anxiety if they are intense or go on for too long.

Worry can wake you in the night, asking your brain to solve the problem. However, unless fully awake It’s unlikely you will be able to do so, instead you will simply turn the problem over in your head again and again and deprive yourself of that all-important sleep. Best put it to the back of your mind if possible, think of something else, the problem will feel less important in the morning and after a good night’s sleep you will be far more able to solve it.

It helps to write down half a dozen things which are worrying me. Two of them, say, disappear; about two of them nothing can be done, so it’s no use worrying; and two perhaps can be settled – Winston Churchill

What to worry about
The human mind is so creative it’s possible for it to worry about almost anything. As one worry is resolved another can appear.

  • Don’t know what to do – where do I start, what should I learn first
  • Don’t know how to do it – how can I get this into my head, what is the best way of learning?
  • Don’t know if I can do it, self-doubt – I am not clever enough. This can lead to anxiety.
  • Don’t know how long it will take, what if I don’t have enough time?

One technique to change these from unknowns to possibilities is to follow the advice of Carol Dweck who suggests you add a word to the end of the sentence – the word is YET. For example, I don’t know what to do YET! Although this may seem trivial it moves the worry from unsolvable to something that if you spend time on can be achieved.

The list of “dont knows” are all triggers to help motivate you, they are calls to action, the only way to reduce the worry is to do something, even if as Churchill suggest you make a simple list. However, there are situations when you can’t take action or at least not an obvious one, perhaps when waiting for exam results. It might seem that all you can do is worry. The bad news is, putting yourself in what can feel like a permanent state of worry can result in anxiety and won’t turn that fail into a pass. But all is not lost, planning for the worst whilst hoping for the best is sensible, coming up with a plan that is achievable can remove the pressure, leaving the feeling that even if you do fail there is a way forward and you can do something about it.

We can end with another quote from Winston Churchill who I am sure had a few worries in his time.

Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning

Test obsession and Test Anxiety

Posted on by

Tests anxiety

“We live in a test conscious and test giving culture in which the lives of people are in part determined by their test performance”

Sarason, Davidson, & Lighthall

What’s interesting about this statement is, it was first published in 1960 and was based on students in the US, yet would not seem out of place in describing the situation in the UK.  The UK, as with so many other things has unfortunately caught up with the US and become a nation that tests and measures…everything.

Where a person’s worth is judged only by the tests they have passed it is perhaps not surprising that examination success has become so important and test anxiety increased.

But it’s not just the UK, this is a global obsession, take China for example where the pressure to succeed has become so intense that cheating in the Gaokao, the nation’s A-Chinese-invigilator-sca-010university entrance exam is a major problem. The government has not been slow to react and for the first time anyone found cheating will face a possible seven year jail sentence. In Ruijin, east China’s Jiangxi Province, invigilators use instruments to scan students’ shoes before they entered the exam hall, while devices to block wireless signals are also used to reduce the opportunity to cheat.

Test anxiety or stress

Stress is a broad term that is experienced when you find yourself in adverse or demanding circumstances, sitting an exam perhaps. Test anxiety is a situation specific type of stress, experienced by people who find examinations threatening. Recently, there has been an increased interest in exam stress and test anxiety in the UK and a need for it to be given closer academic scrutiny.

The research so far shows that test anxiety can actually impair learning and hurt test performance. And this is the issue, are students underperforming in examinations, which as stated above can have a significant impact on their lives not because of their lack of knowledge or even their ability to apply knowledge, but simply because the medium used to assess them is an exam.

In simple terms test anxiety effects exams results and exam results play a major part in people’s lives.

There are three components of test anxiety (Zeidner 1998)

  • Cognitive – the negative thoughts you can have during tests e.g. “if I fail this I will fail all my examinations” and the performance limiting difficulties experienced as a result of anxiety e.g. inability to read questions clearly or solve problems.
  • Affective – physical symptoms e.g. trembling, tension etc.
  • Behavioural – test anxiety creates an environment that encourages students to avoid studying or best delay it.

The reason people develop test anxiety is thought to be rooted in certain social issues e.g. how you are judged by others and the fear of failure in the public domain. It may also be related to the type of anxiety people experience when they have to make a best man’s speech, for example. Another aspect is that it is not always what others think, but what you think of yourself that is the issue and so the expectation of exam failure could impact on an individual’s ego and self-esteem.

