STUDY GUIDE PRO
Chapter III
The Ideal
Student
Although college could be fun and
interesting it is still a place of
competition. Equip yourself with the
basic study skills needed to succeed.
“Prevention is better
English proverb
than
cure”.
“It is easier to cover our feet with
sandals than to cover the earth with
carpets”. Indian proverb
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The 5 Fundamentals
Every serious student should consider the
following five points:
(1) Define your priorities. Doing well in
school should not be at the bottom of the list.
(2) Study, study! Unfortunately there is
no way other way out.
(3) Self-discipline. You have to compel
yourself.
(4) Always attend your classes. Unless
you have a pretty good excuse, you should always
attend your classes.
(5) Manage your time. If you don’t
manage your time, you’re wasting it. We’ll come
back to time management later.
Self-discipline
As human beings we tend to do things often by
habit. If this is the case, and it most surely is,
then why not attempt to transform something
found within your mind into a habit, such as
internally reinforcing the claim that “I really
have to study”. To clarify the issue further,
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instead of just doing what you’re doing out of
sheer compulsion; you actually desire to do what
you know you should do.
This gives rise to a familiar pattern, your
thoughts turn into actions, your actions into
habits and finally your habits turn into a
character trait. It’s now a part of you and there is
no need to force it down your throat anymore.
This may not come at once but with
consistency from your behalf, the length of this
difficult path continues to decrease.
Managing your time
A day consists of 24 hours, the fundamentals of
time management is really how one should slice
those 24 hours in a way that gives the proper
time needed to the different elements in one’s
life. For this to be done, we need to consider
three different requirements:
1. Never taking on more than you can
handle.
2. Critically estimating the time each
activity needs.
3. Acting on what you’ve written down.
And also, do remember that every single minute
is important and too precious to be thrown away.
You can’t go back in time. This is why time is so
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much more valuable than money; you can never
restore lost time whereas you can restore the
value of lost money! Another important thing to
do is to keep a schedule.
You see, if you’re not ahead of schedule
you’re behind of schedule since being right on
schedule is very difficult.
Any mishap or bad estimation could easily
make you fall behind schedule. The worst case
scenario is if it were to occur right at the end of
the semester, when there may be no recovery.
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Poem • By Rudyard Kipling
{…} If you can dream - and not make
dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts
your aim; If you can meet with Triumph
and Disaster And treat those two
impostors just the same; {…}
If you can force your heart and nerve and
sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in
you
Except the Will which says to them: 'Hold
on!' {…}
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's
in it, And - which is more - you'll be a
Man, my son!
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Introspection
It’s important that you learn to keep yourself
accountable. Always reckon yourself before your
teacher does so.
- Understand and be honest with yourself.
You can’t trick or lie to yourself. Get things done
when they’re supposed to be done.
- You need to assume the role of both the
athlete and the coach, keeping a watchful eye on
your activities while doing your outmost to
succeed.
- Don’t be afraid to face your insecurities
or weaknesses. You shouldn’t be ashamed to ask
the professor if you’re unsure about something.
Likewise if your teacher poses a question to the
class you shouldn’t hesitate to answer if you
know the answer. If you happen to answer
correctly, it’s a sign that you know your subject
and if you answer incorrectly you’ll be corrected
and will definitely remember the correct answer
in the future.
- Don’t tell yourself that you’ll fail even if
you’ve done so in the past. Let the past be the
past and the future be the future. Learn from
your mistakes but don’t get restricted by them.
Seek out your weaknesses and attack
them directly. Don’t be naïve, don’t restrict
yourself too much nor believe that there are no
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limitations. We all need food and rest and at the
end of the day, we are only human.
Exams
Here we’ll discuss some basic tactics to employ
when writing an exam.
Later on, we will expand this and cover
more advanced techniques that will help you
tackle your exams.
Preparing
Prioritize your material. Learn how to
concentrate on the most important tasks at hand.
