Change Your Brain, Change Your Grades: The Secrets of Successful Students: Science-Based Strategies to Boost Memory, Strengthen Focus, and Study Faster

by Daniel G. Amen

A breakthrough approach to optimize your brain, change your habits, and succeed in school, from a renowned neuroscientist and bestselling author of Change Your Brain, Change Your Life

Do you feel like you should be getting better grades? Are you spending more time studying than the A students in your class but not getting the same results? Are you heading back to school after a long break and need a refresher to get more done in less time?

With schools becoming more competitive and technology becoming increasingly distracting, today’s students face a minefield of obstacles to academic success. Doing well in school isn’t just a matter of smarts or more studying: It takes good habits, practical tools—and a healthy brain.

Brain health pioneer Dr. Daniel Amen knows what it takes to get the brain ready to succeed. Change Your Brain, Change Your Grades draws on Dr. Amen’s experience as a neuroscientist and psychiatrist as well as the latest brain science to help you study more effectively, learn faster, and stay focused so you can achieve your academic goals. This practical guide will help you:

Discover your unique brain type and learning style

Kick bad habits and adopt smarter study practices

Get more out of your classes with less overall study time

Memorize faster and remember things longer

Increase your confidence and beat stress

For underachievers, stressed-out studiers, and students from middle school to college and beyond, Change Your Brain, Change Your Grades gives you the knowledge and tools you need to get the best out of yourself.

Genres: Nonfiction, Psychology, Self Help, Science, Parenting, Neuroscience

Paperback

First published September 17, 2019

About the author

The Washington Post called Dr. Daniel Amen the most popular psychiatrist in America and Sharecare.com named him the web's most influential expert and advocate on mental health.
Daniel Amen is a life-long Christian and graduate of Oral Roberts University School of Medicine. He is a double board-certified psychiatrist and multiple NY Times bestselling author, with such blockbuster books as Change Your Brain, Change Your Life, Healing ADD, Change Your Brain, Change Your Body, and The Daniel Plan, co-authored by Pastor Rick Warren and Dr. Mark Hyman. In November 2016, he and his wife Tana published The Brain Warrior's Way.
Dr. Amen is the founder of Amen Clinics, which has 6 locations across the United States. Amen Clinics has the world's largest database of brain scans related to behavior, totaling more than 125,000 SPECT scans on patients from 111 countries.
Dr. Amen's research team has published more than 70 scientific articles on a wide variety of topics related to brain health. He is the lead researcher on the largest brain imaging study on active and retired NFL players and was a consultant on the movie Concussion starring Will Smith. In 2016, Discover Magazine named his brain imaging work for psychiatric diagnoses as one of the top 100 stories in all of science.
Dr. Amen has also hosted 11 national public television shows about the brain, which have aired more than 80,000 times across North America and raised more than 75 million dollars for stations.

You can connect with Dr. Amen on Facebook and Twitter

Reviews

[Bmquiram · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is filled with very valuable information but for students who struggle with reading or learning it isn't formatted in a way to encourage them to keep reading. My 16 year old daughter picked up the book after reading the cover and flipped through the pages. Her comment was "That's too bad I don't have time for all that." My 13 year old son didn't even comment when he set it down.

I think teachers could implement this into a classroom in a chapter by chapter or edited version with great success. My middle school children have a course called high school prep, this would be perfect for them or for high school seniors as a refresher for college.

[Glenn Wishnew III · Rating 4 out of 5]

gonna try to eat healthy bc brain health.

[Emmanuelle Works · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book as a Goodreads giveaway win. I never read self-help books but was intrigued by the author's background as a doctor of Neurology. I was an excellent student with what seemed like unusual studying habit, and an atypical brain, and was curious about his findings. It turns out that my study habits were indeed excellent, although I came up with them on my own as a child, so I didn't learn anything from the book. However, if I recall a lot of my peer at the time, this book will be particularly useful for people in high school and college. From the way the book is organized and written, I believe they are his target audience. It's written like a school paper, and, although easy to read, there's a whole lot of repetition and you should feel free to gloss over a lot of the boxes, or only read the boxes. I hope the book does help the students who need better studying habits. I just don't know if it's something you can learn from reading a book.

[Rajiv Bais · Rating 4 out of 5]

Let’s get rid of our ANTs (automatic negative thoughts) and allergens and create notes, positive thoughts, and a schedule for a balanced life and breaks to recover and perform better.

This book might look “cute” in content, but I often felt better after I would read each chapter.

