Quadro sinótico das principais alterações do rito do júri

	Rito Anterior	Rito Reformado
Absolvição sumária	Existência de circunstância que exclua o crime ou isente de pena o réu.	Provada a inexistência do fato; provado não ser ele autor ou partícipe do fato; o fato não constituir infração penal; demonstrada causa de isenção de pena ou de exclusão do crime.
Alegações finais da primeira fase	Escritas no prazo de dias;	Orais por vinte minutos prorrogáveis por mais dez;
Apartes	Fazem parte dos debates desde que não abusivos;	Vedado, salvo por intermediação do presidente, para apontar folha lida ou referida, ou para esclarecer argumento fático, quando requerido pelos jurados;
Apelação contra decisão do Júri manifestamente contrária às provas	Cabível tanto para a defesa quanto para a acusação;	Cabível apenas para a defesa;
Ata do julgamento	Assinada pelo juiz-presidente e pelo Ministério Público;	Assinada pelas partes;
Banco dos réus	Vedado pela Constituição Federal mas previsto no sistema;	Vedado pela Constituição e sem previsão no novo rito;
Defesa prévia	Após o interrogatório;	Após o oferecimento e antes do recebimento da denúncia;
Idade mínima para ser jurado	Vinte e um anos;	Dezoito anos;
Interrogatório na primeira fase	Primeiro ato da instrução;	Último ato da instrução;
Interrogatório na segunda fase	Primeiro ato da instrução;	Último ato da instrução;
Julgamento dos quesitos das teses da Defesa	Teses técnico-jurídicas sustentadas em plenário;	Salvo desclassificação, amplo juízo de íntimo convencimento do jurado;
Julgamento dos quesitos das teses de Acusação	Baseados no libelo;	Baseados na pronúncia, inclusive quanto a qualificadoras e causas de aumento de pena;
Leitura das peças para os jurados	Livre a requerimento das partes após o interrogatório e o relatório do processo pelo juiz presidente;	Exclusivamente das provas cautelares, antecipadas ou irrepetíveis, a requerimento das partes ou dos jurados antes do interrogatório;
Lista anual dos jurados	Publicada entre novembro e a segunda quinzena de dezembro;	Publicada até dez de outubro;
Não comparecimento do acusado solto devidamente intimado	Haverá adiamento do rito;	Não possui qualquer influência no julgamento;
Número de jurados na lista anual	Oitenta a quinhentos;	Oitenta a mil e quinhentos;
Número de jurados sorteados para a reunião periódica	Vinte e um;	Vinte e cinco;
Prazo para a juntada de documentos sobre questões fáticas	Três dias antes da data da sessão;	Três dias úteis antes da data da sessão;
Prazo para a realização do Júri;	Não há previsão;	Seis meses depois de transitada em julgado a sentença de Pronúncia;
Prazo para o término da primeira fase	Não há previsão;	Noventa dias;
Recurso contra a Absolvição Sumária	Recurso em sentido estrito promovido de ofício pelo juiz;	Recurso de apelação promovido por quem for interessado;
Recurso contra a Impronúncia.	Recurso em sentido estrito;	Apelação;
Recurso de protesto por novo Júri	Penas de vinte anos ou mais por fato crime;	Não há previsão;
Sistema que serve de base para a construção do procedimento	Sistema inquisitório, com o Ministério Público ao lado do juiz-presidente;	Sistema acusatório, com as partes lado a lado;
Tempo para os debates em casos com um réu	Duas horas para cada parte e trinta minutos de réplica e tréplica;	Uma hora e meia para cada parte e uma hora de réplica e tréplica;
Tempo para os debates em casos com mais de um réu	Três horas para cada parte e uma hora para réplica e tréplica;	Duas horas e meia para cada parte e duas horas de réplica e tréplica;
Uso de algemas	Não há previsão;	Apenas quando houver absoluta necessidade;

TABELA RELAÇÕES DE PARENTESCO

PRAZOS NO PROCESSO PENAL

PRAZOS RECURSOS ELEITORAIS

Ação de impugnação de mandato eletivo: 15 dias. art. 14§10.º da Constituição Federal.

Ação rescisória nos casos de inelegibilidade: 120 dias da decisão irrecorrível, art. 22 "j" do Código Eleitoral. 

Supressão de mapas parciais de apuração: 3 dias , art. 30 XIX "b" do Código Eleitoral.

Defesa contra a exclusão e cancelamento de titulo de eleitor: 5 dias, art. 77 do Código Eleitoral. 