Keep in mind that your teacher doesn’t have the
freedom of time.
He or she cannot include overly complex
problems in the exam. Learn to recognize a
typical exam problem when you see one.
Skimming through old exams gives you a good
sense of this.
Read during the times that fit your
schedule the best. The choice between studying
in a group or studying individually depends on
many different factors; do you generally get more
done when you study with your friends or do you
tend to accomplish less?
Base these types of decisions on
calculated data by looking at how well you have
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performed in the past when you’ve studied alone
as opposed to in a group.
Complete the most important tasks
during the part of the day when you’re the most
alert. Usually this is the period during the
earlier portions of the day (before lunch) but that
doesn’t necessarily need to be true for everyone.
- Summarize your entire course in as
few words as possible. Writing in few words
forces you to distinguish between vital
information and details.
Also, by compiling a summary of the
course, it compels you to examine the subject in
more detail while at the same time functioning
as extra material that you can review prior to the
exam.
- Go the extra mile and memorize
certain parts of information that you’re
allowed to bring. If for instance you are
allowed to bring your book, learn the different
chapter names by heart.
This will make it easier to find specific
pieces of information during the exam. If you’re
allowed to use a calculator, make sure you’re well
versed with how it works (converting to
radians/degrees, changing preferences etc.).
Reading the manual (the large book that
you usually toss in the trash can) can actually be
helpful, especially in courses such as statistics or
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linear algebra.
- Always search for old exams. The
more you can find, the better. If the exams
are similar that means that this way of studying
will be more effective, however you should never
study old exams exclusively. Although it is
certainly possible to pass certain courses this
way, your understanding will be greatly
diminished. The road to knowledge is long and
I’m afraid that there are no shortcuts.
- Bring a watch if there’s not one
present in the room. If on the other hand,
there is one present, try to sit in a place where
you can see it without having to get up.
- No need to feel anxious, you are there to
win and nothing more. If other people have
managed to pass this exam, so can you. The
process of being judged should be pleasant and
not intimidating. Instead of looking at it as a
moment of possible failure, look at it as an
opportunity to show what you’ve learned. In
simple terms, enjoy being judged!
During the exam
Make sure you have read the instructions
carefully. You have no idea the number of times
people have failed just because they’ve misread
something or missed an important detail. Also,
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always check if there are any questions on the
backside of the paper.
If you have ever written an exam and
near the end of the exam realized that there’s an
entire page left then you know the extreme
anguish that can be felt over such a petty thing.
- Some people would advise you to skim
through the whole exam prior to writing it. I, on
the other hand, have found that this approach
could be potentially dangerous. It’s easy to look
through the exam and see all the major obstacles
a head and feel a bit overwhelmed.
That’s why I’d recommend you to skim
through the exam only for the purpose to
estimate its size so you’ll know how many
questions there are left and how much time to
allocate to each question.
You don't necessarily have to do the
problems in the given order. If a particular
problem is extremely difficult and time
consuming you can always come back to it later
on.
Go for the ones where you're certain that
you will pick up some points. It's not very wise to
spend a large amount of time in the beginning
trying to solve the difficult ones.
Remember that even though it is more
common, from my experience, that the latter
problems are the most difficult, it doesn't
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necessarily have to be so.
If the problem is pretty straight forward,
you can attack it directly, however if you stumble
upon more intricate problems where you need to
find a solution following many different steps, it
might be wise to formulate an approach before
actually attempting to solve it.
That is to say, take a minute or two to
formulate your overall strategy in dealing with
the problem. This way you won't have to correct
yourself later on. I can stand to witness that
going back and erasing everything you've written
down on a test isn't a particularly fun thing to
do.
Do precisely what is requested. Don’t
waste time doing things that won’t receive any
credit. For example, unless explicitly required, do
not rewrite the exam problems on your
answering sheet.
When you simply do not know
If you have no clue, attempt to guess your way to
a solution. This is to be done only when you’re
absolutely sure that you have no other trick in
your pocket.