[♏Vanessa♏ · Rating 3 out of 5]

After 20+ years since I last went to university, and considering I started to study online, I haven't quite got into the swing of things and needed a little bust to help me get organised. This was great with many easy to follow suggestions and techniques that help students concentrate? manage time, absorb content, prepare revision material, and prepare and take test.
My only annoyance with it all was that I felt he rumbled a lot. I think a good portion of American self-help audiobooks have that infomercial feeling to it. It's like the author feels the need to sell me the product I'm already consuming. it's extremely vexing. Apart from that, the content is very helpful, and many of what he suggested were techniques I used when I first went to uni, so it was a good reminder.

[Lucas · Rating 2 out of 5]

*After reading "How to become a straight A Student" By Cal Newport it has reframed what I thought about this book. I would say if you could only buy one buy the Cal newport book.*

As a 2 year previously mediocre college student this book was very useful. I wish I had practiced these strategies my freshmen year of college or even high school(I doubt I could have put in the effort though), I suspect if would have saved me a lot of time and stress attempting to power through college with ineffective study habits I crafted and taped together during high school. My foundational study strategies have always been flawed and inconsistent in there application and usefulness and this book was able to shore up a lot of those issues.

To start I would recommend either just skimming or all out just skipping the first 2 chapters specifically, these chapters seem to offer little in forms of usefulness and more so seem to be there just to push the authors website and supplements. I took the quiz on the website and it wasn't very robust and the solutions just linked to his supplements or offered seemingly generic advice like eat Omega-3s. This might just be due to my understanding of basic nutrition but it didn't seem at all necessary but if you don't know that much it could prove useful but If you do feel like buying the supplements you can just find similar ones on amazon for way cheaper.

The book covers a decent amount of not only study tactics and strategies but it offers a good deal of personal refinement and reflection concepts that I found useful.
For example in Ch.3 Habits some ideas being

-Attitude
-Motivation
-Perseverance

You take the time to ask yourself "why" why are you studying and why are you doing what you are doing, these were useful to me by offering a way to re-frame the context of why I was reading a book a about study habits. I was reading them to improve at studying and I was trying to improve at studying because I want to do better in my college classes so I can get a better job and take care of my family. These sorts reflective exercises were nice and very much welcomed for keeping my focus while studying because I know clearly "Why".

The book of course offers main strategies and tactics for improve at actually studying through out a good portion of the middle of the book. Some of my favorites being
-Practice rephrasing ideas in notes
-looking up words you missed(vocab is huge)
-Reread if you're lost
-Keep the big picture concept at forefront of mind while reading
-Taking active breaks
-Draft out study attack plan before each session
-Track your time and draft a study schedule
-Read the sylabus
-Read other texts like articles or journals on topics to get another view points

The top 5 I found most useful were
1. Be your own teacher by thinking about how you teach the ideas
2.Outline each chapter as you go.
3.Highlight and mark big ideas and the supporting ideas
4.Draft self quiz as a way to rephrase content
5. Review last session and and preview useful content ahead to prime brain for reading.

The book continues on with other strategies but it starts to move more into school study environments such as lectures and professors and the tips become a bit more orientated for that audience. Some of the tips I found useful were
-After class rewrite and clean up notes to engage material again and refine ideas
-Apply short hand such as w/ or w/o ( with, without) amount others
-Build rapport with professors before classes start
-Fight for your grade if you believe you did better than graded.
-Review Tests after the have been graded.

The book also offers some memorization strategies such as
-Rhyming to remember
-Mind palace
-Acronyms and initialism
-Creating a picture

Overall the book gave me what I wanted and I would say you could skip some of the last chapters as well if as they also don't offer any real study strategies is more of a philosophical wrap up about life.
3/5

[Cathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was chosen to receive this book by entering a goodreads drawing.

Dr. Amen is a detailed, concise writer. This book would be a great help to any student but I found it a bit overwhelming with all the instruction. I would recommend using this book as a reference so the brain has time to process each step. Reading the entire book all at once may discourage a person because of all the detailed instruction. I found the synopsis at the end of each chapter very helpful and it emphasizes the importance of doing the same or similar thing after taking notes. There are children in my family who would greatly benefit from this book but with all the distractions and lack of patience the youth of today are exhibiting I have my doubts as to whether they would have the interest to read the book. I will recommend this book to anyone who voices a concern regarding their or their children's inability to do well in school.

[Topkek · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actually a good book very scientific approach from a medical doctor. Some common sense tips that might be to obvious to be recognized by most people but still have a good impact on our learning. The key information in this book is, that you should take care of your brain, preview and review material with every study session, visualize and make many associations with things you already now. Interesting was the number transcription method and the small excurse on the memory palace method, which isn't that easy to learn. Always go from the generalization to the details not vice versa, as the big picture is that what you will remember and from that you are going to derive the details. Also be sure to stay organized write clearly and in general take care of yourself.
All in all solid book, nothing ground-breaking but nicely written and including good sources.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

I believe that Daniel G. Amen put many key important ideas in this book to help benefit the way we study and think about school. Through the book, he gives many helpful tips that would be easy to incorporate into our daily life, along with many scientific explanations to go with the facts. He talks about how to benefit our physical health which would, in turn, help our mental health. Although a pleasant read, throughout the book I sometimes wanted more science-based answers and reasonings for the facts and ideas he had.

