Don’t treat highlighting, rereading, and summarizing as primary study methods
Highlighting and rereading are the most common study habits among students, yet both rank at the very bottom among ten widely used learning strategies. Summarizing, keyword memorization, and visualizing text with images also fall into the lowest tier. They’re not completely useless, but only work under very specific conditions, so spending the same amount of time on self-testing yields far better results.
No cost at all;
A review that rated ten common learning methods by "whether the effect generalizes across learning conditions,…
No cost at all; actually saves time. These methods are easy to apply and give you that “I’m studying” feeling.
A review that rated ten common learning methods by "whether the effect generalizes across learning conditions, student traits, materials, and assessment formats." Rated highest: practice testing and spaced practice. Rated moderate: elaborative interrogation, self-explanation, interleaved practice. Rated lowest, five methods: writing summaries, highlighting (or underlining), the keyword method, imagining pictures for a text, and rereading. The review states that most students say they use rereading and highlighting, but neither steadily raises scores. The review says they should be replaced with other methods, for example practice testing instead of rereading.
Dunlosky J, Rawson KA, Marsh EJ, Nathan MJ, Willingham DT (2013). Improving Students' Learning With Effective Learning Techniques: Promising Directions From Cognitive and Educational Psychology. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4–58. https://doi.org/10.1177/1529100612453266
Open source linkThis is not a ban on underlining. Underlining can mark "which spots to self-test in a moment"; the problem is treating underlining itself as studying. The review also says the lowest band is not zero; the conditions where these methods work are narrow and need more research. For replacements see item 14 (close the book and self-test) and item 15 (spread the same time over several days).