Incorporate desirable difficulties as part of your learning strategy

Elaborate on the new material you’ve learned
For example, if you’ve just learned about the structure of an atom, try explaining the concept to somebody else in your own words. You can also explain how the new information relates to what you already know or how it may be connected to your life outside of class.

Practice effortful generation of information
If you have a question, try to think of an answer before Googling it or asking for help. If you have a math problem, try to solve it before referring to the answers at the back of the textbook. If you’re a teacher, pose a question to your students every 5 minutes or so based on the material you’ve just taught. Instruct them not to look at their notes to force them to recall the information from memory.

Read an article that’s slightly difficult to read
On your digital device, practice reading text that’s slightly out of focus or presented in a font that’s a bit hard to decipher. By forcing your brain to struggle to read the content, you improve your ability to recall the information later on.

Write down your answers instead of doing multiple-choice questions
When testing yourself, use open-ended questions that require you to write down the full answer in essay format. This is more effective than answering questions that provide a set of probable solutions.