ABSTRACT
Students who are studying on their own can utilize planning, development, and reinforcement strategies to make their independent learning more effective. This chapter provides practical tips to help students apply effective learning strategies during their independent learning. It uses that students can use these tips on their own, or teachers and parents to help guide students to create effective independent learning sessions. When people space their learning, they take that same amount of study time and spread it out across a much longer period of time. But spacing people learning requires advance planning; people can't just decide to space out their studying at the last minute. Retrieval practice is the most important study strategy, and people should engage in this activity every time their study; it answers the overall question of how people should study. And finally: elaboration, concrete examples, and dual coding provide additional techniques that can be used in conjunction with retrieval practice.
