I suggest an understanding of the fact that the process one takes to complete ALL applicable problems, should, but more importantly, can be memorized.

For a long time, I spent hours laboring over the book trying to understand the text when I really should have been laboring over my solutions manual and learning each and every assigned problems step. Only through this can one really understand the text because you begin to connect text explanation to problem execution.

Obviously, you must read the book. But a healthy balance between book and solutions manual should be struck, with perhaps more emphasis on the solutions manual. There are truly only a finite number of problems to grasp per chapter. After a time it becomes clear what is actual difference in knowledge and what is just rearrangement of terms. This understanding is important to create a "catalog" of the types of problems that could be on your exams.

Specifically with every chapter example problem and all assigned homework problems you would hope to be able to know the process right away upon reading the question and identifying the concept.

I hope this helps. I took the engineers version of chemistry, but I believe that the technique would apply to all courses. Good luck.

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