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midweek Links | Scholastici. us: Student Productivity At Its Finest (Pingback) Says:
September 25th, 2007 at 4:04 pm
[] use focused question clusters to study for multiple choice tests | study hack tag: linkblog addThis_url = ‘http%3a%2f%2fwww. Scholastici. Us%2f2007%2f09%2f25%2fmidweek-links%2f’; addThis_title = ‘midweek+links’; addThis_pub = ”; print This post []
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AngelaN Says:
October 31st, 2007 at 5:38 pm
Wow, This is going to be really helpful since most of my exams are in mc format.
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Memorize This! 7 Ways to Memorize Anything! | Mindful Ink (Pingback) Says:
February 4th, 2008 at 5:52 pm
[] study hacks: use focused question clusters to study[]
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Study Hacks » Blog Archive » Monday Master Class: The 5 Most Useful Study Hacks Articles That You Never Read (Pingback) Says:
February 11th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
[] use focused question clusters to study for multiple choice tests one of the most glaring omissions in straight-a is that i didn’t address fact-based technical courses — life sciences, anatomy, intro psych — the type of subjects that have you learn a lot of technical details, but feature few big ideas or sample problems. This article extends the classic quiz and recall method to efficiently handle notes that contain a large number of facts, systems, and details. []
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Rae Says:
February 20th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
Cal, you are awesome! thank you so much for This…. This really makes studying more efficient and i now have more time on my hands now….
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Daisy Says:
May 26th, 2008 at 11:11 am
Thanks so much for This! It’s a very big help to me; all my exams are This way! 
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Study Hacks » Blog Archive » Monday Master Class: Conquer Complicated Material with the Mini-Textbook Method (Pingback) Says:
June 23rd, 2008 at 1:40 pm
[] a reader recently asked me for some study advice. he was facing an exam in a course with unusually complicated material. the concepts were numerous, and tricky to understand, and connected to each other in non-obvious ways. it was clear that there was too much information to be efficiently handled by standard quiz-and-recall, so i referred him to my favorite under-appreciated study technique: the focused cluster method. []
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Joe The II Says:
October 6th, 2008 at 9:45 pm
If you’re still looking at This post: do you have any tips for creating question clusters based on material learned in textbooks?
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Study Hacks » Blog Archive » Q & A: Mastering Question Clusters, Breaking Up with Terrible Majors, Withdrawing from a ‘B’, and Debating a Two-Day a Week Course Schedule (Pingback) Says:
November 21st, 2008 at 10:17 pm
[] have three questions about your focused question clusters study []
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Study Hacks » Blog Archive » Monday Master Class: How to Use Gmail to Reduce Your Study Time by 50% (Pingback) Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:35 pm
[] use focused-question clusters to study for multiple choice tests []
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Michael Says:
March 30th, 2009 at 2:56 am
Hi,
Is focused question cluster strategy useful for subject like anatomy? the exam for the anatomy course i am taking consists of essay questions and short answer questions. what is the best way to study for This type of course and exam questions?
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Study Hacks Says:
March 30th, 2009 at 12:59 pm
Is focused question cluster strategy useful for subject like anatomy? the exam for the anatomy course i am taking consists of essay questions and short answer questions. what is the best way to study for This type of course and exam questions?
You might need a combo of focused question clusters for the short answers, and something more like q/e/c for the bigger picture ideas you tackle in the essay questions.
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Study Hacks » Blog Archive » Q & A: Taking Biology Notes, Switching Between Tasks, Deconstructing Crappy Papers, and More (Pingback) Says:
April 29th, 2009 at 9:03 pm
[] notes using your laptop and format them directly as focused question clusters. This removes any obstacles between your notetaking now and efficient studying []
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Dottywine Says:
August 17th, 2009 at 7:16 pm
I haven’t tried This tech. yet…
so your notes will be questions. and you find the answers in the textbook? or you write the q and the a?