[Flor Palarino · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m back at the university to get another degree and I’m 37, so I thought I’ll find some new tricks

I think this book is really good for when you start studying (I wish I had this book when I was 20)
Give you nice tips, and reminds you how important is food for our brain

If you are like me, you are studying for your second degree/master, if you know the basics about how the brain works (I do because I read the other books of dr Amen 🤗) maybe is not so useful

The good part of this book is that teach you a little of everything, method of study, ANTS, food for the brain, relationships with your teachers, I recommend it to you if you are in your 20s or if you are starting now reading about how the brain works 🤗

[Alice · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always start fresh with a good mind to get full in my tests but end up wasting time and getting a normal pass... as a result, upsetting my parents. I find it really hard to study faster and mostly feel lazy to put up my talents. I am a class 12 student, and its very important for me to work hard, I wake up early in the morning but tend to feel sleepy withing an hour. And I also have the habit of writing and studying as i cannot recollect if i don't write after learning. I feel it takes time thought its effective, until i met Bluehackangels407 At G mail com, who makes it easier for me, when he successfully changes all my poor grades. I feel more relief than ever.

[Beatriz · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wish I was able to read this book when I was still a student. It could’ve helped me a lot since I have always wondered why I have short attention span. It was great to know what my brain type is. At least I have an idea why I am like this. I am an avid learner but I do struggle with focusing for a long time doing one task only. I can multitask though.
The daughters of Dr.Amen also have some helpful advices in this book as they are also students.
This book is suitable for everyone especially for students.

[Natasia Angel · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book gives many practical tips and guidance related to study. However, since this is a continuance of previous books by Dr. Amen, the book does not detailed information related to the types of brain other than the basic understandings. Overall, quite useful and a pretty quick reading, even though it takes me a month still to finish it.

[Jo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Got this book for my son-in-law (who teaches) and our grands who are in advanced classes. Thought they might pick up some pointers. This is a good book but very deep and detailed. It's not something to be read in one sitting. Should be a resource/learning tool. I did see several things which may benefit them all.

[Tony Sandoval · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the best books I have read about personal academic motivation. The beginning of the book might seem a little overwhelming but it will form the base for the rest of the books and the practical tips that it offers. Great book, very quick read for fellow college students!

[Ashwini Vijayakumar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Most of the tips given in the book are taught by parents but through the book we understand the scientific reason behind the tips. An amazing book for all to maintain the brain healthy and improve your memory to help in your life.

[Larisa Hinojosa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent tools to improve your study and learning skills! All based on scientific knowledge.

[Yaduraj Choudhary · Rating 4 out of 5]

*I received book free as a giveaway; all opinions are my own*
Nice book with good strategies.

[Flimtag101 · Rating 4 out of 5]

no

[Angel Davila · Rating 4 out of 5]

Informational

Great information about the brain and developing good study habits. Very practical. A great tool for learning about brain health.

[Anant Kanndpal · Rating 2 out of 5]

Quite generic. The classification of the 5 personality types and the steps to improve blood flow etc were quite good. Another example of a book which should be a blog post or a podcast

[Kevin Demel · Rating 1 out of 5]

A lot of info about why to keep your brain in shape but very little about how and it's affect. I skimmed the book in a couple of hours.

[Gwen (Draco’s Version) · Rating 4 out of 5]

can you tell im worried/stressed/anxious for my first year at uni 🫣🫣

[Amanda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mostly a review for me. However, very good tips and methods for new college students who have gaps in their study skills. There are a few things that I picked up that I will be using on the students I tutor.

[Joe Macko · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an absolute must read for any aspiring student, high school or college. As a senior citizen, I so wish I had had access to this book so much earlier in my Academic life. Most of my learning now comes from reading, and watching video courses, this book actually encourages me to attend classes where additional communication with teachers and other students would enhance my continued learning experiences. Loved the book!

[Kristen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I just received the book today and finished it rather quickly. As a mother of a senior in high school, this will be a very helpful resource for him now and in the near future. This is a must read for any student, but especially for those who struggle with time management, organization and study skills.

[Jamie Scott · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great Reminders

Not all of this can be easily applied to online courses but for in person classes these work well. Any student could benefit from this book.

[jane carvelli · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have read and found the book quite interesting in theories. But, it wasn't real. I needed real. Disappointed 😞