There are two types of students after a lecture.
The first type calmly reviews the slides, tidies up their notes and makes a sensible revision plan.
The second type downloads the PowerPoint, saves it as “week 4 thing”, forgets it exists, then rediscovers it three days before the exam like an academic crime scene.
Most of us have been the second type at some point.
That is where Google NotebookLM can be genuinely useful. It is an AI study tool that lets you upload your own sources, such as lecture slides, notes, PDFs and articles, then ask questions, generate summaries, create flashcards and build quizzes from that material.
It will not revise for you. Annoying, but true.
What it can do is turn a messy pile of lecture slides into something you can actually test yourself with.
What NotebookLM Is Actually Good For
NotebookLM works best when you give it specific material from your course.
That could include:
- Lecture slides
- Seminar notes
- Reading list PDFs
- Journal articles
- Textbook chapters
- Revision notes
- Module handbooks
- Your own typed notes
It is not at its best when you ask vague questions like “help me revise psychology”. That is too broad.
A better prompt would be:
“Using these Week 3 and Week 4 lecture slides, create a quiz on the key theories, definitions and examples I need to know.”
That gives the tool something clear to work with.
The big advantage is that NotebookLM uses the sources you upload. So instead of getting a generic explanation from the internet, you can ask it to help with the actual material from your module.
Why Quizzes Beat Rereading Slides
Rereading lecture slides feels productive because your eyes are technically moving across academic words.
Unfortunately, that does not always mean much is going into your brain.
The problem with rereading is that it can become passive. You recognise the content, so you think you know it. Then the exam asks you to explain it, compare it, apply it or criticise it, and suddenly everything feels much less familiar.
Quizzes are more useful because they force you to retrieve information. You have to answer before you check. That makes gaps obvious.
Instead of staring at a slide titled “Key Features Of Attachment Theory” and thinking, “Yeah, looks familiar,” you can ask NotebookLM to quiz you properly.
For example:
- What are the main features of Bowlby’s attachment theory?
- How does Ainsworth’s Strange Situation support or challenge Bowlby’s theory?
- What is one limitation of attachment theory?
- How could this theory appear in an exam question?
That kind of active revision is much better than slowly scrolling through slides while half-watching TikTok.
Start With One Module
Do not throw every document from your entire degree into one giant NotebookLM project. That will get messy quickly.
Start with one module.
For example:
- Introduction To Psychology
- Contract Law
- Marketing Principles
- Anatomy And Physiology
- Victorian Literature
Create a separate notebook for that module, then upload the sources that actually belong together.
A sensible setup might be:
- Week 1 lecture slides
- Week 2 lecture slides
- Week 3 seminar notes
- Core reading chapter
- Your own revision notes
This keeps the tool focused. If you mix unrelated modules together, you are more likely to get vague or confused answers.
Upload Better Material For Better Results
NotebookLM is only as useful as the sources you give it.
Good sources include official lecture slides, cleaned-up notes, course readings, seminar handouts and revision guides provided by your lecturer.
Less useful sources include blurry whiteboard photos, half-finished notes, random websites, screenshots with no context, or another student’s notes that may be wrong.
If your lecture slides are very thin, upload your own notes as well. Some lecturers put barely anything on the slides because they explain the important stuff out loud. A slide that just says “criticisms?” is not enough for NotebookLM to build a strong quiz unless your notes explain what those criticisms are.
Ask For A Summary First
Before creating quizzes, ask NotebookLM to summarise the material.
Try:
- Summarise the main topics covered in these lecture slides.
- What are the key theories, definitions and examples in this material?
- Create a study guide for this lecture in simple language.
- What are the most exam-relevant points in these sources?
This helps you check whether it has understood the material properly.
Do not just copy the summary and call it revision. Read it alongside the original slides. Has it picked out the important points? Has it missed something your lecturer clearly cared about?
If the summary is too basic, ask a more specific follow-up:
- Add more detail on the criticisms of this theory.
- Explain the difference between these two concepts.
- Give me examples from the lecture slides.
- Focus only on the material from Week 5.
Turn The Slides Into Flashcards
Flashcards are useful for things you need to remember clearly, such as definitions, key theorists, dates, processes, models and terminology.
A good prompt would be:
“Create flashcards from these lecture slides. Focus on key terms, theorists, definitions and examples. Keep the answers short but clear.”
You could also ask:
- Create 20 flashcards for this topic, starting easy and getting harder.
- Create flashcards only from Week 3.
- Create flashcards that test the difference between similar concepts.
- Create flashcards for key studies and what each one found.
The trick is to avoid flashcards that are too broad.
Bad flashcard:
- Question: Explain globalisation.
