coolguy2005 said:
Thanks for the reply young. I"ll be more specific.
1. I have trouble making organized notes for myself.
2. I have time management problems. I can never seem to find the time to finish.
3. I have trouble motivating myself to study.
Any suggestions on how I can improve in those areas?
I'm in my final year at university, and you don't get this far without being organised. I'm going to share some of the tips that help me personally but obviously, as Josazax mentioned, don't expect the same things that work for me to work for you, but they may help in pointing you in the right direction.
1. Organised notes ok....I normally deal with 8 modules a year, thats 4 a semester and each module is split into 2 distinct parts -basically lots and lots of notes. I've noticed some students keep a single folder full of all their notes or seperate folders for each module, whilst others (myself included) just take one folder and organise its contents to correlate with the following days lectures. This forces you to ensure that you know what lessons you have the next day (and may even encourage you to study, like a reminder). Using seperators really helps maintain some clarity between subjects too.
As for the notes themselves, what are you finding difficult? Is it hard to write what you need from the lecture? Can you not understand your notes afterwards?
I never date my notes but instead head them up with the subject contents in a bright pen, I highlight the things I
don't understand so I'm forced to comprehend them first, then the easy stuff last. I don't copy direct from the board or what we're told to write. I try to listen and understand what we are told, then write only what I need. It's actually very hard work to not just copy blindly from the board but I think its worth it.
2. I think you need to be realistic about how long certain activities take, and if in doubt (which is most of the time) add some buffer time into your plan incase you take longer than expected. I know its a pain, but pre-planning your time helps in the longrun. In an exam, would you just rush in and try and complete all the questions regardless of how much time you should be allocating for each? Hopefully not.
Take a little time to pre-plan your week, spreading out the study time so you don't get bored etc. Do you use a diary? They're invaluable!
3. I find it impssible to motivate myself to study subjects I have no interest in, so maybe you need to inject some realism into what you study. You didn't mention a subject, so assuming its all flat dull theory (like a science, or even economics or something very structured and dull like law)...it would be great if you could find a way of engaging yourself to the subject. Either that or imagine a nice shiney pot of money at the end of your degree.
I'm a little bit competitive with my grades and always like to see that I've done better than most. This is what pushes me to work hard. It's strange, and probably not very healthy, but it makes me feel good and forces me to work better. 8O
Let me know what you think of this advice.
