One of the things that I (Cindy) tell my students is that either studying can be hard or the test can be hard, which would you prefer? Each of the 6 strategies for effective learning can be a challenge to use appropriately. Spreading out study feels inherently more difficult than cramming the night before. Studying one topic at a time and re-reading notes are easier than mixing things up and practicing retrieval, but the key is that the struggle matters. The struggle is what results in better recall later on. These are sometimes referred to as “desirable difficulties,” meaning that those things that are difficult result in better learning (1, 2).

After talking with my students who have tried to use the strategies without success, I realized that many of them have tried to make them easier. Some students try to just use images they’ve found on google instead of creating their own image to go with the material they’re trying to learn. Some have used “spacing” by studying two days or maybe even a whole week before the test instead of studying throughout the semester. These “cheats” mean that the students are not getting the full mental effort needed to make the strategies effective.

There is no one correct way to use the strategies.

We selected these 6 strategies because there is a lot of evidence showing that these strategies work under many different circumstances. However, we never say exactly how to use them so that people can be flexible when trying to apply them to their unique contexts. We’ve discussed previously how retrieval practice, specifically, does not always work the way that people expect. While it would be nice for us to be able to hand out study schedules and specific materials that should be used at each study session, it’s just not that simple. For almost all of the strategies, they work best when the individual comes up with their own way of using them. For example, we could provide you images to go with study materials, but you are much more likely to remember an image that you come up with yourself.

Because the strategies work best when they are designed by the individual doing the studying, the burden is on that person to do the effortful processing needed to be successful. We cannot create one image or study schedule that would work for every person, and similarly, cannot guarantee that the ones used will “work” the way that a student or teacher hopes.

There are a lot of other factors that can affect performance.