Comprehensive Report on Study Skills: Learning, Brain and Mind-Mapping

This report delves into the realm of study skills, emphasizing their importance in personal and academic development. It explores various approaches to learning, including the behaviorist and social learning approaches, highlighting how individuals learn differently and the impact of environmental stimuli and observation. The report also examines the capabilities of the human brain, emphasizing its role as the seat of learning and memory, and how its functions can be optimized for academic success. Furthermore, the report introduces mind-mapping as a powerful tool for storing and retrieving information, providing a visual method to connect key concepts, improve memory, and enhance overall learning effectiveness. The report concludes by summarizing the significance of these study skills and their impact on achieving academic and professional success.

Study Skills

Study skills are refers to the approach that applied by an individual to learning. As, it is
essential for acquiring good grade and also help people in developing their learning. Along with
this, it is also an arrangement of skills which used to tackle the process of managing as well as
taking in new information, keeping the same and at the same time also assist in dealing with
assessment (Cardinale and Johnson, 2017). In order to boosts person ability to study, various
skills are there that help developing their learning and also improve their personalities. Study
skills are the discrete technique that learned from individual for a short time and also applied to
most field of study. Current project is going to describe the different approaches to learning and
also understand how can people learn. In addition to this, capabilities of the brain and its
connectivity to the academic study is mentioned in this project that can be beneficial in
improving their learning activities. At last, Mind-mapping is an effective aspect that includes in
this project that may aid to storing and retrieving of information.
Different approaches to learning
Each and every people are different from each others, therefore they also do or learn in
different ways. As, they also have different preferences or strength in learning that help them in
improving their skills and knowledge. If an individual choose to learn that they can learn non-
stop and also develop their mind set regarding it. People can learn new ideas by connecting
themselves to what they already know and after that they transferring them in their long term
memory and also recognise the same whenever they required. Along with this, an effective
learning includes initiative, curiosity and creativity which influence people to learn something to
develop their personality. Thus, learning is one of the important part for an individual to become
a successful learner in which they develop their ability to self-regulate in different situation. In
relation to this, there are different approaches to learning that can be used by students in their
learning process. These can be understood by following description:
Behaviourist Approach to learning is an effective learning approach which is based over the
ideas of learners that they used to respond to stimuli within their surrounding (Al-Hilawani,
2016). In this relation the primary purpose of the learning facilitator, hence, in order to give
appropriate and useful stimuli. This can be beneficial for the learner responds to and also assist
to gains the variety of knowledge or experience within their learning activities. Along with this,
the behaviourist approach to learning is based over the belief in which the behaviour of people
can be taught by changeless continuation of a task that is combined with appropriate feedback
1

that provided by the facilitator to the learners (Villarreal and Martinez, 2018). As positive
feedback can provides encouragement and better success and on the other side counter feedback
and contiguous correction can be a cause of discourages the continuation of a error or unwanted
behaviour of people in their learning process. Mainly, this type of approach is consider as an
effective because it is based over the view points that there is one right way and one truth that the
student required to learn. This kind of knowledge and learning is same for all the people who
wants to learn some kind of skills. For this, it provides importance to instructor or trainer control
as the learners consider all the external reinforcement that can motivate and also encourage
individual to reach the stated objectives.
Social learning approach is type of learning approach is related with development of early
behaviourism theory. In this, people can learn from different aspects that present in society
because they learn from both directly and indirectly or by observing others behaviour. In this, it
becomes attentive into repertoire of behaviour of people as it also required to be positively and
effectively reinforced. It put great significance within the learning of an individual with other
people by interacting with each others. It can be interpersonal interactions that includes face to
face and in a team. With the help of this, people can easily learn and improve their knowledge by
seeing others. Furthermore, the main issue with this approach is that people do not copy
everything that they see so that they needs to be selective about what they select to copy. It is
important approach when individual get proper training so that they can easily pick up on error
quickly. By this, people can improve their learning and keep their knowledge strong.
Capabilities of the brain
A human brain is an intelligent machine that store and includes various things and
information as well. As it is stated that the seat of learning is the human brain as it carry all the
memories to the structural core in which it is compared with existing memories. This can be
stores all the long term memory and vast repository of each and every aspect that an individual
ever experienced in our lives (Naqvi and et. al., 2018). In addition to this, the human brain also
command centre for the human nervous system. For improving learning process of a students,
brain is one of the significant phase that contributes to remember all the necessary key aspects of
academic study. Apart from this, a strong memory is highly depend over the health and vitality
of individual brain because it provide sign to recognise the information (Kneale, 2019). In the
context of academic study, human brain includes certain capabilities including get creative, allow
2

