Do your best to keep up.
Especially in courses with weekly problem sets, do not fall behind. Organize your time so
that you can stay on schedule.
Pursue multiple modes of understanding.
Economic ideas can often be understood mathematically, intuitively, or graphically – try to cultivate all three modes.
Practice problems as much as possible.
Economics professors assign problem sets or practical exercises to help students learn
analytical material. Realize that these problem sets are essential to your learning. They may only count for a small fraction of the grade, but it is a mistake to use that as an excuse to allocate little time to them. Doing problem sets, assimilating the material, asking for help with the problems, talking to others about them – these are the heart of learning economics. This is particularly true of the core theory courses.
Practice active reading.
A good strategy is to go through a chapter and try to explain any figure, table, or
equation to yourself – the theory behind it, its implications, any assumptions, what it really means, how it relates to problems, etc. Explain it aloud. Work with a partner to explain it to each other. It is amazing how something can seem obvious when you just read through it, but then be very confusing when you have to explain it to yourself or someone else. Figures presented in economics courses usually embody more than one insight. Scrutinize them! Try to reproduce them from scratch. If you see a pattern in the economic analysis, don’t just memorize it – investigate why and how it happens.
Build on your past work.
When an assignment is returned to you, take some time to look at it carefully with the solutions, and learn from the experience. Even write down suggestions for your own future work. These will help focus your studying later on.
Start exam prep early.
Review the material, making review notes if that is useful. Write out key definitions and concepts, and know them. Draw figures, and understand them. Explain the material to yourself. Then try to do problems, possibly categorizing them into types. You can do
new problems from the book or review materials, or just re-do problem set problems. Understand the types of problems, the approach, what purpose they serve. Think about the issues, just play around with the ideas and become comfortable with them. Ask for help with any questions that come up in your studying. If there is a pre-exam help session, you can go to it even if you don’t have questions, just to hear the discussion generated by others’ questions. When you think you’re close to ready, take an old exam for practice (do this under exam conditions), and use that as another learning experience.
Information compiled by the Office of Academic Learning Resources Student Staff.