Phase one is OK BUT

I think in the UK we are through the worst part of this, let’s call it phase one, and by that I mean we know that examinations and testing are not the answer, and that people are not their exam result. We have learned this the hard way by producing groups of exam qualified students, releasing them into the world of work, ill prepared to cope with the demands of the workplace. In addition, we have developed helpful techniques that enable people to better cope with test anxiety. Some of these I have discussed in previous blogs, Stress or Pressure – Don’t let the bridge collapse, Exam stress – Mindfulness and the “7/11” to name but two.

BUT………we still have some way to go with phase two, which involves answering the question, what do we replace exams with if they are so bad? And until we solve that, helping good people perform in the system we have just now is the best we can do.

 

Stress or Pressure – Don’t let the bridge collapse

Posted on by

Releasing PressureI have long been interested in the way knowledge from one domain can help inform another and have had two very good examples of this recently, both leading in the same direction.

 

 

The first came from an engineering friend of mine who started a conversation about the meaning of stress and pressure in his world. He described stress and pressure as essentially the same except being applied in different forms. Pressure is applied on the external surface of a body, while stress is the internal resistive force per unit area of that body, which resists its elongation or compression.

Alternatively – Stress is generated within the material whereas pressure is the applied force.

The second example came from a stress management seminar* I recently attended, not so abstract you might say but it wasDont let the bridge collapse the analogy the presenter used that was interesting. He asked that we thought of a bridge, the cars going over the bridge created pressure on the bridge and as a result the bridge would experience stress.

No matter how strong the bridge, there was a point that if too many cars were on at any one time it would collapse.

How does this help?

Analogies can be very helpful where it’s difficult to conceptualise or understand complex ideas. For example the bridge will show signs of stress before it collapses. This is no different for people; signs of stress will be present well before the stress levels are high enough to cause problems e.g. short temper, lack of sleep, headaches etc.  Also if we carry on with the analogy, there are two ways in which you can make sure the bridge doesn’t collapse. One, don’t have so many cars on the bridge and two, support the bridge so that it can take more cars. This translates into reducing the number of external pressures you are under (less cars) and having coping strategies to help when you are under pressure (some support).

Pressures when studying

A lot of pressures when studying are time related, for example taking on too many subjects or having to study as well as holding down a responsible job.  But some pressure might be created by the way you feel about yourself, not being capable or clever enough. Also people often put themselves under pressure – interesting term “putting yourself under pressure” by having very high expectations or maybe those expectations are put upon them by others.

The simple answer – take some of the cars off the bridge, reduce the number of subjects your studying, lower your expectations etc. This is not to say that having high expectations is not good, but if it is affecting your performance in a negative way, then you have to do something. And I know it may not be easy to do this in all circumstances; do you step down from that responsible job, how practical is that?  Yet if you do nothing, the bridge will collapse and that has to be avoided at all costs.

The alternative to taking cars off the bridge is to add in extra support.

Strategies to cope

Lazarus and Folkman in 1984 suggested that stress is the result of an “imbalance between demands and resources” or results when “pressure exceeds one’s perceived ability to cope”. They came up with two types of coping responses.

Emotion-focused – These techniques work very well when the stress is or at least appears to be outside the individual’s control.

  • Keep yourself busy to take your mind off the issue – just keep working through the course
  • Let off steam to other students/partners, anyone who will listen in fact
  • Pray for guidance and strength – and why not
  • Ignore the problem in the hope it will go away – not always ideal but the problem may sort itself
  • Distract yourself – go for a run
  • Build yourself up to expect the worse – “I will probably fail anyway”

Problem-focused – These techniques aim to remove or reduce the cause of the stress.  These are similar to taking cars off the bridge.

  • Take control – being out of control is often the cause of much stress. Revaluate what the problem is, and ask is it worth it!
  • Information seeking, perhaps the most rational action. Find out what is causing the problem and look to solve it e.g. why do you have such high expectations, does it help?
  • Make a list, evaluate the pros and cons and put in order of importance.

Studying can be stressful and this can result in feeling under pressure but this is not altogether a bad thing stress and pressure are key motivational forces, so don’t think of stress as the enemy but watch out for any cracks that might appear in the bridge.