Impugnação do registro de candidatura: 5 dias , art. 3.º da Lei de Inelegibilidade. 

Contestação do pedido de impugnação de registro de candidatura: 7 dias, art. 4.º da Lei de Inelegibilidade.

Recurso contra a sentença da impugnação: 3 dias, art. 8.º da Lei de Inelegibilidades. 

Prazo para contra razões: 3 dias, art 8.º §1.º. 

Recurso contra a expedição de diploma: 3 dias, art. 258 do Código Eleitoral

Recurso contra o indeferimento da inscrição de leitor: 3 dias, art. 45§7.º e art. 258 do Código Eleitoral.

Recurso contra o indeferimento da transferência de domicilio eleitoral: 3 dias, art. 57§3.º do Código Eleitoral.

Recurso perante as juntas eleitorais: 3 dias, art. 258 do Código Eleitoral.

Recurso contra a decisão do juiz eleitoral em caso de exclusão ou cancelamento de titulo: 3 dias, art. 79 do Código Eleitoral.

Recurso contra o indeferimento de reclamação ou representação: 24 horas, art.22 II da Lei de Inelegibilidades.

Recurso contra sentenças de condenação crime: 10 dias, art. 326.

Recurso contra sentença proferida em representação da lei n.º 9504/97:  24 horas, art. 96§ 8.º da Lei das Eleições, conforme jurisprudência, EAAG n.º 7011/SP ,rel. Min. Caputo Batos, em 8.2.2007.

Recurso contra decisão ofertada em Ação de Investigação Judicial Eleitoral: 24 horas, art. 30- A  da Lei das Eleições e art. 22, II da Lei de Inelegibilidades

Recurso especial: 3 dias, art. 276 II, §1.º do código eleitoral e art. 11§2.ºda Lei de Inelegibilidades, AAG n.º 8184/RJ, Min. José Delgado, em 7.8.2007.

Recurso ordinário: 3 dias, art. 276 II, §1.º do Código Eleitoral e art. 11§2.ºda Lei de Inelegibilidades.

Recurso Extraordinário: 3 dias, Sumula 278 do STF .

Embargos de Declaração: 3 dias, art. 275§1.º do Código Eleitoral.

Embargos de Declaração de sentença fundada no rito art. 96 da lei das eleições: 24 horas, art. 96§ 8.º da Lei das Eleições, ARESP n.º 26904/RR, rel. Min. Cezar Peluso, em 27.11.2007.

Embargos de Declaração fundados em direito de resposta: 24 horas, art. 58§5.º da Lei das Eleições.

Agravo contra a decisão monocrática de 2.º grau que deferiu a produção de provas: 24 horas , art. 270§2.º do Código Eleitoral.

Agravo de Instrumento contra denegação de recurso especial: 3 dias, art. 279 do Código Eleitoral.

Representação ao Ministério Publico : 10 dias, art. 357 "caput" e  §5.º do Código Eleitoral.

Arrolar testemunhas em processo crime eleitoral: 10 dias, art. 359 § único do Código Eleitoral.

Arrolar testemunhas no procedimento sumário: 5 dias, art. 22 I, "a" da Lei de Inelegibilidades.

Prazo para Alegações Finais no procedimento sumário: 2 dias, art. 22 da Lei de Inelegibilidades.

Prazo para Alegações Finais no procedimento ordinário: 5 dias, art. 360 do Código Eleitoral.

Requerimento para o registro de candidatura na falta da atividade partidária: 48 horas, art. 11 VII§4.º da Lei das Eleições.

Inicio da ação pelo procedimento sumário (art. 22 lei de inelegibilidade) quando da rejeição de contas: 5 dias, art. 22§4.º da Lei das Eleições .

Prazo para o envio da prestação de contas: 30 dias após a realização da eleição , art. 29 III, IV da Lei das Eleições.

Representação do art. 22 da Lei de Inelegibilidades: 5 dias, da data do fato.     

 

Representação  referente ao art. 30-A  da Lei das Eleições: até a diplomação. Impossibilidade após a eleição, REsp.25935/SC. 

Representação referente ao art. 73 da lei das eleições: 5 dias a contar do fato,  TRE/SP Rec. Cível n.º 24913, rel. Juiz Paulo Salles. Impossibilidade após a eleição REsp.25935/SC. 

Representação referente ao 41-A da Lei das Eleições: até a diplomação, ARESPE n.º 27744/MA , rel. Min. César Peluso, em 11.9.2007.

