College 101

Post Midterms

During college you get to learn and experience the amount of midterms you are and will be taking depending on your major. You are studying like no other and trying to find a schedule that works for you but one thing you only get to experience after your very first midterm is that there are more than just 1 midterm per semester. Some classes have 2 per semester, others have 3 and some might have more. There is a lot going on and sometimes you have to remind yourself why you are doing this. 

After the first week of midterms, you'll feel drain. If you did not do well on the first set of midterms, do not bring yourself down. It is easier said than done but remember, you are going for a degree that will be used in the future. If you are feeling down after taking your midterm, that is normal. Sometimes it may feel like you didn't study enough or might've missed a topic and that is normal. 

The best way that I found myself motivated after midterms weren't just mini rewards but also a change in scenery. Taking a break in between studying was something that helped me. It kept me distracted for a bit and helped my brain retain information that was being reviewed. It also helped my mental health. That is a topic that not a lot of college students talk about in public or on the media and I am here to touch upon this topic for every college student. Yes midterms, exams, projects, research papers, or any other heavy assignment can be draining and sometimes we are not aware of it. Next college blog entry will be touching on this topic more and the best ways to take care of yourself as a student!! For now, do not give up!! You will pass those exams and you will do amazing this fall semester!!

College 101

Midterm Season

Right about now, you are reaching that time of the semester where midterms start happening. Well at least for some of you. You might be stressing and worrying about your midterms starting or they are coming up. Some of you are probably studying like crazy for not just 1 but for 2+ courses (depending on how many you are taking). Let this blog post help you relax and ease your mind for a bit. I will be giving you my tips and tricks for getting comfortable with midterms.

Resting

No matter how long you are willing to stay awake, you need rest. Your brain needs to rest and process everything that you're studying to retain that information. Your body also needs that rest. If you are a commuter, best believe your body gets drain. It is on a constant move that you may forget but your body does feel it. Resting also involves your health. When you stress, your body stresses and when your body stresses, it starts affecting your health. Resting 8 hours can do wonders for you.

Study Methods

Main study tip is to not try and review every material the night before. Rookie mistake and that probably won't be saving you in any class. Space out the material. If there are classes that you feel more confident in and the information is easier to understand then you don't have to prioritize those classes as the main portion of your study session, heavy info classes might require more than just 3 days to review. The best way to help you is making a study schedule. If you have time in the morning to review or study, use this time to study for the heavy classes. Your brain is going to be highly active in retaining information. At noon (or around that time) you can focus on classes that you are not 100% confident in but still understand the topic. You are already awake and fueled up to get you started on these study sessions. In the evening/night you can review what you have studied throughout the day for 30 mins, take a 10-15 minute break and then review/study for the classes you already feel confident in. If you are taking 5 classes, space them out evenly in your study schedule. Assigned certain days for these classes that also align with your personal schedule. You can do:

Active recall: Allowing your brain to retrieve information that was taught. This method can be done by writing on a blank piece of paper, white board, or speaking out loud.

Practice tests: Using any practice tests that are given to you in class or generating one with the lectures that you have been taught. This is a perfect way to prep for a midterm (or any exam) and you are able to create tests on the topics that you struggle with the most.

Spaced repetition: Reviewing material at different time rates to fight natural forgetting. This can be by reviewing lectures from your first class and going ove4r them every 2 days to allow your brain to retain the information and makes studying easier before an exam/midterm/final.

Feynman technique: Teaching someone else what you are learning in simple terms. You can teach your topics to a family member, friend or your pet. As long as you understand the topic, teaching this to someone will be easier.

If you need extra help, watch YouTube videos that correlate to your topics. Attend office hours with topics that can be challenging for you and ask your professor to teach it in simpler terms.

Proper Meals/Snacks

Having a proper meal before an exam is important. It is not just fueling your body but it is also fueling your brain. You cannot work on an empty stomach when doing an exam, speaking from experience, I have dozed off on a few midterms/tests. Learned my lesson and make sure to have a proper breakfast or lunch (depending when you have class). If you have 2 midterms back to back in one day and both are in person, take snacks. It can be a fruit, a yogurt bowl, or a granola bar. If you have an hour or 2 hour gap, a snack will do but you might want to accompany that with a mini lunch.

