Study as a sport: Using the Intuition Study Method.

🤔 The right mindset?

Working Smart, and not just hard

Authentic learning and performance are about doing, not just hoping to absorb information. A football player doesn’t improve by watching games alone; they need to get on the field and practise and perform. The same goes for study.

Many students fall into the “illusion of competence” through excessive passive study. The illusion of competence is a false sense of knowing material that can vanish under stressful conditions, such as an exam.

• Passive Study: Includes activities such as reading notes, highlighting text, formatting your notes, and organising your study. Often, these activities don’t lead to building knowledge.
• Active Study: Doing questions (like your Intuition homework), writing down notes, questioning what you are learning, and teaching others. These activities build deep knowledge.

SMART Goals

The first step to being effective is being organised. The best athletes have highly organised training schedules that pinpoint areas of weakness and build strength. Studying can be the same, but it begins with setting goals. Setting SMART goals gives your study purpose and direction.

S - Specific: Your goal must be clear. Instead of "study Maths," aim to "Understand how to factorise quadratic equations."

M - Measurable: Track your progress. For example, "Correctly solve 10 quadratic equation problems."

A - Achievable: Set realistic goals. Setting unreachable targets can be a way to create an excuse for failure. Small, achievable wins build confidence and motivation.

R - Relevant: Ensure the goal aligns with your overall objectives, like an upcoming exam.

T - Timed: Set a deadline. "Solve the 10 problems in 10 minutes." This creates focus and urgency.

Failure is Feedback: Learn from Mistakes

Almost everything that we do at Intuition stems from this point. You learn by failing. We often treat failure as a negative trait or experience, but the opposite is actually true: failure allows us to grow, improve, and master.

Fear of failure can be paralysing. "Failing is part of learning" and "Failing is Fine!". A cricketer who gets bowled in the nets doesn't quit; they analyse their technique and face the next ball.

An incorrect answer on a practice test isn't a judgment of your intelligence; it's a diagnostic tool that pinpoints exactly where you need to improve.

This shifts your mindset from anxiety to strategic action, building the resilience needed for peak performance. Failure leads to improvement and optimal performance.

Finding your why?

Motivation is what gets you started, but routine is vital for long-term success. Motivation can be:

• Extrinsic: Driven by external factors like grades or entry into a specific university course.
• Intrinsic: Fuelled by genuine interest and the satisfaction of mastering a topic. Even the most motivated athlete has days when they don't feel like training. On those days, it's their routine that gets them on the field. The routine you set with application of SMART goals allows you to cultivate powerful, automatic study habits, enabling you to make consistent progress even when motivation is low.

🙋 The A / B Study System

The core of the Intuition study technique is setting up a training/study schedule that balances different types of study, just like a football player’s week includes high-intensity practice, skills sessions and weight sessions. This is the Type A/Type B system, designed to maximise performance and prevent burnout.

Type A Sessions - The Practice Match

Type A sessions are your high-pressure, timed simulations of an exam. The motto is: "Practise like it’s match day"

• Activities: Doing past exam papers under strict time limits, or writing a complete essay from an unseen prompt.
• Purpose: To build confidence under pressure, get used to the exam environment, and expose hidden weaknesses in your knowledge or timing.

Type B Sessions - Drills and Strength

Type B sessions are more relaxed, focused on learning content, reviewing mistakes, and consolidating knowledge. This is where you analyse the replay to understand what went wrong in your Type A session and build a stronger strategy for next time. It’s also where you make sure you have the skills and strength to perform in a Type A session.

• Activities: Reviewing notes, creating mind maps, making flashcards, revising notes or correcting mistakes from a Type A session to understand why they happened.
• Purpose: To deepen your comprehension and transfer knowledge to your long-term memory. This is where the real "gotcha" moments of understanding are.

The Balance

Success lies in striking a balance between these two types of training. Too much Type A leads to burnout; too much Type B leaves you unprepared for exam pressure. The right mic depends on you and what you are preparing for.

A good starting point is a ratio of two Type B sessions for every one Type A session.

As exams get closer, gradually increase the frequency of your Type A sessions. This is like a team increasing its match-play intensity as it approaches the finals, ensuring you peak at the right time.

Ensure that just before the “game day”, you don’t overdo the Type A study and injure yourself!

📖 The Study Techniques Toolkit

This list includes some essential techniques that you can use when studying; it's not an exhaustive list, but it will provide the proper drills. These active processing techniques are the specific "drills" for your training sessions, designed to build deep, lasting knowledge.

