General

Why You Don’t Make the Grade: 8 Reasons and How to Avoid Them

Intro: The pressure to do well in school is overwhelming. It can seem like everything is riding on your performance, and you’re constantly questioning whether or not you’ll make the grade. But what if I told you that there are ways to make sure this never happens? You don’t have to be stuck with mediocre grades; here are seven reasons why you don’t make the grade and how to avoid them!

1. You don’t know the subject well enough: One of the most common reasons is that you don’t know the issue well enough, and it’s shown in your grades. So what should you do?

Make sure you review: Make a schedule to study for tests and quizzes on the subject, even if they’re weeks away. Review notes at least three days before an upcoming test or examination.
Ask for help: If you don’t understand the material, ask your friends or teacher for help. They should be able to explain it better and help you know. Also, visit wizeprep.com for help from the experts on any topic/subject to improve your understanding.

2. You lack focus and discipline: Sometimes, we’re so excited to start a new term or semester that we lose track of what’s essential. You must discipline yourself to learn each day and develop short and long time plans to achieve your grades. to remedy this problem, create a schedule for each day and do your best to follow it. Make sure you get into the habit of studying each day. Remember you are working hard for a future that will help you retain a stable lifestyle. Remember your goal, focus on the results you want, work towards your goal each day, every day till you are on the top, and discipline is the way to get to the top.

3. You fail to prepare or study adequately: If you’re not ready, you won’t be able to do well on an exam no matter how much effort you put into it. You can try all you want, but even if you guess correctly on half of the questions, your score will still not cut it. This year, put in the necessary time and effort to prepare for your exams. It means studying for an hour or two a day after you’ve completed all of your homework. It’s okay if it takes some time; the more you learn, the better prepared you’ll be for your exams.

4. Your writing is sloppy and unorganized: This is precisely the opposite of what you want when writing a paper or essay. Your spelling and grammar mistakes are distracting. You need to make sure that your wording is clear, correct, and follows a logical order.

Here are some tips on how to write better essays:

Start with an outline, brainstorming all of your ideas and the order they should be in. Then narrow down your essay by choosing what is most important/relevant/needed for this paper.
Be specific! Don’t make generalizations or assumptions about something if you can write about it in a specific and concrete way.
Also, use the words and phrases your teacher uses to show that you understand what they’re saying. If they say “write more,” give them ten sentences instead of 5!

5. You are too focused on grades, not learning: If you are only interested in getting good grades, there is a higher chance that you won’t make the grade. Why? If all you care about is receiving an A for an assignment or test, there’s no way to know whether or not you learned something. So how can students prevent this from happening? First, don’t worry about grades; worry about learning. Rates reflect how well you can apply what you’ve learned, so if your focus is on understanding and mastering the material rather than getting an A, the grade will come naturally.

6. You don’t know how to manage your time: It might be time to reevaluate how you spend your time throughout the semester. You should be spending about an hour and a half to two hours working on it per night (if you can’t get it done in this time frame, consider cutting back some more). Scheduling 5-6 hours of work on weekends is also advised. This way, you can save time on your weekdays to do other essential things for yourself. You should also invest some time in studying for tests. It might be hard at first, but it’ll get easier as the semester goes on.

7. Procrastination! You tell yourself, “I’ll start studying right after dinner,” and it is probably one of the worst things you can do. You need to start studying or doing your work as soon as it’s assigned; that way, when you have to sit down and finish it, you are ready! Procrastination is one of the biggest causes of not making a grade. Putting off studying until the night before or not starting an assignment until it’s due is never a good idea. Start by tackling your smaller projects first to get in the swing of completing work on time, and then work up until you’re doing all your homework in advance. Once you get used to this, try starting your tests and quizzes a day or two in advance as well, so you can feel comfortable and confident during the big test.

8. Not paying attention during class! You may think that not listening in class that it’ll give you more time for studying. But, it forces you to rely more on your friends, notes, and textbook for information that isn’t always accurate. To answer questions on an exam, you have to know what the teachers are talking about, which it’s as simple as writing down notes or paying attention in class. If you’re not listening, you shouldn’t expect good grades.

Paying attention will allow you to gauge what topics the professors and teachers are stressing over, and those are the exact topics that are going to be on the tests. If you narrow down what you need to study, it’ll put less pressure on you and will ultimately lead to less stress and better grades.

Conclusion: to know what you must do, you must also know what mistakes to avoid. Be sure you dodge all the dead ends and bad habits related to studying and work to the best of your abilities to score the grades you deserve. You must not try to correct your bad practices by eliminating them but try to overcome and remedy them so that you compensate for your lost efforts by doing things the right way. Focus!