Watch this TED – Kelly McGonigal: How to make stress your friend.

Related posts – Exam stress – or is it your stress and Exam stress – Mindfulness and the “7/11”

* The course was delivered by the stress management society – click here for their website.

Sleep is for wimps – oh and successful students

Posted on by

Get some sleepAlthough I am sure someone is preparing for an exam this very minute, July/August are the traditional months to take a holiday and get some well earned rest. A holiday can be exactly what you need especially if you have just come to the end of a long period of study followed by in some instances, weeks of exams.

I have to express a personal bias in so much that I believe holidays are essential if you are to be at your best. For me this years holiday has to provide some degree of relaxation after what has been a particularly busy 6 months. I am looking forward to a change of scene, meeting different people and the freedom to wake naturally, feeling rested after a good nights sleep. Holidays are of course very personal and for some an adventure holiday, travelling to new places every day, might be far more desirable.

But one thing that all holidays should provide is the ability to relax and catch up on sleep, even if that means you climb two mountains, swim for three hours before crashing out in a state of satisfied exhaustion on the evening.

Sleep is essential for learning 

Of course sleep is something you should do “properly” every day, it’s just that we don’t. Modern life steals that vital rest time, this is acutely the case when trying to balance both work and study. Studying is often undertaken on an evening and sometimes late into the night as you effectively try to do, too much in too little time.   We now sleep less than we did 50 years ago, it used to be around 8.5 hours, it’s now only 6.5. The sleep should also be of high quality, yet our sleep is interrupted by the lights of mobile phones, and sounds made when texts arrive late into the night. In order to sleep better it is a good idea to avoid light approximately 30 minutes before going to sleep, yet how many read in bed from iPads or equivalent with the bright light emitted from the screen telling your brain to stay awake.

Why sleep is important

We have known that sleep has been important for many years but we didn’t know why, cognitive scientists now have some of the answers. There are three views as to why sleep is beneficial:

One restoration – some of our genes only turn on when we sleep, their role being to make essential repairs.

Two conservation – we sleep to conserve energy, and

Three consolidation – our brain revisit events and experiences, and begins to make sense of them, moving data into long term memory and solving complex problems.

Susanne Diekelmann at the University of Tubingen in Germany says “sleep helps stabilise the memories and integrate them into a network of long-term memory, it also helps us to generalise what we’ve learnt, giving us the flexibility to apply the skills to new situations. So although you can’t soak up new material, you might instead be able to cement the facts or skills learned throughout the day.”  Bodies need rest – the brain needs sleep Sometimes you may find yourself having to push sleep to one side and in specific situations thats fine.

It’s when lack of sleep becomes the norm that problems arise, the result is greater stress, poor judgement and ineffective learning.   So now the exams are over, take a break, get some quality sleep and try and make a few simple adjustments in you life so that sleep takes more of a priority.

It is a common experience that a problem difficult at night is resolved in the morning after the committee of sleep has worked on it.

John Steinbeck  

Music to help you sleep and two video to watch but not just before you go to sleep

TED neuroscientist Russell foster  explains more about why we sleep  

Arianna Huffington talks about the importance of sleep

Thank you for the music – listening to music when revising

Posted on by

May and June are the traditional months when students around the world lock themselves away to revise for their exams.

In China for example over 9 million students will be sitting the university entrance exams.

Last May (2012) Teenagers at Xiaogang school in Hubei province were pictured hooked up to bags of intravenous fluids hanging from the classroom ceiling to boost energy levels during the revision period. An extreme action by anyone’s standards, but perhaps an example of how much pressure students feel this time of year.

As I mentioned in last month’s blog my daughter is currently caught up in this May/June exam frenzy. So once again I found myself looking to her for inspiration. What was she doing, how did she revise? This is not because she is a perfect example of a revision student, in many ways she is not, but I do think she is typical of many.

What does Beth do?

  • Makes notes from her notes – This is a standard exam skill, reducing content down into measurable and personal chunks. She does use mind maps (possibly my influence) but not exclusively.
  • Prepares as if she has to teach someone else – this I find interesting and has certainly not come from me. She writes on a white board the key points as if she was going to teach that subject. I like this idea, as many teachers and lecturers will tell you nothing focuses the mind nor motivates you more than having to teach it to others.
  • Practices past exam questions…of course!
  • Studies while listening to music – now this is the one that intrigued me and as a result I have devoted the rest of the blog to answering the question …..