I've personally done this before with
limited success. What you do is you write down
everything (and I mean everything) that is even
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slightly related to the topic at hand.
Write down any equations or formulas
you think could be applicable, write about
important principles, people, history or concepts
that is even slightly adjacent to the problem.
If you write a lot and put down basically
everything you know about the subject some
teachers - and only some I'm afraid – might give
you a few points thinking; “well at least he/she
were on the right track”.
Remember the time
- Don't rush it nor forget about the time. As I
mentioned earlier, it's important that you
allocate the right amount of time to each
question.
Look at the watch every now and then
and make sure that you have adequate time to
finish all the questions. In the beginning of the
exam, calculate the average amount of time that
you can spend on each question.
If for instance there are a total of 20
questions and the exam takes 3 hours to finish,
you can then estimate that each question should
be answered within 9 minutes (3hrs = 180 min,
180/20 = 9 min/question). If a question ever takes
more than the calculated average, skip it! Always
attempt to answer each question within that
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timeframe, keeping in mind that some questions
will take less than the average and some
question might need more time.
In the ideal case you should have finished
your exam long before it officially ended. This
will give you some extra time to review your
answers and search for mistakes.
If you have time, first skim through all
your answers looking for some rudimentary
errors. If there aren't any that you can see, redo
the entire exam on a separate piece of paper.
This time you can do it a lot faster. In the end,
look at the two exams, the actual exam and the
one that you wrote down on your draft papers.
Did you get the same answers on both
exams or did you perhaps add/omit something
the second time you wrote it down? Compare
these differences and choose the answers you
believe to be correct.
Ask questions if you have them. Don't
hesitate to ask your teacher if you're unsure
about something.
Never assume that things are in a
particular way unless you're absolutely certain
that they are as you perceive them to be.
If you do make any assumption that
cannot be inferred from the actual question itself,
then make sure you write that down on the exam
paper.
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For instance, if it's a physics problem in
mechanics, you may have to assume that there's
no friction involved. The assumption however
has to be relevant to the question at hand and
cannot be made “just to make things easier”.
Usually you will know when to make an
assumption and when to refrain from doing so.
Make it clear and easy to follow. Teachers
don't like to read through intricately written
exams, make it easy for the teacher to follow
along on your thought process. Explain each step
as you go and review it later on. Also make sure
that you understand everything that you wrote
down; if you can’t understand it, neither will
your teacher.
- If the exam that you're writing is in a
course that has subjective elements in it, you
may want to avoid referring to personal opinions
unless it is stated on the exam. It is usually safer
to refer back to what the teacher and/or the
textbook has detailed.
- Furthermore, citing the course textbook
to support your claims makes it easier for the
grader to judge whether your answer is correct or
not. Remember, unless the exam is entirely
multiple-choice, a human being is going to grade
it. The interesting thing about these human
beings is that they tend to have this propensity
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to not enjoy spending too much time grading
papers. For this reason alone, keep your
statements to the point and make it easier for
the person grading.
- Sit as long as possible. Unless you have
something extremely important to do following
the exam you ought to sit down and finish it
without any haste.
Even if you feel like you have nothing else
to add, there might come up something in the
last few minutes that you forgot to include. How
many times haven't we left an exam room and on
our way home remembered a mistake that we
did? Why go through this agony when you can sit
down and finish it in peace?
After the exam
Do not - under any circumstances - discuss the
outcome of your exam with your peers. It's going
to be extremely tempting I promise you but try
your best to refrain. Why?
Because it doesn't bring any good, that’s
why. What's the benefit in being told that your
answer was wrong if you were convinced you
were right?
The only difference is that now you feel
worse about it. The same thing goes for trusting
the answers given by your peers; just because a
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lot of people answered in a certain way doesn't
necessarily mean they were correct.
I know of people who were told that they
were wrong and believed that to be the case and
then felt bad about it, only to find out later that
they had been right all along.
