Daily Study Session

What this is

A single 90-minute study block, broken into setup, focused work, breaks, and a closing review. It's designed to be re-run — copy it whenever you sit down, rather than treating it as a one-off plan.

The setup tasks are not preamble

Deciding what you're studying before you sit down is what separates ninety productive minutes from ninety minutes of opening files. Study biology is not a session goal. Work through the practice questions on cell respiration and write down what I got wrong is.

Phone in another room, not face-down on the desk. Proximity alone measurably degrades concentration even when the phone is untouched.

Ninety minutes, split

Two focused stretches with a real break between them fits how attention actually decays. The break should be genuinely away from the desk — standing, walking, water — and not a screen, because scrolling doesn't restore attention the way physical movement does.

Finish with retrieval

The review task at the end is the highest-value five minutes in the session. Close everything and write down what you covered and what you couldn't recall. That act of retrieval is what moves material into memory, and it also tells you where the next session starts.

Don't judge the session by how it felt

Effortful sessions feel worse and produce more learning than smooth ones. Sessions where everything makes sense as you read are usually recognition rather than recall, which doesn't survive to the exam.

Timing

Run it plain — this is a same-sitting checklist. For a whole exam period, use the Exam Prep Plan to schedule the sessions.