<p>Currently, I am in a few honors, AP, an Pre-AP classes in school. I have a friend who never studies and gets good grades in these classes. I have to study atleast an hour or more to pass all the test and quizzes with an A or better. </p>
<p>I am starting to think he is lieing and actually does study, if he is not then I feel dumb.</p>
<p>PS, the classes I am in with him are AP Physics B, AP United States History II, and Pre-Calculus and Trigonometry (H), AND Pre-AP English 11. Yeah I know, hes that guy that got stuck in all the same classes as me xD. </p>
<p>My question is does it come easily to everyone?</p>
<p>It doesn’t to me, but yes it does for many of my friends. For example, our valedictorian was captian of the swim team, in the hardest classes possible, and still got to bed by 9pm every night.</p>
<p>My closer friends both got 34’s on their ACT’s without studying, and one of them got a 800 on the Math SAT. These kids are super smart and just not challenging themselves lol.</p>
<p>Eh, it just depends on how you learn. I can do well just by listening to a lecture and taking notes, but other people need to spend more time reading the book and taking notes. No method is necessarily better or worse, and I often practice both.</p>
<p>I rely heavily on my intuition. Subjects that I understand intuitively require little to no studying. In general, I find that I can intuitively master mathematics, physics, economics, government, and history as well as any writing on the above topics. Literature, most biology, foreign languages, and some areas of chemistry are much harder.</p>
<p>^ Depends on the area of chemistry for me. Bonding, stoichiometry, and electrochemistry are all relatively intuitive. I never really clicked with thermochemistry or gas laws.</p>
Eh, I wouldn’t think this could be intuitive. I mean, if you know a lot about history, and get a question about something you don’t know, you can often infer things, but if I asked you where the only battle Gaius Julius Caesar ever lost was, who it was against, who the commander of the enemy forces was, and what his name meant in his native language, you’d need to actually know all of that. (incidentally: The Battle of Gergovia against the Gauls, let by Vercingetorix - “King of the World”)</p>
<p>There’s this one kid who always cranks out perfects on our Honors Science Chemistry tests and last year got A’s on the Fluid Forces test, the hardest test of the year without studying. I have to study for science, but I can usually pull good grades in Math with little to no studying.</p>
<p>English tests are easy, just vocabulary: cram before test begins. I’m pretty good at writing papers but I’m not very good with comprehending large novels.</p>
<p>Social Studies, I’m good with multiple choice and pretty good with writing, but sometimes I have problems answering the question directly.
Spanish: We go so slowly…</p>
Okay, it depends on the format. For something like AP U.S. History MC, you are right. But for FRQs in an average honors-level history course, only knowledge of broad historical trends is really important in order to write something cogent.</p>
Though I never took AP US History (electing to take two college level US History courses in its stead), I agree. Though I just took the US History SAT Subject Test, and I answered many correctly using inferences.</p>
<p>I think for History, you still have to read the text, but you need to also be able to tie things together cogently. I find the APUSH FRQ’s harder than the multiple choice because it involves branching from things you’ve covered either yesterday and 6 months ago.</p>
<p>I have never had a problem with a history or english class. I got about 98% in both AP Euro and APUSH, as well as 5s on the exams, and all I ever did was read the chapter once and I knew it. </p>
<p>Strangely, I had to study a lot for AP Bio, and struggled for an A in the class, but so far I’m breezing through AP Chem.</p>
<p>For me and several of my friends we just “get” it when we go through the problems and concepts of math and science and then we don’t really study. English is another story…</p>
<p>When I hear of a concept, I constantly think about it until I completely understand it. The time it takes for me to understand a concept depends on the difficulty of the concept.</p>
<p>I agree completely, halflife. For me, memorizing something without “getting” it is tortuous until I can have that eureka moment and understand it.</p>
<p>I think it depends on the subject. In my case, I never study for Spanish and can pull off A’s on tests and quizzes, and my friends wonder how in the heck I am able to do that. Conversely, these same friends can walk into AP Calc BC or AP Bio not knowing if there is a quiz/test and still ace it, while I have to study my *** off to even think about getting good grades on those subjects.</p>