Far too often students will go to the library to tackle a paper and isolate themselves in a corner and swear to never leave that spot for the next 4 hours. Have you heard of this before? Chances are you've done it, or at least locked yourself in for the night in the promise you'll study for hours until you pass out over your work? and then...you log on to the dreaded Facebook and mindlessly stalk people you met only once and there goes 40 minutes of your study time. I believe this can be prevented and swearing to study for hours straight is not productive. One needs breaks. One needs to get up and stretch his or her legs; we are not designed to sit for hours straight.
I advise that for every hour you study you get up and do something active for 5 to 10 minutes. This will keep your blood flowing, which will help bring oxygen to the brain, and will provide you with a productive distraction that is not Facebook or social media. You may claim that if you're there for 3 hours that is about half an hour of your study time, but give it a shot because it is worth it. What is great about these short breaks is that it keeps you from getting distracted while working and also gets any little burst of energy out so that you can sit down for the whole time and focus.
I advise if you're in your room do some push ups, sit ups, squats, jumping jacks, even just a few stretches.
In the library it is trickier because you don't want to look like a fool doing push-ups in the middle of the library so: Go to the bathroom, visit a friend for 5-10 min (assuming you have to walk to them or go up and down a flight of stairs), go to the bathroom, fill up your water bottle, or even just walk up and down the stairs.
The main point I really want to note is inactive breaks are not good breaks because they do not set you in the mood to study more/get work done.
That's my short post for the day!
Stay Strong,
Trev
Picture from http://themetapicture.com/check-me-check-me/
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