Prazo para oposição da Ação de Investigação Judicial Eleitoral que trata o art. 30-A  da Lei das Eleições: até a diplomação, Ementário TSE, jul-agos./99.

Dias Toffoli terá alcançado, aos 75 anos, o posto de ministro que ficou no cargo por mais tempo

Se não sair antes de chegar à nova compulsória, o ministro Dias Toffoli terá alcançado, aos 75 anos, o posto de ministro que ficou no cargo por mais tempo. Ele foi nomeado em 2009, aos 41 anos, pelo ex-presidente Lula. Ficará, portanto, até 2042, quando completará 33 anos de Supremo.

José Paulo de Araújo foi ministro que ficou mais tempo no Supremo. ^STF

Contando desde o STF do Império, o ministro mais longevo foi José Paulo Figueirôa Nabuco de Araújo, que integrou o antigo Supremo Tribunal de Justiça durante 31 anos e 3 meses. Ele foi nomeado aos 36 anos, em 1832, pelo imperador D. Pedro II. Aos sete anos, D. Pedro nomeou o ministro mais jovem de toda a história da Suprema Corte até hoje.

Da República, o ministro mais longevo até hoje é o ministro Hermínio do Espírito Santo. Foi nomeado pelo presidente Floriano Peixoto em 1894 e ficou no Supremo durante 29 anos e 11 meses, até 1924, quando morreu, aos 83 anos. Naquela época o cargo de ministro do Supremo era vitalício. Só passou a existir aposentadoria compulsória para o STF em 1934, quando foi promulgada a Constituição que menos durou na história do país.

Celso de Mello já está no rol dos mais longevos da história, pois ocupa uma cadeira no Supremo há quase 27 anos. Se ficar até os 75, completa 32 anos de STF e perde para Toffoli por alguns meses.

Tribunais superiores
No Superior Tribunal de Justiça, também houve uma redistribuição das responsabilidades. Sem PEC, Dilma indicaria três ministros. Seriam os substitutos de Napoleão Nunes Maia Filho, Laurita Vaz e Felix Fischer.

Com o aumento da idade para aposentadoria compulsória para 75 anos, Dilma não indica mais ninguém para o STJ. Dos quatro, Napoleão e Fischer serão substituídos pelo sucessor de Dilma e Laurita pelo presidente que vier depois — descartada a reeleição.

Quem presidir o Brasil entre 2027 e 2030 será o que indicará mais substitutos de ministros da composição atual do STJ. Serão cinco, para os lugares de Francisco Falcão; Nancy Andrighi; Benedito Gonçalves; Moura Ribeiro; e Jorge Mussi. O impacto é diluído porque a corte é composta de 33 ministros.

No Tribunal Superior do Trabalho, a PEC também não teve impacto significativo. Dilma indicaria três ministros daqui até 2018. Não indica mais ninguém. Em compensação, quem for eleito presidente do Brasil em 2026 substituirá 11 ministros da composição atual do TST, que conta com 27 ministros ao todo.

Writing Tips from Ross Gubermann

By Ross Guberman –

When partners report the symptoms of associates’ writing problems, they often sound like a patient who goes to the doctor and says, “I don’t feel so hot, but I can’t quite put my finger on it.”

So below I reveal the four writing symptoms that BigLaw partners most often report. And then I share the diagnoses that these vague observations likely reflect. I even prescribe a treatment plan or two—but don’t worry, PD professionals, I promise not to send a bill!

First Vague Symptom: “He writes like he’s still in law school.”

Likely Diagnosis: The associate still expects to be rewarded for “ideational fluency”—the skill that gets you top grades on law school exams. He is probably an intellectual type who loves “on the one hand,” “on the other hand” analyses but is afraid to take a firm position on any legal issue.

(Hint: This problem often disappears if the associate commits to setting forth on the first page of every document a single idea or action that he want to reader to endorse.)

Second Vague Symptom: “Her writing is not persuasive.”

Likely Diagnoses: The associate spends too much time discussing cases and authorities without linking them to the client’s fact pattern or business goals. Or she thinks that hyperbolic attack language is a substitute for reasoned analysis. Or both.

(Hint: These associates often improve if they learn to explain exactly why various authorities help their client’s cause before they engage in any copying-and-pasting or quoting.)

Third Vague Symptom: “His writing needs more punch.”

Likely Diagnoses: The associate is miming the stereotypes of lawyers’ writing, purposely seizing on every possible heavy-handed or pretentious construction, all the while linking his sentences with stiff connectors like “Moreover” and “However.” Or he is not confident enough about the subject matter to express thoughts directly, naturally, and even evocatively. Or both.