Just move on. It's over, no matter how
good or bad it went, there's no benefit in
worrying about it. The results will come when
they come, don't put much energy in waiting to
find out.
Further suggestions
- Keep in mind that most ideas, even very
complex concepts, are simple at their foundation.
Learn to recognize the simple foundations that
these concepts are built upon. This will not only
give you a deeper understanding of your topic but
will also ease understanding of the more difficult
concepts.
- Look for general principles and
methods. Learning through examples is one of
my favorite ways of learning things. If the
general principle isn't mentioned in the example,
you should try to 'reverse engineer' it in order to
find out.
It’s important to keep in mind that
learning by examples has its own limitations so
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don't put all your eggs in one basket.
- Incorporate as many different
methods for solving problems as you can.
The more, the merrier. You see, the more
examples you've completed and the more
methods that you've learned, the easier it will be
to find the 'perfect method' to use when it’s time
to write the exam.
- Recognize why the problem is
solved in one way and not the other. A
problem can be solved in more than one way;
however in many occasions there are specific
reasons why one method is to be used and the
others to be discarded. Find out why this is so
prior to the exam. If you can't figure it out
yourself, ask the instructor for assistance.
- Teach others. By teaching your subject
to others, you will learn it yourself. Why not
discuss it with other people and see if you can
make them understand. If you can't make them
understand, perhaps you haven't understood it
yourself.
- Learn by observing others in your
particular discipline. Notice the things that
seem to work for them and consider
incorporating their methods into your way of
doing things. This only holds true when their
way of doing things is genuinely better, you don't
exchange gold for eggs.
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- In order to be efficient, you shouldn't
restrict yourself in learning only one thing at a
time; instead have several things going at once.
Then, if you happen to get tired or bored you can
change from one course to the other. This way,
you'll stay more productive and more active
throughout your entire learning period.
- Don't rely on “all-nighters” to get
things done. There are no secret shortcuts to
study success. If you stay up late, you are only
taking precious time away from your morning.
What goes in from one hole goes out the
other. Learn to be more productive with your
studies by maintaining short study sessions
every day during a long period of time.
If possible, bring your textbook with you
to class. This will enable you to look up a piece of
information instantaneously instead of thinking
“I'll look it up later” only to forget about it as
soon as the class ends.
- Unless you feel it's extremely
uncomfortable, always write down your notes
using a pencil instead of a pen. The sheer notion
of being able to revise your notes is crucial and a
pencil makes that process a lot easier.
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In closing
Overall, there's one basic trait that distinguishes
successful students from those that are not; both
may have troubles understanding something but
the successful students refuse to give up and
instead forces themselves to understand.
Don't take ignorance for an answer;
understand the things that you're studying!
Looking for shortcuts isn't the way to go, in fact I
would argue that in most cases it's only time
consuming and does more harm than good.
In short, be firm in your studies and
always try to understand what you're studying.
Studying more efficiently
One of the corner stones of college study life is
the ability to understand ‘you’. In order to do
this, we’ve set up some questions for you to
answer beginning with how do you study best?
Do you have an organized system or do
you just study arbitrarily without any
forethought about how you actually learn? What
time of the day do you like to study and why?
As for the question on where to study, we
will cover this in chapter 5 whereas in chapter 8
you’ll find information on how to manage your
time and work in an organized way.
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That only leaves the final question
unanswered. However, before we tackle it, let us
first take a quick journey to the realms of
biology.
Understanding how your memory
works
When we first learn something, information
enters the brain by a neural trace in what’s
called the sensory memory.
If you pay attention to the received
information, it could end up in the STM (Short
Time Memory).
Now if you keep on working diligently to
process this information, it finds its way up to
what is referred to as the LTM (Long Time
Memory).
The difference between these two is that
in the LTM, the information stays almost
permanently (when occasionally reviewed) while
the STM is swifter in storing information but it
might lose up to 80% of what entered it in a
single day.
