The students in my Public Finance class asked me if they could have a 3 x 5 post card of notes for their first exam. I asked them if they really thought the cards would help them on the exam. They were all convinced that they would so I said yes, on one condition—after the test, they had to tell me how they created their note cards and how they used them.

After the test, they told me exactly what I expected. They tried to write as small as  possible to get the maximum amount of information on the cards. So I asked them if the card was big enough for everything they wanted to write. The answer was a resounding no. So I asked my students how they decided  what went on the cards and what didn’t. They read, reread and studied each piece of information to decide how it fit with all they needed to know for the exam. If they felt they really needed that bit of information on the card, they distilled it to its essence so they could fit it on that tiny card.

I asked if they did the card only once. They said “Oh no!  We had to do  the cards over several times to get them exactly right.”  Then I asked how much they used the cards in the test. At this point, the students began to see what I wanted them to understand. They said they didn’t use the  cards very much because they already knew what was on them. So I said, “In other words, you had to understand and learn what was going to be on the test in order to create the card.  That’s when the learning was really happening. Doing the card is just one way to learn what you needed to know.”

My students were surprised, they didn’t realize that their 3 x 5 “secret weapon,” what they thought  would give them that extra ability to do well on the test was really a great way of learning what they needed to know. I encouraged them to use this approach in any class even if they couldn’t bring the cards into the test. The cards make excellent study notes to use before tests and  are an example of how to study hard and smart for success in college.