(Hint: In many cases, these associates will improve if they start using the readability statistics function in Microsoft Word.)

Fourth Vague Symptom: “Her drafts are way too long / don’t get to the point.”

Likely Diagnosis: The associate probably clings to the myth that the only way to make a document shorter is to cut important content, which she doesn’t want to do. Someone probably once criticized this associate, in fact, for leaving out some essential point, so now she overcompensates by including every possible detail and issue, no matter how remote.

(Hint: These associates need to learn that they can cut at least a word or two from most of their sentences. If they can trim things down at the word level by spotting common wordiness culprits, they won’t even need to consider cutting anything of substance.)

By the way, if you think partners are vague about associates’ writing problems, you should try talking to the associates themselves. The problems they report to me are nearly always external: the firm never gives them enough time, or they just can’t adapt to the varying styles of those crazy, idiosyncratic partners. But that’s a topic for another day!

LEARNING TECHNIQUES - HOW EFFICIENT ARE THEY?

The lesson you never got taught in school: How to learn!

by SIMON OXENHAM

• • ABOUT 2 YEARS AGO
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A paper published in Psychological Science in the Public Interest has evaluated ten techniques for improving learning, ranging from mnemonics to highlighting and came to some surprising conclusions. 

The report is quite a heavy document so I’ve summarised the techniques below based on the conclusions of the report regarding effectiveness of each technique. Be aware that everyone has their own style of learning, the evidence suggests that just because a technique works or does not work for other people does not necessarily mean it will or won’t work well for you. If you want to know how to revise or learn most effectively you will still want to experiment on yourself a little with each technique before writing any of them off.

Elaborative Interrogation (Rating = moderate)

A method involving creating explanations for why stated facts are true. The method involves concentrating on why questions rather than whatquestions and creating questions for yourself as you are working through a task. To do this yourself, after reading a few paragraphs of text ask yourself to explain “why does x = y?” and use your answers to form your notes. This is a good method because it is simple, so anyone can apply it easily. It does however require enough prior knowledge to enable you to generate good questions for yourself, so this method may be best for learners with experience in a subject. The technique is particularly efficient with regard to time, one study found that elaborative learning took 32 mins as opposed to 28 mins simply reading.

An example of elaborative interrogation for the above paragraph could be:

Elaborative learning is useful for proficient learners because it allows them to apply their prior knowledge effectively to process new information. It is rated as effective because it is time efficient and relatively easy to perform.

“The current evidence base for elaborative learning is positive but lacking"

Self Explanation (Rating = moderate) 

A technique that is useful for abstract learning. The technique involves explaining and recording how one solves or understands problems as they work and giving reasons for choices that are made. This was found to be more effective if done while learning as opposed to after learning. Self explanation has been found to be effective with learners ranging from children in kindergarten to older students working on algebraic formulas and geometric theorems.  Like elaborative explanation, self explanation benefits from its simplicity. Unlike elaborative learning, self explanation was found to double the amount of time spent on a task in comparison to a reading control group.

“The core component of self-explanation involves having students explain some aspect of their processing during learning”

Summarisation (Rating = low)

An old staple, tested by having participants summarise every page of text in to a few short lines. Summarising and note taking were found to be beneficial for preparing for written exams but less useful for types of tests that do not require students to generate information – such as multiple choice tests. Summarising was rated as being likely less beneficial than other methods available but more useful than the most common methods students use – highlighting, underlining and rereading.

“It can be an effective learning strategy for learners who are already skilled at summarizing”

As you might have guessed, I personally find summarising to be very effective – my love of taking notes is probably what drove me to blogging in the first place. I love the function of being able to “ctrl-f” or search my notes folder for the fact that’s on the tip of my tounge. Since starting blogging I love that I can throw a phrase I’m after in to Google along with ‘neurobonkers’ and instantly have the relevant fact in front of my eyes. On a vaguely related note – some have suggested that the ability to Google spontaneously is destroying your memory – but based on the evidence I can’t say this is a view I agree with.

Highlighting and underlining (Rating = low)

The runaway favourite technique of students was found to perform spectacularly poorly when done on its own under controlled conditions. It seems pretty intuitive that highlighting alone is ineffective for the same reasons it is so popular – it requires no training, it takes practically no additional time and crucially, it involves very little thought above the effort taken to simply read a piece of text.