individual to power nap, break out of daily routine and also tries to something new in developing
their learning activities. The general conviction inspires Brain-based learning that learning can
be quickened & improved if instructors base how or what they teach on learning instead of on
past educational practices, established conventions, or some assumptions about the learning
procedure. For example, most people once believed that human intelligence is a kind of fixed
characteristics that stays unchanged for whole of individual life. Moreover, cognitive science
research has uncovered that human brain truly changes when it learns as well as that in wake of
rehearsing certain abilities, it turns out to be progressively simpler to keep learning and to
improve those skills. This finding learning adequately enhances brain functioning, strength, and
working intelligence has conceivably broad ramifications for how schools can structure their
academic programs (Villarreal, 2018).
Furthermore, human brain also plays a huge part in an individual life as help or allow
people in storing and retrieving the information. At the time of studies, brain is on active mode
as it keep the area that people can learn and recognition in their academic study. In ever changing
world, it demand the ability to think critically, communicate effectively, apply continually
changing technology, be aware and adaptive, judgement and open mindedness. Brain is also
provide assistance to an individual to make complex decision as it also functioning appropriately.
This is the reason that students needs to keep their mind active so that they can easily make their
learning strong and at the same time also improve their recognition aspects. With the help of this,
brain can develop creative ideas and ways to enhance their ability to learn something new and
innovative within their career (Cathey, 2016).
‘Mind-mapping’ as an aid to storing and retrieving of information
Mind-mapping refers to the way of linking key concepts by using images, lines and links
as well. Mainly, it is uses the concept of radiant thinking in which thoughts of people are radiate
out from a single idea as it often expressed as an image. Mainly, it is consider as an important
tool for the human brain that includes or captures thoughts, thinking that goes on human mind.
Along with this, it is also beneficial for people to think, gather knowledge, create ideas and also
assist them in remember all the aspects and activities. As it can be created in different ways but
at the same time also includes same basics such as central theme, associations, covered lines,
keywords, proximity, colour and images. All these are help in developing a mind-map that assist
human to improve their memory and also recognise the different skills and aspects. One of the
3

main advantage of mind-mapping is to store or recover all the information that an individual
wants. It also help them in learning activities in which an individual includes certain themes and
ideas to present their overall knowledge to others, With the help of this, student can improve
their mind and also keep it active so that all the necessary information and activities can be easily
store and recover (Gormley et. al., 2018). In addition to this, in a mind map as it is opposed to
the linear text or traditional note taking in which all the information is structured in a way that is
easily resemble with human brain and what it actually works. In context to strong information, it
is considered as an activity that includes both aspects such as analytical and artistic which keep
engage human brain in much richer way (Thompson, 2017).
Furthermore, mind-mapping define all the information in a visual way that provide
assistance to people in storing and retrieving all the necessary information for their learning
objective. In this regard, there are some different benefits of mind-mapping show that why is
works. As mind mapping is effective in avoids dull, jogging creativity of people, linear thinking
and making notes that assist in taking fun. In context to this, there are some important purposes
of using mind map such as:
 Note taking
 Problem solving
 Studying and memorization
 Presenting information
 Brainstorming
 Developing creativity
 Researching information from multiple sources
 Gaining insight
 Storing and retrieving information
Along with this, mind-mapping is an effective tool of memory boosting because it
support in encouraging people brand to make proper balance among ideas at the time of
developing themes within the mind-map. This become more memorable for an individual as it
contributes in link and at the same time also put all the ideas into a visual format. Furthermore,
mind-mapping is also contributes in improving students memory this is the reason that they use
this diagram that make them able to store and retrieve important information. The act of mind-
mapping is also may assist in increasing association, creative thinking and imagination of people
4

