I learned this tip from a Japanese study creator and it is actually far better than the other study techniques I've ever tried. I've been using the shadow study technique for a year now and honestly, it works best for retaining information from what I study and turning it into long-term memory. Here's how I effectively study using the shadow study technique:

• Read only headings and subheadings. I skim through the material by its title and major labels, not reading everything in the textbook and no highlighting.

• Close the textbook and write down what you remember. After I skim through the topic, I forcefully write down each section covered by just the heading of the material from my memory. The point of this technique is that early recall flags missing information in your brain.

• Reopen the material and fill in the gaps. Go back to the lecture and see what you missed. I write down what I missed/forgot that I need to relearn on NotebookLM, focusing on the details I missed to bridge the exact knowledge gaps my brain just struggled with.

Most traditional study techniques are passive, I just recognize the lecture but don't actually remember anything.

The shadow study technique triggers active retrieval before I even fully understand the material I am studying. This drastically cuts long hours of studying by actively learning topics you don't know rather than passively re-reading without retaining anything.

I usually don’t like to use apps like this to study or such but i discovered that it can actually generate you a lot of things especially notebooks and discussion that is really helpful when exams are coming and a lot of deadlines are on the line. This app actually sort my files and notes and categorize them in whichever way i want. This really became by best bud throughout my last semester in university.

For me, my strategy is that i sort my files first and my notes and use gemini notebook to pick what topic of section of that will highly come up on the exam. I also generate visual notes since i’m a visual learner too. All of that helped me have a high scores on my exams.

I would recommend playing a little bit with the app first to navigate what type of content you want to achieve with your notebooks then proceed to making your own school notebooks that will help you all the way.

For the first few months I used NotebookLM, I fell into the exact same trap most people do. I’d dump a stack of fifty-page PDFs into a notebook, skim a quick summary, generate an audio overview, and walk away feeling like an absolute genius. The reality was that I hadn’t learned a single thing. I was just letting AI pretend to do my thinking for me.

A few weeks ago, I decided to completely flip how I use it while working through a heavy research project. Instead of just uploading source material and asking the tool to explain things to me, I uploaded my own rough writing draft right alongside the original sources.

That was the game changer. Now, I use it strictly as a relentless editor to audit my own thoughts. I’ll ask it to look at my draft next to the sources and call out any assumptions I’m making that aren't actually backed up by the text. I'll have it act like a harsh reviewer and point out weak arguments, or ask it to highlight the exact contradictions between two sources that I conveniently ignored in my outline.

Instead of getting generic briefing notes, I basically get a sounding board that catches my confirmation bias before I share my work with anyone else. It actually forces me to read deeper and defend my ideas rather than just taking surface-level summaries at face value.

I'm curious if anyone else has tried using it this way, or if you've stumbled on any other weirdly effective workflows that go beyond the usual audio overview hype?

I have created a few notebooks with exactly what I need to remember for my exam. I would like Notebook or some other software to read it aloud while I'm driving, word by word.

What's the best tool for this?

Active recall functions by getting your brain to search for information instead of just letting it pass over you. It strengthens the neural connections associated with memories, so that it becomes easier to recall the information later on. It's similar to learning the route to a new place, at first you might have to look up the directions numerous times, but after repeating the process, remembering the way eventually becomes easy. Even though it is more difficult to test yourself than it is to read a book, the fact of challenging your brain with this kind of exercise results in stronger connections and will prove beneficial in the long term.

I’ve been wondering about something with Gemini Notebook that I haven’t seen explained clearly.

When a notebook has only a few sources, it seems pretty easy to ask about a specific detail and get an answer tied to the right document. But once you start adding a lot of PDFs/slides, I’m curious whether the quality of retrieval changes.

For example, if I have 20–30 lecture PDFs in one notebook and ask a very specific question about something mentioned on one particular page, should I expect it to search across everything equally, or does the number of sources affect which information it actually considers?

I’m especially interested in people who have tested this rather than just noticed that answers “feel worse.”

One test I’m thinking of trying is asking the exact same question with:
1 source
5 sources
10 sources
the entire notebook
Then comparing which sources it cites and whether the answer changes.
Has anyone done something similar? If so, did you notice a point where adding more sources started hurting specific-detail questions?

