Back in high school I was a night owl. When exam time came around I would buy a six pack of Coke and and study through the night as I crushed cans of soda. This trend continued through my university days. I remember my first year of university in Ohio and studying for a botany test with Dr. Dickinson. A few of us got together to pull an all-nighter. Someone brought a package of chocolate covered coffee beans and we snacked on these and quizzed each other on the Latin name for oak and the various organelles of the plant cell. Schwarzenegger was known as the Austrian Oak. The genus for oak is quercus. So Schwarzenegger would be the Austrian Quercus. Yes, this is how I studied. Knowing what I know now I would have done things differently. What would I have changed? Well for starters I wouldn't have pulled all-nighters. I would have spent more time preparing earlier rather than leaving it all to the night before. Grades are important but health is more important. Plus at a certain point I'm sure there is the potential for diminishing returns when sacrificing sleep in order to try and learn the content from one more chapter. What I should have done would have been to get a good night's sleep and exercise before the exam. Dr. Ratey does a great job in his book Spark of explaining the benefits of exercise on the brain especially when it comes to cognitive function like taking an exam. And hopefully this routine of getting better sleep, waking up early and exercising before work or school would have carried on through life. Because there are a variety of chronotypes. Some of us are early birds, others are night owls and the rest fall somewhere in between....