which make it the perfect tool (Cottrell, 2019). This will directly contributes in boosting people
memorization skills. As there are some effective aspect that define that how exactly mind maps
improve memory of people are as follows:
 Mind map needs to be includes only keywords and very short phrases. It can be helpful in
keeping thinks and thoughts memorable with meaning.
 Mind map also promote better associations and connections among creative ideas that can
improve the capacity of human mind to remember all the necessary information.
 Mind map needs to use attractive colour and images that may stimulate the imagination
as it is effective for students to quickly scan and understand. This may support in making
it easier to remember.
CONCLUSION
From the above mentioned report it can be summarised that, learning is one of crucial
activity for every individual improve their personality and also get higher success within the
professional career. As, all the people are different and their learning is also differ from each
others. As some are learn from seeing others and some are from using academic aspects. In
addition to this, some effective approaches to learning like Behaviourist Approach to
learning:Social learning approach are also used by students to improve their skills and
knowledge. Furthermore, human brain is also refers to the machine as it store and retrieving
information so that people can easily recognition all the necessary aspects that required in
academic study. Apart from this, mind-mapping is refers to the crucial visual presentation that
cover various aspects through which a learner can quickly identify and recognition about the
information. This will assist in improving the learning activities of students and at the same time
also make them able to attain higher success in their career growth.
5

REFERENCES
Books and journals
Cottrell, S., 2019. The study skills handbook. Macmillan International Higher Education.
Thompson, P., 2017. Communication technology use and study skills. Active learning in higher
education. 18(3). pp.257-270.
Gormley, M. J. And et. al., 2018. Impact of study skills and parent education on first-year GPA
among college students with and without ADHD: A moderated mediation model.
Journal of attention disorders. 22(4). pp.334-348.
Kneale, P. E., 2019. Study skills for geography, earth and environmental science students.
Routledge.
Naqvi, S. and et. al., 2018. Study skills assessment among undergraduate students at a private
university college in Oman. Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences. 9(2). p.139.
Villarreal, 2018. Assessing study skills in college students: A review of three measures. Journal
of College Student Development. 59(5). pp.629-635.
Al-Hilawani, Y. A., 2016. Metacognition in Real Life Situations and Study Skills and Habits:
Two Types of Processes. International Journal of Progressive Education. 12(1).
Cardinale, J. A. and Johnson, B. C., 2017. Metacognition modules: A scaffolded series of online
assignments designed to improve students’ study skills. Journal of microbiology &
biology education.18(1).
Cathey, 2016. Helping when they are listening: A midterm study skills intervention for
introductory psychology. Psychology Learning & Teaching. 15(3). pp.250-267.
Daisy, P. J. and Nair, A. R., 2018. An Exploratory Study On Life Skills Intervention And Its
Impact On The Study Skills Among Young Adolescents. International Journal of
Innovations in Engineering and Technology (IJIET). 10(3). pp.14-20.
Hart, C., 2018. Doing a literature review: Releasing the research imagination. Sage.
Ahmad, I. and Ahmad, S., 2018. Multiple Skills and Medium Enterprises’ Performance in
Punjab Pakistan: A Pilot Study. The Journal of Social Sciences Research, Special. (4).
pp.44-49.
Setiadi, R. and Piyakun, A., 2018. Foreign literacy practices and learning skills among
Indonesian and Thai students of graduate education studies. Kasetsart Journal of Social
Sciences.
6

7