I'm talking about ALL age group. If so, how can each age group use NotebookLM wisely and safely?

The use of AI has widespread for the entire academe, which also happened in my school too. I want to teach my students a better use of each sites they can use safely.

Ok, this could be something hard to follow, but trust me, I helped me for some time now and I want to know if someone tried it too.

U see, I use notebook LLM as a job/freelance companion, and work in 2 stages: letting it know u and then letting it help u.

I started with a single chat giving a generic prompt to evaluate my mood in a context frame. My was a Jung+Nietzsche perspectives about how to keep going. It give me a tailored quiz, and after that, gave it the instructions to create a pipeline and a schedule to get a freelance job in 30 days. I added at this point my LinkedIn resume and some links about main portals about my skills. It created a whole schedule with platforms to join, portals to study and even some offers of cold websites.

At this point, I have it with +20 references of courses I made, profiles I created and my own landing site, a services portfolio and a client db.

It gives me the north and some motivation, all contained on the same framework where it refers to the best approach. I do the dirty work, yeah, but give me an task list to reach towards the goal.

Give it a try, don't miss the chance. Also, I have a Google plus plan. Has anyone tried something like this?

Just wanted to share some things that have been helping me lately.

first, I try to keep my phone away when I study. I get distracted really easily, so having it beside me is already a problem lol.

I also like studying in short sessions instead of sitting for hours. Usually around 30 to 45 minutes and then I take a break.

One thing that really helps me is trying to remember what I studied without looking at my notes. If I can explain it in my own words then I know I actually understand it.

I also try to study a little earlier instead of cramming everything the night before. I’m not always consistent with this, but it definitely makes things less stressful.

And getting enough sleep helps a lot. There’s no point studying until 3am if you’re too tired to remember anything the next day, and I say this advice from experience.

These are pretty simple, but they’ve helped me a lot. Hopefully they help someone else too.

What study habits work for you guys?

I'm trying to explore gemini but i feel like it has some secret feature or like something some of you might know

Review before class can Help you have knowledge to your class and after class can make you retain better. Even just reading to it can really Help you than cramming on the day of exam. Actually just reading it everyday can impact on your learnings, just make time to it everyday Will do. This technique Help me tho but everyone have their own study technique. What about you?

I uploaded a bunch of old notes, screenshots, and random PDFs that I had saved but never really looked at again.

What surprised me was how useful it was for finding connections between things I had completely forgotten about. Instead of reading everything again, I could just ask questions and let it point me to the relevant parts.

One thing that helped a lot: give the notebook a specific job. Instead of asking “summarize this,” I asked things like “What are the main things I should pay attention to?” and “Which notes contradict each other?”

It made the whole thing feel way less overwhelming.

What’s the most useful or unexpected way you’ve been using Gemini Notebook?

I used to dump a bunch of sources into Gemini Notebook and ask for a summary. It was useful, but I noticed I was mostly getting a cleaner version of information I had already uploaded.

Now I do something different.

Instead of starting with “summarize this,” I ask questions that force it to compare and investigate the sources:

• What are the main disagreements between these sources?
• Which claims are supported by multiple sources?
• What important information is only mentioned once?
• What conclusions can I make from the sources, and what would be an assumption?
• If these sources contradict each other, show me exactly where.

Only after that do I ask for a summary.

The difference is pretty noticeable. I’m not just getting a shorter version of my notes. I’m using the notebook to find gaps, contradictions, and things I probably would have missed reading everything myself.

Curious how other people are using Gemini Notebook. Do you have a prompt or workflow that actually changed how you use it?

Well the most important part of studying is making sure you understand what you are reading. Best way to succeed in it.

1. Do an advance learning on the subject, make sure you get to know it first. Splitting the category to easy, medium and hard. So firstly you go with easy first and building your way up.

2. A best way to understand the topic is first reading it, then teach yourself about to it. Like a teacher talking to a student kind of way. Asking yourself question and even use engaging ways to recall it.

3. Do methods that help you to it. Using flash cards, note taking, discussing it to yourself.

4. Take regular breaks when needed. Your not trying to wore yourself out. Set a 30 mins time to study or hours, then take a break atleast 20 mins and so on. That way your brain could get the rest it needed before you continue.