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James Says:
October 30th, 2009 at 7:12 am
Can you give an example of This? like the stories you wrote in your book. when the plan was put into action. and the type of questions?
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Study Hacks » Blog Archive » The Grade Whisperer: How Jay Became a Living Incarnation of the Study Hacks Canon (Pingback) Says:
November 5th, 2009 at 9:32 pm
[] strategy during walks between buildings. in class, he takes notes with a mixture of q/e/c and focused question clusters, depending on the material. he also uses one of my all-time favorite strategies, the sunday ritual []
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John Smith Says:
November 7th, 2009 at 6:14 am
Can you give an example of This? like the stories you wrote in your book. when the plan was put into action. and the type of questions?
Yes, i would also like an example of the focused question. i’ve read it so many times but i still don’t understand how it’s formated properly. i need This for patho!
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Study Hacks » Blog Archive » How to Study for Non-Technical Science Courses (Pingback) Says:
November 17th, 2009 at 8:32 pm
[] non-technical science courses, i recommend using the focused question cluster format for your notes. This strategy has you pull out the important ideas and capture them in clusters of []
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Allan Says:
November 22nd, 2009 at 12:42 am
This is the best way to study for med school classes. anatomy and histology exams become much more manageable when you’ve answered the questions to yourself first. i made 3×5 flashcards where each card dealt with a subtopic, and had 4-5 q’s on each card. thanks for clearly spelling This method out!
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Chris Says:
December 19th, 2009 at 11:53 pm
I too would like some specific examples of the focused question clusters. i have been using q/e/c, however wanted to also try This out to.
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heidi Says:
March 7th, 2010 at 6:26 am
How is writing rapid fire questions helpful if i do not know how to answer those? i am sorry but i think that what makes you answer more rapidly is to build a clear mind map with clear connections in your brain. This is probably the most essential and once This is done you can probably secure 95% of the exam (assuming you have solid understanding). i do agree This method would help getting the 5% and achieve the perfectly inhumane 100% mark.
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Phedre Says:
March 10th, 2010 at 3:46 am
Heidi – You sound like a very visual-based/auditory learner. I bet you have a great memory, too. But every one learns differently, and many students do not have eidetic memory. They need the verbal/written connect-This-to-brain method to “cement” the knowledge. Other people, like me, need to read things aloud to really learn them, or try to explain it to another person, because we have crap memories and aren’t visual learners. 
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Mike Says:
March 15th, 2010 at 9:48 pm
Hey cal, i’m a bit of a fix with biology right now and i’m not sure if i am doing the focused clusters correctly or not but for some reason i’m still dying on my bio exams (could you provide an example of This technique? sample notes perhaps? )
thanks.
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Brandon Says:
April 24th, 2010 at 1:52 am
Cal, i’ve been employing the cluster technique for the last 2 biology exams which of course have tons of material on them. i keep getting low b type grades, and unfortunately it is to late to get an a with only the final to go. it seems as though when i finish the test i know so much more material that wasn’t even tested, and there were a handful of questions that were on the test that seemed to slip my mind. however, i have 2 more semesters of bio. exams that will be in This long mc format are there any tweaks you think may help? seems as if some of my classmates just simply re-read the book with flash cards and score 90′s i’m at a loss…
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Study Hacks Says:
April 26th, 2010 at 1:23 pm
Hey cal, im a bit of a fix with biology right now and im not sure if i am doing the focused clusters correctly or not but for some reason im still dying on my bio exams
See my somewhat more recent post on studying for non-technical science classes. i would give This same advice to @brandon. you might also check out my article on studying for orgo — which is probably relevant as well.
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Bryan Jones Says:
October 27th, 2010 at 9:20 pm
I have to say that This piece of advice would work very well for a variety of test formats, such as:
Mc
fill-in-the-blank
matching
identification
quotations (literature classes only)
I am lost though as to how to apply it for essays, since all of my history tests have essay components.
Also, is there any way This could be applied to foreign language courses?
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