It’s worth remembering that this study only assessed research examining highlighting/underlining as a stand-alone technique. I’d be interested to discover how effective highlighting is when paired with other techniques.

The keyword mnemonic (Rating = low)

A technique for memorising information involving linking words to meanings through associations based on how a word sounds and creating imagery for specific words. Much research has found that mnemonics are useful for memorising information in the short term in a range of situations including learning foreign language, learning people’s names and occupations, learning scientific terms etc. However, it seems the keyword mnemonic is only effective in instances where keywords are important and the material includes keywords which are inherently easy to memorise. The review cites one study for example that required students to use mnemonics to memorise English definitions that were not well suited to keyword generation – the study found that the control group outperformed the group using mnemonics. More worrying – it seems that though the keyword mnemonic has been found effective for aiding short term recall, it has been demonstrated to actually have a negative effect when compared to rote learning in the long term. So, the mnemonic might be useful for remembering definitions the week before an exam but it doesn’t seem to be much use when used in any scale as a long term memory aid.

Imagery for Text Learning (Rating = low)

Experiments asking students to simply imagine clear visual images as they are reading texts have found advantages when memorising sentences, but these advantages seem much less pronounced when longer pieces of text are involved. Interestingly, visualisation was found to be more effective when students listened to a text than when they read text themselves, implying the act of reading may make it harder to focus on visualising. A major problem with imagery research is that most researchers instructed one group to visualise but did not follow up to see if they actually did. One experiment that checked afterwards found that some participants instructed to imagine did not, while some participants in the control group reported using visualisation on their own accord. It is therefore likely that imagery could be a more useful technique than this evaluation currently demonstrates – it is certainly an easy technique to use, so there is little harm in trying. Perhaps more interestingly, imagery research has found that drawing does not seem to improve comprehension and may indeed actually reverse the benefits of imagery. Finally, though imagery is reported to be more versatile than the keyword mnemonic, it has also been found useful only for certain situations. For example, imagery was not been found to be effective to help students answer questions that required inferences to be made from the text, nor was it been found useful for answering questions about a passage on the human heart.

Rereading (Rating = low)

Overall, rereading is found to be much less effective than other techniques – however the research has drawn some interesting conclusions. Massed rereading – rereading immediately after reading - has been found more effective than outlining and summarising for the same amount of time. It does seem however, that rereading spaced over a longer amount of time has a much stronger effect than massed rereading.

Practice Testing (Rating = High)

This is where things get interesting; testing is often seen as a necessary evil of education. Traditionally, testing consists of rare but massively important ‘high stakes’ assessments. There is however, an extensive literature demonstrating the benefits of testing for learning – but importantly, it does not seem necessary that testing is in the format of ‘high stakes’ assessments. All testing including ‘low stakes’ practice testing seems to result in benefits. Unlike many of the other techniques mentioned, the benefits of practice testing are not modest – studies have found that a practice test can double free recall!

Research has found that though multiple choice testing is indeed effective, practice tests that require more detailed answers to be generated are more effective. Importantly, practice testing is effective when you create the questions yourself.

So how can you apply this research? Students can create flash cards (or even use free software to do this). Alternatively students can use a system such as the Cornell note-taking system (Example PDF) which involves noting questions in a column next to their notes as they learn. This finding looks like wonderful news for MOOCS which typically use intensive practice testing as a primary method of teaching. The finding is also great news for students – as practice testing actually takes up much less time than other methods such as rereading, which practice testing far outperforms!

Try it yourself: Can you name and explain two methods of self-testing?

Distributed Practice (Rating = High)

Have you ever wondered whether it is best to do your studying in large chunks or divide your studying over a period of time? Research has found that the optimal level of distribution of sessions for learning is 10-20% of the length of time that something needs to be remembered. So if you want to remember something for a year you should study at least every month, if you want to remember something for five years you should space your learning every six to twelve months. If you want to remember something for a week you should space your learning 12-24 hours apart. It does seem however that the distributed-practice effect may work best when processing information deeply – so for best results you might want to try a distributed practice and self-testing combo.

There is however a major catch - do you ever find that the amount of studying you do massively increases before an exam? Most students fall in to the “procrastination scallop” – we are all guilty at one point of cramming all the knowledge in right before an exam, but the evidence is pretty conclusive that this is the worst way to study, certainly when it comes to remembering for the long term. What is unclear is whether cramming is so popular because students don’t understand the benefits of distributed practice or whether testing practices are to blame - probably a combination of both. One thing is for sure, if you take it upon yourself to space your learning over time you are pretty much guaranteed to see improvements.

