You ask a great question! Research suggests that studying quant and verbal simultaneously and systematically provides the best avenue for learning because we learn more effectively when we give our brains a little time to forget what we just learned, and then we review and/or recall the material at a point in the near future. This process is referred to as “spaced repetition,” and it has been shown to improve learning considerably.
Let’s use the topic of units digit patterns as an example. Say you wanted to get in some additional study on this topic. To leverage spaced repetition, you could study units digit patterns for a preset time, say, one hour. Then, after the hour, move on to a verbal topic, for example, sentence correction. Over the course of a day or so, you’ll start to forget some things that you learned about units digit patterns. Now is the perfect time to restudy that topic. Sit down for a study session and work again on units digit patterns. You’ll find that you more quickly and easily attain the same level of competence that you attained in your earlier session. In fact, you’ll probably gain some new insights that you didn’t get in your previous session as you add to your knowledge base. Had you not switched to verbal after studying some quant, you would lose out on the opportunity to “forget” and then relearn.
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