How To Study A Subject You Hate: 5 Effective Hacks

In class, you feel sleepy, and homework causes nausea – the typical symptoms of unloved subject syndrome. But this ‘disease’ can be cured. Here is effective advice for learning a subject that you don’t understand or don’t like.

Lifehack 1. Eliminate the cause

Think about why you don’t like this or that subject. Be honest. The answers it’s useless or I’m a humanitarian are too superficial. Dig deeper. Think back to when you were introduced to the discipline and at what point stopped you from understanding it.

Maybe it was when you did something wrong while answering at the board and the kids laughed at the mistake? Or maybe you once had a whole quarter sick, and your classmates were way ahead of you? In the first case, you need to discuss the situation with your parents or psychologist, and in the second case – start with the basics. After all, every science is studied sequentially: from the simple to the complex.

Lifehack 2: Determine the usefulness of an unloved subject

There are no useless sciences (or at least they’re not taught in school). You need to figure out what benefit the subject you don’t like can bring, now or in the future. For example:

Algebra: now I can quickly count the change in the store I will be able to manage finances competently.

English: now I can impress my peers by chatting, and in the future, I will write a resume without mistakes and get a great job.

Geography: now I can easily navigate in a big city and I will be able to plan trips without the help of a travel agency.    

Chemistry: now I can show cool experiments to my friends and I will be good at understanding substances and eating right.

The more specific the wording and the more applied the meaning, the easier it is to change my attitude to the subject I don’t like.

Lifehack 3. Change your approach to learning

In 1987, New Zealand school superintendent Neil Fleming investigated the learning effectiveness of high school students. He wondered why naturally inquisitive kids gradually cooled off (at least in some subjects).

Fleming developed the theory that humans perceive the world through the prism of the five senses, dividing people into visual, auditory, and kinesthetic.

With time, due to functional asymmetry of the brain, one of the channels of perception begins to dominate. That is why it is necessary to combine different ways of presenting information and types of tasks on an unloved subject. For example:

Visualists think in pictures, they need silence while studying. It is not enough for them to listen to the class: they need to take colorful notes, make lists, draw diagrams. Memorizing with cards works well.

Audiologists think linearly, read and talk slowly. They have a hard time with tasks with texts and on time. If you’re one of that type of person, be open to use write my essay online service. Also It is better to listen to video lessons and audiobooks, and then discuss with someone what they have learned. Repeat information aloud and use associations to memorize.

Kinestheticians are restless and need to touch and smell things. They quickly lose concentration and need frequent breaks. It is necessary to break learning into stages and apply the material in practice. Memorization works best through play.

Find out who you are – auditory, visual, or kinesthetic. There are many tests on the web to determine the dominant channel of perception. Try to study complex topics in any subject in the format that is most convenient for you.

Suppose you are kinesthetic and have difficulty with biology. Try making a model of a cell or a model of the classification of living organisms. By “touching” the subject, it will be easier for you to understand it.

Lifehack 4. Find a related hobby to the one you don’t like

This technique is closely related to the previous two. Revisiting the format of the study of an unloved subject and find its practical use, you will begin to enjoy it.

For example, if you are not friendly with algebra and geometry, do speed cubing, and if you cannot stand history, go to the historical reconstruction.

Lifehack 5. Enlist the support of a mentor

Are you familiar with the saying, ‘Everything depends on the teacher’? You can be an A student with one teacher, but with another, you can get C’s. Pedagogical talent does matter. But to fall in love with any subject can be a simple conversation with a passionate person.  

Try making friends with someone who likes your problem subject. It is desirable that the new buddy was about your age and impressed with you. As you are inspired by the communication, you will gradually begin to adopt his interests (and he will adopt yours).

If you cannot make friends with the antipode, enlist the support of an older friend. Someone to whom you can complain about a subject you do not like, or promise to learn a paragraph. Attention and support of a stranger, as well as a responsibility to him or her, are great motivators when studying any subject you don’t understand.