Interleaved Practice (Rating = Moderate)

Have you ever wondered whether you are best off studying topics in blocks or “interleaving” topics – studying problems of different types in a slightly more haphazard fashion? Unlike the other methods discussed above, there is far less evidence to go on. The research that has so far been conducted seems to suggest that interleaving is useful for motor learning (learning involving physical movement) and cognitive tasks (such as maths problems) – where benefits of up to 43% have been reported. It also seems that like distributed practice; interleaved practice seems to benefit longer term retention:

“Accuracy during practice was greater during block trials but accuracy a day later was far higher for students who had received inter-leaved problems.”

So why do we use the wrong techniques and which should we use?

The review looked at a range of educational psychology textbooks and found that despite the wealth of research evidence, none of the textbooks that were reviewed covered all of the methods described above – and in those that covered one or more, the coverage was minimal. So if you happen to be an educational psychologist looking to write a textbook, you’re not in a bad position. We are all expected to be able to learn but currently we don’t ever really get taught how to learn. So next time you have something to learn why not take a second to create a schedule to distribute your practice, while you're reading – instead (or as well as) taking extensive notes why not write yourself some practice questions with a special focus on why questions; and when you are learning a new skill why not write a detailed explanation of how you answer the questions. This doesn’t mean you should rush out and bin all the highlighters, but maybe try to gradually incorporate a new technique every time you study and see which techniques work best for you!

Reference:

Dunlosky, J., Rawson, K., Marsh, E., Nathan, M., & Willingham, D. (2013). Improving Students' Learning With Effective Learning Techniques: Promising Directions From Cognitive and Educational Psychology Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14 (1), 4-58 DOI: 10.1177/1529100612453266 [PDF]

The Worst
Highlighting and underlining led the authors’ list of ineffective learning strategies. Although they are common practices, studies show they offer no benefit beyond simply reading the text. Some research even indicates that highlighting can get in the way of learning; because it draws attention to individual facts, it may hamper the process of making connections and drawing inferences. Nearly as bad is the practice of rereading, a common exercise that is much less effective than some of the better techniques you can use. Lastly, summarizing, or writing down the main points contained in a text, can be helpful for those who are skilled at it, but again, there are far better ways to spend your study time. Highlighting, underlining, rereading and summarizing were all rated by the authors as being of “low utility.”

The Best
In contrast to familiar practices like highlighting and rereading, the learning strategies with the most evidence to support them aren’t well known outside the psych lab. Take distributed practice, for example. This tactic involves spreading out your study sessions, rather than engaging in one marathon. Cramming information at the last minute may allow you to get through that test or meeting, but the material will quickly disappear from memory. It’s much more effective to dip into the material at intervals over time. And the longer you want to remember the information, whether it’s two weeks or two years, the longer the intervals should be.

(MORE: ‘Implicit Learning': How to Remember More Without Trying)

The second learning strategy that is highly recommended by the report’s authors is practice testing. Yes, more tests — but these are not for a grade. Research shows that the mere act of calling information to mind strengthens that knowledge and aids in future retrieval. While practice testing is not a common strategy — despite the robust evidence supporting it — there is one familiar approach that captures its benefits: using flash cards. And now flash cards can be presented in digital form, via apps like Quizlet, StudyBlue and FlashCardMachine. Both spaced-out learning, or distributed practice, and practice tests were rated as having “high utility” by the authors.

The Rest
The remainder of the techniques evaluated by Dunlosky and his colleagues fell into the middle ground — not useless, but not especially effective either. These include mental imagery, or coming up with pictures that help you remember text (which is time-consuming and only works with text that lends itself to images); elaborative interrogation, or asking yourself “why” as you read (which is kind of annoying, like having a 4-year-old tugging at your sleeve); self-explanation, or forcing yourself to explain the text in detail instead of passively reading it over (its effectiveness depends on how complete and accurate your explanations are); interleaved practice, or mixing up different types of problems (there is not much evidence to show that this is helpful, outside of learning motor tasks); and lastly the keyword mnemonic, or associating new vocabulary words, usually in a foreign language, with an English word that sounds similar — so, for example, learning the French word for key, la clef, by imagining a key on top of a cliff (which is a lot of work to remember a single word).

All these techniques were rated of “moderate” to “low” utility by Dunlosky et al because either there isn’t enough evidence yet to be able to recommend them or they’re just not a very good use of your time. Much better, say the authors, to spread out your learning, ditch your highlighter and get busy with your flash cards.