Is it a good idea to revise whilst listening to music?

As ever the science needs much interpretation.

It’s a bad idea

Researchers from the University of Wales, tasked 25 students with memorising lists of consonants. Some were shown the letters while sitting in silence, others while listening to music by their favourite bands or by groups they had a strong aversion to. The conclusion was that listening to music, hampered their recall.

So it’s good then

Scientists at Stanford University, in California, believe there is a molecular basis for music known as the “Mozart Effect“. It was discovered that rats, like humans, perform better on learning and memory tests after listening to a specific Mozart Sonata in D.

But then there is the evidence that suggests that switching attention when trying to learn as might be the case with listening to music slows down the cognitive process.

Yet you cannot ignore the research that clearly shows music has the ability to alter your brain and induce relaxation which in turn helps create an ideal state for learning.

Watch what happens to your brain when you listen to music.

Hopefully you get the idea.

Conclusions

  • Listening to music puts you into a more relaxed frame of mind and that is of course good for learning. So listening to music before or after revising can help.
  • If you do want to listen to music, avoid music that requires you to shift your attention. This would suggest you should not listen to  music with lyrics  as it can mean you need to think about what is being said nor should you listen to something new that you may not have heard before. This is one of the reasons classical, in particular baroque music is the preferred choice of many students. Also don’t play the music too loud, keep it as background noise.
  • If there are specific facts that you simply need to know, then avoid listening to music completely, give it your full attention. But you can’t concentrate at this level all day, only for short periods.
  • On the whole be consistent don’t keep changing the type of music, you need familiarity.

Music to help you study

The internet has many websites that offer relaxing and helpful music, here are a few that might help.

You have to be joking – learning fun!

Posted on by

A famous scientist was on his way to a lecture in yet another university when his chauffeur offered an idea. “Hey, boss, I’ve heard your speech so many times I bet I could deliver it and give you the night off.” “Sounds great,” the scientist said. When they got to the auditorium, the scientist put on the chauffeur’s hat and settled into the back row. The chauffeur walked to the lectern and delivered the speech. Afterward he asked if there were any questions. “Yes,” said one professor. Then he launched into a highly technical question. The chauffeur was panic stricken for a moment but quickly recovered. “That’s an easy one,” he replied. “In fact, it’s so easy, I’m going to let my chauffeur answer it!”

Okay it might have made you smile rather than laugh out loud and it may not be the best joke you have ever heard, but it will have changed your mood and as a result made you more receptive to learning.

The facts

But how does this work? Dopamine is the chemical neurotransmitter most associated with attention, memory storage, comprehension, and executive function. Research indicates that the brain releases more dopamine when you play, laugh, exercise and listen to stories. (Depue and Collins 1999).

Interestingly making learning fun also reduces stress which can impede the learning process.

During periods of high stress or anxiety, functional MRI studies show increased blood flow to the “emotional” portion of the limbic system. When the amygdala (part of the limbic system) is in this state, neural activity in the rest of the brain is profoundly reduced (Xiao and Barbas 2002; Pawlak et al. 2003).

But learning is not fun!

Of course something that is fun to one person may not be fun to someone else. And what do people do to have fun? One answer to this is they play games, in fact there is a whole industry built around playing games to learn, unsurprisingly and somewhat disappointingly its called game based learning (GBL)

A game is said to have several key elements.

1. Competition – The score keeping element and/or winning conditions motivate the players and provide an assessment of their performance. Note that players are not necessarily competing against each other. In fact, a lot of games have players working as a team to overcome some obstacle or opponent.

2. Engagement – Once the learner starts, he or she does not want to stop before the game is over. This engagement is thought to come from four sources: challenge, curiosity, control, and fantasy.

3. Immediate Rewards – Players receive victory or points, sometimes even descriptive feedback, as soon as goals are accomplished

Can learning be fun, yes of course and making it into a game is a great way of doing it. It might be as simple as writing the questions for a quiz based on a subject to be examined and testing a group of friends. Setting the quiz from a learning perspective is probably better than answering the question. Keep to the rules above though, so make sure you offer a reward.