Now let’s go back to answer the question I
posed; “what time of the day do you like to study
and why?” Let me give you a personal tip on this
matter. First of all: forget studying during night
time unless you sleep most of the day.
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It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that
you’ll probably end up sleeping with books
beneath your face. I recommend that you only
review and go through your assignments once or
twice before sleeping and then set the alarm
clock to go off early in the morning.
And when I say early, I mean really early.
Learn to combat sleep before it becomes a sturdy
foe. You will hopefully have awoken with your
mind fresh and ready for some study action. You
will be surprised on how quick information can
be stored during these few early hours.
Tip • Once you’ve subscribed to a study
method that fits your needs, be sure to
stick with it! A lot of times, students
change the way they study from one
course to the other.
This will most likely lead to confusion and
disorganization. I would recommend that
you refrain from doing that unless you’re
unsure of the best study method for you.
In that particular case, it would make
sense to try different methods until you
finally locate the one that works the best.
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The SQRW technique
What exactly is SQRW?
Well Joe, it’s a study method where you try to get
the best out of your textbook studies. It consists
of a 4-step approach where each letter denotes
one step in the process.
Let’s go through it and see how it could
make your study life a little bit easier!
What does it stand for?
• S stands for Survey: You need to survey each
chapter in your textbook. Survey the title, the
pictures, the graphs, maps or tables if any, the
introduction, summary and conclusion.
This will give you an overall grasp of what
the chapter is about.
• Q stands for Question: Ask questions in your
mind and you’ll find you stay focused when
reading and it also makes for better
remembering.
Ask why, who, where, when, what and
how!
• R stands for Read: Read to understand, read
to answer the questions in your mind and read to
remember.
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As you answer each question, make sure
you stay focused on the subject.
• W stands for Write: Simply write down each
question with its corresponding answer and read
through it carefully and voila!
You’re ready to participate in your class
discussions.
Note taking skills
The most comprehensive note taking systems
require attention from your part. Alertness in
class will facilitate the note taking process and
help you write down intelligible notes.
You can’t rely on “writing everything
down” because some of the information given in
a lecture won’t help you to learn the material. If
you have problems determining the relevant
points in a particular class, you can always ask
the professor to clarify them for you.
The 2-6 Method
The 2-6 method deals with the approach you take
in dividing the space on your notepaper. This is
the basic idea.
Begin by creating two columns by using
the red line on the left of the page as your border.
Then, when you take notes in class, use the 6
column for the notes and the smaller 2 column on
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the left as a highlighting system.
Write main headings and important
points on the left, including material you think
you will be tested on.
Finally, remember to always include the
date of the lecture as well as the professor who
presented it. This will be helpful along the way,
it’s not always easy to remember who delivered
the lecture, especially if the course had
numerous guest lecturers.
Things to do • Abbreviate long words to
save space (e.g. because = b/c). Write
down every example given. Leave some
blank space between the lines so the text
doesn’t become cluttered. Write down
definitions
and
new
terminology,
understanding a subject is really just
understanding its terminology.
Things to NOT do • Write down
everything. Sit in the back unless you
have reasons to do so. Look at your phone,
friends or any other distraction. Avoid
using messy handwriting, even if you can
understand it yourself, you won’t be able
to share it with anyone else.
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Chapter IV
How To “Live” 5
Extra Years
This is a post about the art of
living more not longer.
Do you want to know what it
implies to live more?
- You get more things done in less
time
- You can live life more; 5, 7 or
even 10 years which would
otherwise be in vain.
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Are you crazy? (Considering the title, one
might say I am the one who’s crazy)
I am sorry for asking this question but a lot
of people, when it comes to issues relating to
time usage, do indeed give the appearance of
being crazy.
Do you find yourself spending
countless of hours in front of the TV set or
just surfing the Internet for no real purpose.
These and other unproductive activities
constitute - without any doubt - great
obstacles in the way of your success.
Now I think I suspect I know what you
are wondering; how on earth can I live two
extra years, this guy is apparently a wacko.