Mini Rewards

After completing a midterm, don't forget to reward yourself. No matter if you did good or bad. You finished and studied for that midterm, you deserve a reward!! It can be something small like buying snack or a drink. For most of my rewards, I bought myself drinks (lattes, matcha, or a smoothie). Most of the times I would get a smoothie no matter how hot or cold it was, a smoothie after a midterm was always the best reward for me. There are some midterms that tend to be a heavy component to your grade and for those I would reward myself with something a bit bigger. The most "expensive" reward I would get for myself was a book. For my undergrad courses that were very important (all of them were) there were some that retained a lot more information than others. Those courses were biomechanics, disease and plasticity in neuromuscular system, physics, anatomy, and physiology. I did spend a lot of my time studying and memorizing certain actions and terms that wouldn't just appear in the first exam but in multiple and for the rest of the year. Depending on how heavy the course is, you can then choose your rewards with things you like. 

College 101

Study: Hate or Enjoy?📓✏

Study study study. That is probably what you are doing this week, and next, and the week after. You might get burnout from studying too and that is normal. I have gotten burnout from it and if it is one thing that I have learn about studying is that you can either hate it or love it. Most of the time you will hate it. Especially with midterms being right around the corner you might not know where to begin. Let me help you by motivating you and convincing you to at least enjoy studying. The best thing for that is having a good study spot.

Study Spots

Studying can be done at home, campus, or public areas (there are specific ones). Once you find your personal favorite spot, you will be enjoying it. It is even better when you do it with a friend. Even if you are not in the same major, you are motivating one another to thrive in your college education. I will be telling you some of my personal favorites and how it made me enjoy studying for my classes instead of forcing myself to do it. 

Home

I wasn't one to enjoy studying at home. It was a bit hard for me. Throughout the day it was difficult. I wanted to go outside and enjoy my time with friends or go shop. The only times where I knew that I was able to do it was when everyone would be sleeping. I found it peaceful, yet I would listen to music to help me focus even though no one was awake. There was always something about studying at night with the moon being present that made me enjoy it more. Learned my lesson that I wasn't cut out to be studying at home. I needed to be in an environment where I saw everyone focus on their work to keep me going and being at home was not the place. If you tend to focus more at nighttime, being at home with a candle burning and some tea (or coffee) is the best way for you to enjoy a study session.

Campus

One of the most common spots that you will be focus is the library. Depending on how big your university is, that will also depend on which library you choose. There are some that are seen as the social areas and ones that are dead silent that if you drop a pen, everyone will hear it. Don't forget that the libraries are not the only places that you can study. Some buildings (or colleges) at universities have study spots and for me those were my personal favorite. I would find my spot and tackle the most important assignments to get out of the way. Even studying outside is always an option and refreshing as well. Obviously depending on the weather too. On the right day with the perfect weather, makes the studying session even better. Also helps you ease the mind. If your campus has coffee shops, take advantage. Not only do you get to stay in campus in between your classes but you get to reward yourself with a coffee. It sets the environment and helps you focus on your main tasks.

Public Areas

Throughout my college years, I would go to coffee shops to study or public libraries. There were times where I would go alone, with my sister, or I went with friends. If I went with friends I would go in the afternoon (12pm-4pm) and we would go to local/downtown area coffee shops. These were perfect for lunch catch ups and help each other out with our studies. When I would go study with my sister, we would go out to study in the evening. Most of the places that we went to were in the downtown area of Los Angeles. We both felt safer going together in the evening for the late study sessions enjoying the late night city drives. If I went solo to study, I would go from 10am-6pm. My solo study sessions would be either at coffee shops or at public libraries. These were moments where I wanted to solely focus on my big assignments (midterms, finals, presentations, or projects). 9/10 times I would get 90-100% of the work done.

Don't feel restricted on where to study. There are places that you can go to and enjoy a different scenery. The places that I went to don't have to be the places that you should go but ideas. If you dorm and want to explore the cities close to your campus, this is the perfect time to go explore. You got this and don't give up!!!

College 101

 Study Tips

Throughout college you will find that not everyone studies the same. Finding what study method works for you is important but also pay attention to the subject/major. Every major shares different information regarding the topic you are learning. There are some students that review their notes and rewrite them, others make flashcard, some summarize their lectures and make annotations. For my major, most classes required a lot of memorization and active recall. My best study method was making flashcards, reviewing & summarizing my notes, annotating readings, and active recall. Work with what is best for you. If you don’t know, let me guide you.

Flashcards: works best when you are focusing on memorization (nursing, kinesiology, science)

Practice problems: perfect for any math topics, chemistry, and physics. 