Also it might be American football, which I have to admit I don’t understand, but if you do you will love Financial Football click here to play, its a free online game with cool graphics that aims to teach money management skills.

Have a revision party

Okay the idea might sound a little of the wall but watch this short video, it looks like fun to me…

Ps the loud one is my daughter.

And the outtakes 

Want to find out more then read this article by Dr. Judy Willis who is an authority in brain research and learning.

And just for fun Dawn French and the accounting joke.

Exam stress – Mindfulness and the “7/11”

Posted on by

I have been aware of the term mindfulness for a few years now, but had struggled to think how it could help with exams.  That was before reading an article in the Guardian, Could beditation be the answer to exam nerves? ‘Mindfulness’ is the latest big thing in schools. What is it and why is it so popular?

In the article they describe two ways in which mindfulness may be used to help with exams. One is called the “7/11” the other bedetation.

  • The “7/11” is a relaxation breathing exercise. Matching the counting to the breath, you breathe in through your nose for a count of seven, and out through your nose for a count of 11. As with many mindfulness techniques this helps focus your attention, in this instance you use the breath as an object of concentration. By focusing on the breath you become aware of the mind’s tendency to jump from one thing to another. The simple discipline of concentration brings us back to the present moment and all the richness of experience that it contains. Watch this video, it shows exactly how to do “7/11” breathing.
  • Beditation is simply the process of meditation whilst lying down. Meditation might sound slightly new world, but it is of course thousands of years old. On one level meditation is a simple yet powerful technique that effortlessly allows your mind to become calm and peaceful. Which is not a bad state to be in when you’re studying or in the exam room.

What exactly is Mindfulness?

Although mindfulness has its roots in eastern philosophy, many acknowledge the work of Jon Kabat-Zinn from the Medical Centre at the University of Massachusetts as being the founder of the modern mindfulness movement. Jon Kabat-Zinn defines mindfulness as “paying attention, on purpose in the present moment non judgementally.”

If you imagine that there are two modes of attention, thinking and sensing. Attention often gets drawn to what’s wrong, what’s threatening, our attention scans for problems and this is for good reason, it is a primeval survival technique. This triggers the thinking part as you attempt to solve the problem. Now there is nothing wrong with this but the mind needs a balance and there is a time to think and a time to relax and sense.

By moving your attention to the present moment and into the sensing mode you will instantly become more relaxed. The “7/11” breathing and meditation techniques are just ways of helping you do this. Research is showing that there are huge benefits of spending some time in the sensing mode and not in the thinking mode.

Listen to this TED lecture given by Richard Burnett who is the co-founder of the Mindfulness in Schools Project (also known as .b, pronounced “dot b”), whose aim is to introduce mindfulness as a discipline in the school curriculum.

How it helps with exam stress

Stress is often created by thinking what might happen if I fail, what happens if I am not good enough, or can’t answer this question? These are all examples of the thinking state of attention. Now as I have mentioned before in a previous blog, exam stress or is it your stress to feel stressed is a perfectly natural reaction; it is the result of being faced with a challenge that initially at least, looks impossible to overcome. But in an exam it is far from helpful, often cutting off your ability to think straight and sometimes paralysing your actions.

By using the “7/11” breathing techniques before the exam, to help you feel more relaxed, during the exam to stop a panic attack taking over, and even after the exam when you begin to wonder what you should have done but didn’t, can be incredibly helpful.

And meditation can help both in the short and long run, our mental health and intellectual skills are shaped by what we do with our attention, where we place our awareness. And of course intellectual skills are vital not just in the exam but whilst studying as well.

Is it just in the mind?

Brain-imaging studies show that mindfulness meditation can reliably and profoundly alter the structure and function of the brain and produce, for example, greater blood-flow to and a thickening of the cerebral cortex in areas associated with attention and emotions. As well its impact on specific problems, mindfulness has been shown to have a very positive effect on intellectual skills, improving sustained attention, visual special memory, working memory and concentration

The National Institute for health and care excellence (Nice) are recommending mindfulness.

Watch this short video on more ways that mindfulness may help in exams.

Can ‘Mindful’ meditation increase profits?

And for the more commercial minded of you, it might even help your business increase profits. Watch this to find out more.

 

Related articles