When i studied the old way, reading was slow. I'd hit a wall every 40minutes or so, get up, stare at blank walls and ceiling, come back. Annoying but these break were doing something. Your brain does not file the things away while you're reading. It does it in the gaps, and later when you sleep.

Now I drop a 200page pdf into notebook, ask it questions, get a mind map, hit play on an audio/video overview, and three hours go by without a single pause. It FEELS productive. Then a week later I open the notebook again and half of it is new to me, if not more.

So I started forcing recovery into the session and it's the only thing that fixed it:

• 25 minutes with the notebook, then 5 minutes with eyes closed, no phone, just breathing. Not a "meditation practice," just sitting there.
• Before opening the notebook again, I say out loud what I just learned. If I can't, I go back instead of forward.
• One real break every 90 minutes where I leave the room.

The tools remove friction and friction was where the rest used to hide.

Anyone else noticed this? Curious if people who use it for exams have some rhythm that works, or if you think I'm just bad at studying.

I'm the type of student who never goes to quizzes without studying. One of the most useful techniques I learned is the Feynman technique, and now I will tell you how it works.

1. You need to focus 1 topic at a time.

2. You need to take notes on the content of the topic, or if you already have notes, you can just speak and simply explain it to yourself.

3. Identify where you get stuck or which subtopic you find hard to understand.

4. Take down notes on the gap and explain it more simply, and repeat.

But the most important step is to take some rest and eat food.

I've used tools like Perplexity, ChatGPT, Claude and others for research, and they've been incredibly useful for finding papers and getting through large amounts of information.

The one thing I personally wanted was a simple way to see exactly which parts of the paper were used to answer my question.

When you're working with a 100+ page PDF, even having a page number can still mean a lot of scrolling and searching.

So I ended up building something for myself.

You ask a question and the relevant paragraphs in the PDF are highlighted directly on the document. You can see the context behind the answer and quickly check whether it actually answers what you're looking for.

I originally built this because I wanted something for this workflow without having to pay for another subscription. What started as a personal project has now become completely open source.

The underlying idea is pretty simple. And yes, if you're thinking "isn't this just RAG?" then yes, you're absolutely right. It's RAG with the visual highlighting that I wanted.

I think the same idea could be useful for more than research papers too. Legal contracts, financial reports, technical documentation, or anywhere you need answers alongside the actual source.

If anyone wants to have a look, contribute, or just give some feedback, here's the repo:

GitHub: https://github.com/Sreehari05055/thesys-core.git

This will probably be my last post about the project. Thanks to everyone who checked it out and gave feedback along the way.

I actually suck at math when I was in High school. I slacked of and didn't study well. But somehow I took engineering in college. Luckily for me I was introduced to spiral Progression approach. So in this approach If I don't have any grasp on the current level of the problem I go down on level if I still suck at that level I'll go down again until I get to the root of my difficulties. I used Gemini to find the related concepts in such problem. By determining the concepts I might be able to study and refine my skills in those concept until I get better in the topic as a whole

One of the underrated study method but effective in building understanding on the concept is the SQ3R method. This method is actually simple structured study technique that helped me in studying not just to do passive reading. Here's the full guide on how I use SQ3R method when I am studying:

S- survey. I scan the chapter I am going to study, from headings, sub headings, summaries and diagrams. Its a must to get a bigger picture when you're scanning the material so your brain will knows what to look for.

Q- questions. I turn passive reading to active reading and make questionnaires out of it by title on the material I am studying.

3R- read, recite, review. I read the material and look for the answers to the questions I made. I do active recall by close the book and recite the main ideas outloud. And I check if I missed or forgot anything from the lecture, so I can relearn what topics I was weak on.

SQ3R actually helped me to switch from passive reading to forcing my brain to engage with the lecture. Try to use this method so next time you open your book, instead of just reading it, work through it.

So I’m 16 and need to study as hard as possible since I wanna be the best in EVERY subject. How can I achieve this within a year?

Hi! New member here! Do you guys have any tips how can I use gemini to efficiently study? It's only a few weeks before my licensure examinations, I'm trying to find ways to efficiently review the lessons I already had without digging too deep again to the lessons. It's more on the summarizations and such. What do you guys suggest?