how to study…

By President Asael T. Sorensen

Part I

How to Setup a Sound Study Situation

1. Prepare the place and the time:

Consistently use the same study place and time so that you will have a psychological attitude—“a conditional reflex”—favorable toward immediate, persistent effective effort.

2. Prepare the paraphernalia:

Using the list below as a guide or an inventory, collect the items as soon as possible so that you will have everything you might conceivably need within seated reach. (Check off the list now)

Table or desk

Straight chair

Lamp

Waste basket

Thermometer

Typewriter

Eraser

Triple Combination

Bible

File cards

Correspondence

Pencils, red, blue, black

Pens

Paper

Paste

Liahona

Portuguese (all) reference books

Dictionary

Reports

Reinforcements

3. Prepare the mind:

Now you are ready to invite the Spirit of the Lord through PRAYER to attend you and your companion while studying. “As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he.” Put your mind into the proper attitude, by desiring to LEARN THE GOSPEL, and to LEARN the Portuguese language. You put forth the effort and the LORD will bless you with a testimony and the ability to use the Brazilian language. Think positive thoughts.

4. Prepare the body:

Keep yourself in prime health, mentally and physically—have a sound mind and a sound body—by following the obvious recommendations concerning diet, sleep, recreation, exercise, lighting, ventilation ever realizing that health is also a matter of planning – and, in order to work to the best of our ability—we need to keep ourselves mentally and physically fit.

5. Prepare the method:

We become successful by following the rules that beget success. Compare your methods of studying with systems used by the other Elders about you, especially those that are achieving the desired results.

Part II

How to Read With Speed

6. Eye check up:

If you haven’t had your eyes examined or your specs checked in the past three years, you’d better have an eye to eye talk with an eye doctor.

7. Choose the right speed:

Consider the material you are studying and treat it accordingly.

1. If it’s doctrinal where every word counts – go slow and sure.
2. If it is ordinary material where the ideas as a whole matter, push yourself to read faster.
3. If it is pleasure reading … skim through it catching the main ideas.

8. Watch these signposts:

As there is practically no speed limit to reading, always try to get yourself to read as fast as your gears will take it. Keep a heavy foot on the accelerators.

1. Read against a continually shorter time limit.
2. Plunge especially hard at the beginning of a chapter; dive hard toward the end
3. Eliminate all lip and tongue movement, holding your finger on your lips or Adam’s apple as a reminder.
4. Read by intelligent phrases instead of word by word.
5. Consciously use fewer and wider “eye fixations” per line, folding the page vertically in two’s or three’s as a reminder.
6. Positively refuse to look back at a line, sentence, paragraph, or page.

Part III

How to Read to Remember

9. Head start:

Before reading at length in any unfamiliar reference book, look it over carefully for:

1. The author’s name and connections.
2. The title and sub-title.
3. The name of the publisher.
4. The date of publication, reprint, and edition.
5. The place of publication.
6. The table of contents.
7. The index, glossary, appendix, etc.
8. The general plan of organization.

10. Read backwards:

Before reading through a chapter or a book, check at the end of the chapter or the book for a summary which may save you wading through unnecessary pages of detail.

11. Watch signals:

Take full advantage of “typographical signals”—italics, boldface type, footnotes, references, numbered points, etc.

12. Keys:

Learn to detect swiftly the topic sentence, the key paragraph, the summary.

13. As you read:

Do these four things as you read:

1. THINK OF questions and examples.
2. RELATE to your previous reading and experience.
3. ANTICIPATE the author’s line of reasoning.
4. APPLY the reading matter to the current problem, situation by analyzing—judging, comparing, classifying and generalizing.

14. Jargon:

Seek out at one time all the abbreviations, symbols, etc. that are likely to occur in your reading—learn them!

15. Vocabulary:

Use a dictionary when the meaning of the word is not clear.

16. Review:

Use the index of a book for a review, see how many items you can recall adequate information. ALWAYS carry something in your pocket to read, review, or memorize in odd moments on the street car, etc.

Part IV

How to Achieve and Memorize

17. Get the facts:

Learn what your duties are, set out to fulfill them.

18. Organization:

Set up a schedule that you can FOLLOW consistently. In order for you to achieve the most from your studies, you must be organized.

19. Goals:

Set up a daily goal and work toward it—then your weekly, monthly and yearly goals will take care of themselves. Give yourself a margin of safety.

20. Attention span:

By experimentation and analysis learn your “concentration” span or limit; then change the subject or rest briefly before starting on another subject.

21. Best hours:

Watch out about studying too much too early or too little too late. We can condition ourselves to absorb at any hour that our senses are alert. We should endeavor to study the same time every day.

22. Repetition:

Repetition is one of the important LAWS OF LEARNING.

23. Be choosy:

Be picky about what you memorize, learn to be selective. Don’t clutter up your mind with a lot of attic junk.

24. Understanding:

Be sure that you understand whatever you commit to memory. Understanding is a bright light to a foggy memory.

25. Motivation:

To become a SUCCESSFUL MISSIONARY.

26. Whole method:

To memorize the “whole” or “unit”; repeat the entire selection orally over and over again in complete form, working over separately those parts that give you difficult.

27. Steps:

Here is a recommended process of memorization:

1. Read the material at full speed and without pausing.
2. Reread carefully word for word, making a mental outline.
3. After doing something else, reflect upon what you remember, trying to build up associations.
4. Check back to see what you have and haven’t retained.
5. Repeat the process on such weak parts as necessary.
6. Continue to go over the material even after you know it.

28. Sleep method:

Memorize just before retiring, you may be the type who can sleep on something and awake with the material you learned.

29. Utilization:

Just as soon as you have learned it, discuss it with someone.

30. Teachableness:

When we lose humility we cease to be teachable. When we cease to study books and the world about us, we cease to learn.

Much can be said on this subject. We hope that these few points may be of value.

Asael T. Sorensen

President, Brazilian Mission