How many hours should a college student study outside of class per course?
Emilia, Sarasota, Florida
Different courses require different kinds of studying and work outside of class.
For example, in a language course, you may spend anywhere from 1 to 3 hours a day reviewing material for that class (ie: learning vocab, practicing speaking and pronunciation, or memorizing and practicing grammatical rules).
However, you could also take an American Studies course, which requires a significant amount of reading in preparation for each class. In this case, you could spend anywhere from 1 to 3 hours reading and preparing the material for class. Also, if your grade in the class is based on writing papers, then you will be studying a lot more outside of class when a paper has been assigned than when you are just preparing for lectures and class discussion.
I think you will find that when you start taking college classes, you will be able to figure out how much time you need to set aside to prepare for each class, and what kind of studying it requires. Similarly, you will be able to learn which study habits work for you, and thus your study schedule may be completely different from your friends or roommate.
-Ali