Two-Step Takedown - Effective Note Taking

This technique forces you to process information, rather than just copying it.

• Process & Condense: Read a small chunk of text. Look away and ask, "What's the main idea here?" Rephrase it in your own words and write it down as a concise bullet point.
• Reconstruct & Verbalise: Using only your bullet points, explain the concept out loud in complete sentences. If you can explain it clearly, you understand it. If you get stuck, you've found a weak spot to review.

There is nothing more effective than writing down notes with a pen (or pencil) and paper. Writing down something means you are far more likely to retain it since your brain needs to process it in multiple ways. Your brain will make more connections, and thus you have a better chance of remembering.

Active Recall - You and your mind

Active recall is the act of retrieving information from memory, which is far more effective than passively recognising it on a page.

While there are many ways to do this, one of the best ways is to do drill sessions:

💪 How To Solve Drill

1. Set aside 10 mins.
2. Open up an exam, textbook, homework, etc.
3. In the 10 minutes, say out loud how you would approach each question. (e.g. I would draw a diagram and then use Pythagoras’ Theorem to find the length).
4. If you can’t do a question, leave and move on.

This technique is a great way to build confidence and not get overwhelmed. It focuses on being able to analyse a question quickly. This is similar to the reaction training F1 drivers do just before a race.

💡 The Feynman Drill - Teach to Understand

Richard Feynman was one of the greatest physicists of the 20th century and is also known for his seminal work “The Feynman Lectures on Physics”. He said that teaching something or explaining it to someone means you understand it.

1. Take a concept and explain it in the simplest terms possible, as if to someone who knows nothing about it.
2. Anywhere you struggle or use jargon is a sign that your own understanding is incomplete. There is a lot of power in vocalising your thoughts and explaining something out loud.

🏃 Conquering the Inner Game

Often the hardest things to overcome are not technical but rather emotional. Just as in sports, often the most complicated things are those that are on the outside: distractions and the emotions of life.

An academic athlete must train their mind with the same discipline they apply to their subjects.

Procrastination

Procrastination isn't laziness; it's an emotional response to a task that feels difficult, uncomfortable, or unwanted. Your brain seeks a distraction (like your phone) to escape this feeling of mental "pain".

The Intuition method helps break this cycle by making tasks less intimidating (through SMART goals) and providing low-pressure environments to build confidence (in Type B sessions).

Mental Toughness / Resilience

Effective study can feel uncomfortable (and often does). Pushing through this discomfort is a trainable skill; it's something that you learn to do. Our minds and bodies are highly elastic and, over time, are great at adapting. T

• The 5-Minute Rule: Commit to working on a task for just five minutes. Getting started is often the most challenging part of the process. Once you’ve started, you’ll often continue without stopping.
• Acknowledge the Feeling: When you feel the urge to procrastinate, recognise the discomfort without judgment. Remind yourself it's a regular part of learning and will pass. If you need to change your settings for a few minutes to ‘reset’

The Foundations of Performance: Sleep, Fuel, and Recovery

You can't perform at your peak without a healthy mind and body. The foundations are non-negotiable.

• Sleep 🥱: Sleep is by far the most critical part of study. It's when your brain consolidates memories and locks in learning.
• Fuel 🍏 and Hydration 🧋: Your brain requires energy to function correctly. Eat well and stay hydrated.
• Recovery 🏸: A balanced life with time for exercise, hobbies, and friends is essential to prevent burnout. Use the 50+10 Rule: 50 minutes of focused study followed by a 10-minute break, where you get up and move around. If this needs to change, then go ahead, find what works for you.

📝 The Game Plan: Your Study Schedules in Action

You can find a downloadable study plan here: Intuition Study Plan.

It’s a great tool to get started and gives you the framework you need. An example of the filled-in schedule is below.

🏅 Conclusion: Walk into Your Exam with Confidence

The 'Intuition' method is a shift from stressful cramming to strategic training. Adopting an athlete's mindset, you can build a structured plan that balances intensity with recovery, use elite athlete techniques for learning, and prioritise your well-being.

The goal is to walk into an exam not with fear, but with quiet confidence, knowing you have prepared intelligently. Stop being a passive learner and start training like the academic champion you can be.

References

1. Intuition Education - Study Skills Seminar. (2025).
2. Helping Your Teenager Study: A Guide for Parents (5th & 6th Year). (2021). The Institute of Guidance Counsellors.
3. STUDY Smarter Survival Guide. The University of Western Australia.
4. Mastering the Olympic Mind - The psychology behind peak sports performance (2024)