- Answer: A huge paragraph that looks like it needs its own coffee break.
Better flashcard:
- Question: Name Two Economic Features Of Globalisation.
- Answer: Increased international trade and the growth of multinational companies.
Flashcards should test small, useful pieces of knowledge. If every answer is a paragraph, you are basically making tiny essays.
Create Quizzes That Test Understanding
Flashcards are good for remembering facts. Quizzes are better for checking whether you actually understand the topic.
Try prompts like:
- Create a 15-question quiz based on these lecture slides.
- Make a multiple-choice quiz on this topic.
- Create a quiz that tests understanding, not just memorisation.
- Make the quiz harder and include short-answer questions.
- Create exam-style questions from this material.
- Give me the answers only after I have attempted the questions.
That last one matters. If the answers appear immediately, you are more likely to read them and think, “Oh yeah, I knew that.”
You want to force yourself to answer first.
A useful quiz might include definitions, comparison questions, scenario questions, “explain why” questions, and questions asking for strengths and weaknesses.
For example, if you are studying marketing, a basic quiz question would be:
“What does SWOT stand for?”
A better one would be:
“A small clothing brand is losing customers to cheaper competitors. Give one strength, one weakness, one opportunity and one threat that might appear in its SWOT analysis.”
That forces you to apply the idea, which is much closer to what university assessments often want.
Use Your Wrong Answers Properly
Do not just mark the quiz and move on. Your wrong answers are the useful bit.
Try asking:
- I got questions 3, 7 and 11 wrong. Explain the correct answers using the lecture slides.
- What part of the topic do I seem to be misunderstanding?
- Give me three more practice questions on the areas I got wrong.
- Explain this concept more simply, then test me again.
The point is not to get everything right the first time. The point is to find the gaps while you still have time to fix them.
Check Everything Against Your Actual Course
NotebookLM can be useful, but your lecturer, module handbook and assessment brief still matter more.
Before relying on any quiz or summary, check it against:
- The lecture slides
- The module learning outcomes
- Your reading list
- Seminar questions
- Assessment criteria
- Any revision guidance from your lecturer
AI tools can still make mistakes. They can oversimplify, miss context or produce questions that sound convincing but are not quite right.
Your safest rule is this:
If NotebookLM says something that is not clearly backed up by your lecture slides or readings, check it before you trust it.
A Simple NotebookLM Revision Routine
Here is a simple routine you could use after each lecture:
- Upload the lecture slides and your own notes
- Ask for a short summary of the lecture
- Generate 10 flashcards for the key terms
- Create a five-question quiz to test understanding
- Mark your answers honestly
- Ask NotebookLM to explain anything you got wrong
- Add the weak areas to your revision list
That is more work than just downloading the slides and forgetting about them. But it is much less work than trying to relearn eight weeks of content during exam season.
The best time to use NotebookLM is not the night before the exam. It is 20 minutes after the lecture, while the material still looks vaguely familiar.
What To Avoid
Do not upload everything and ask it to “make revision”. That is too vague.
Do not use it to replace the reading. It can help you understand a reading, but it should not become an excuse to avoid reading properly.
Do not blindly trust every answer. Check important details against your actual sources.
Do not create 200 flashcards you will never review. A small set of useful flashcards is better than a giant digital guilt pile.
And do not use it to write your essay for you. Use it to understand material, test yourself and organise ideas. Do the actual thinking yourself.
Useful Prompts To Copy
- Summarise this lecture in plain English, using only the uploaded sources.
- List the key terms I need to understand from this lecture.
- Create 15 flashcards from these slides. Keep each answer under three sentences.
- Create a quiz that tests my understanding of this topic. Do not show the answers until after the questions.
- Make the quiz harder and include questions that require examples.
- Create five exam-style questions based on these lecture slides.
- Explain the three most difficult concepts in this material.
- What common mistakes might students make when revising this topic?
- Test me on the topics I am weakest on.
- Create a table comparing the main theories in these slides.
- Give me a checklist of what I should know before the exam.
The more specific you are, the better the result usually is.
The Bottom Line For Students
Google NotebookLM can be a brilliant study tool if you use it properly.
Its biggest strength is that it works from your own sources. That makes it ideal for turning lecture slides, seminar notes and readings into flashcards, quizzes, summaries and study guides.
But it is not a shortcut around learning. It is a way to make revision more active.
Use it to test yourself. Use it to find weak spots. Use it to turn boring slides into questions you actually have to answer.
Just do not let it become another shiny productivity tool you set up beautifully and then ignore until deadline week.
Because at that point, the problem is not the software.
It is the “week 4 thing” file staring at you from your downloads folder, quietly judging your life choices.