I’m not joking here, nor is it any kind
of myth, just simple common sense. It is
grounded upon two basic principles;
a) How long you might live
b) How you manage those hours.
Let us start with asking the question; how many
hours do you sleep? In my example I will be
assuming somewhat around 8-10 hours, let’s pick
10 as it’s perhaps more common amongst
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students. Let us say that you live until you reach
80 years of age, this is just an assumption of
course. Now let’s do some simple math:
Little Math • First we’ll have to
assume a couple of things.
• The person in our example, let’s call
him Mike, sleeps 10 hours a day.
• Mike decides to sleep 2 hours less
every day.
• He lives until his 80th birthday.
• In our example, the person is
currently 20 years old.
Are you with me so far? Great, now let’s
calculate how many hours of sleep those
2 hours would constitute.
2/24 ≈ 8,3%
80-20 = 60 years to live
8.3% of 60 ≈ 4,98
That is approximately 5 YEARS
wasted on unnecessary sleep!!
And all he did was wake up 2 hours earlier than
usual.
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These are some amazing results. Consider what
you could do with 5 years. That’s about the time
it takes to acquire an advanced university
degree!
Don’t waste your life in sleep, wake up
early and seize the day!
These results were based solely on the person
sleeping a little less. Now imagine if this person
were to cut down on TV by a mere hour a day, or
any other time consuming useless activity by the
same factor.
According to A.C. Nielsen Co, the average
American watches more than 4 hours of TV per
day. Imagine if he were to watch only 2 hours per
day and cut down on the other 2 hours, once
again, in a life span of 80 years, our friend Mike
would have saved another 5 years of his life, now
a total of 10 years that he would have otherwise
spent in unnecessary sleep or frivolity .
Skimming is winning
Ever scanned through a phone book or a list of
contacts in search for a friend’s name? Did you
then read every piece of information or only
selective pieces of information?
The concept of skimming is much like
scanning, the one big difference being: “in
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scanning you’re aware of what you’re looking for,
in skimming you’re not”.
Since you don’t know exactly what you are
looking for, you should try to find clues in the
text before proceeding any further. Take a brief
look at the cover, title, references and the table of
contents.
This will enable you to develop at the very
least a sense of what is to be expected. After
you’ve done this, it’s important that you look for
any interesting keywords, sometimes they are
highlighted and other times they are not. Also
look for names, places, ideas, and numbers.
When you start to envision the central
idea, it becomes a lot easier to digest specific
parts of information.
In the beginning you’ll only notice bold
type, italics, # digits, or Capitalized words. These
are by far the easiest to spot. However as you
become more efficient in skimming you’ll start to
pick up new or atypical words and phrasings.
The more you skim through things, the
more efficient you’ll become in harnessing
information from a textual source. This is a
crucial skill every student should possess.
Not only does it save you time to be able
to find a particular idea amidst an ocean of text
but it also saves you from the agony of searching
in vain.
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The efficient skimmer has a wide span in terms
of perception which enables him or her to quickly
find the heart of the matter. Remember to skim
through any given textbook prior to sitting down
and reading it.
When you’re well acquainted with the
ideas presented in the book, it will become easier
to either digest or discard them.
Remember to practice a lot. If you don’t
skim through a text every now and then, chances
are that you’re effectiveness will decrease. It is
therefore prudent that you always keep yourself
active when it comes to reading in general and
skimming in particular.
If you have an important decision or
choice to make, it might be a good idea to skim
through all the different arguments involved,
both the pros and as well as the cons before you
make that decision. The same can be said about
writing exams; the more efficient you are as a
skimmer the easier it will be to spot a mistake on
an exam.
Some people prefer to highlight important
concepts and ideas when skimming. This could
be a good thing to try out in the beginning as it
helps you localize the most important pieces of
information. However, when it comes to the long
run, the goal is that you develop this skill
independent of any note taking so you won’t need
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