Writing notes: listing down important point from lectures or readings. (Psychology, sociology, social work, science, business, nursing, history, etc)

Active recall: writing, teaching, or talking out loud on the topics that you have been taught on (any major, if you are a science major, works perfectly).

Staying Organized

When working on your notes, make sure you are staying organized. The best way that I was able to keep them organized on my iPad or laptop was by making a file of my major and small folders under that file of all courses that I took. Best way to label them is by splitting them up as “general education courses”, name of major (example, “psychology), under the major folder i personally like to add the number (example 200’s; ECON 201, ECON 202, ECON 203). This made looking up all the lectures and midterms. In each class I had them split by “Term 1, Term 2, Term 3, etc”. This depended on how many midterms I had for a class and the lectures leading up to that term made it easier to look back of when the topic was taught.

College 101

 Syllabus Week📚

First week of school is always going to be the easiest week, at least for those who are going into their 2nd, 3rd, or 4th year. If it is your first year, do not panic. Let the professors introduce themselves and the class. Your first day of the semester should be easy. If you already started college, then you must have experience how quick some professors go over the syllabus and then go straight into lecture. Congratulations, you have are no ahead that other most classes. If your professor did not do that, you will get to experience it in upcoming years. 

The first week is a perfect time to build your routine. Knowing when to take breaks, when to study, take lunch, or even take a nap. Start planning ahead as well. There are times when professors will state what exams or important assignments coming up, write those down in your planner or make a note of it in your phone. 

On syllabus week, you normally don’t have big assignments to worry about. The most you have to get done is take a syllabus quiz, introduce yourself in a discussion post, and/or get your textbook for the class. Most of these assignments are a week grace period but there are some professors that give more time in case more people get added. Finishing those assignments are easy to do and don’t take longer than 5 minutes to get done, get them out of the way before the deadline to let you enjoy the weekend. One tip I will give is to never buy a textbook from your university’s bookstore. The prices on these textbooks can be a lot and half 90% of the time you can find them at a cheaper price if they are being rented or bought on a different place such as Amazon. I have found most of my textbooks on Amazon and have rented them out or bought used since they are cheaper. There are going to be some textbooks or lab manuals you will have to purchase at the bookstore.

1st Official Lecture Week📚

Don’t try to rush and understand the very first lectures that are being taught. I have done that a couple of times and it has confused me. Look over the lectures before the start of your class. Read over the slides to give you an introduction of what the lecture will be about. Once class starts take notes or annotate. When doing this, keep in mind of what is important, topics you don’t understand highlight or underline, topics you want to revisit and study more, and bookmark these slides to go back and review. After your lectures are over, give yourself a break until you have established a time to study. With all the notes/annotations you made, review them by active recall. This will help you understand the topics more and better prepare for quizzes/tests or midterms. For better studying resources, make a study group. Topics are easier to understand when your peers teach it to you as well. Makes it less confusing than a professor teaching. Even searching up a YouTube videos helps!! 

College: Preparations

College

My time in college has been one of the most memorable moments that I could have experienced. Meeting new people, joining clubs and organizations, spontaneous trips with friends, relationships, education, and growth. College is a time where you learn more about yourself and what best impacts your future. These are the times where you want to do everything and anything. Meet new people, explore your campus, join clubs/organizations, explore the city, etc. Live it to the fullest because these 4 years will not come back. 

Advice/Preps

If there is one thing that I can tell my college freshman self is to organize everything you need before the first day of class. You definitely got to plan ahead. Not a lot of college students use planners and I can tell you that a planner saved my life. This helped me by organizing any big midterms, exams, papers, or projects that classes required. Best way to differentiate is to color code your classes when making these labels and writing down the important assignments. I have seen TikTok's about college students making an assignment tracker on Google Sheets or Excel to help them complete all of their assignments and that is another perfect way to prepare for the semester. 

One of the biggest tips I will give you is one that I am glad I did with my sorority sisters. We went to campus together to look for our classes before the semester started. If this is your first semester (or 2nd, 3rd, or 4th year)) at college, I highly recommend you do this as it also helps you get to know your campus a little better. For any commuter who is going to check out the location of their classes, this is a perfect time to check out what parking structure is ideal for you. Me personally, I would always park in the structure that was the closest to my last class of the day.

Supplies

One thing about college is that it is nothing like high school. You do not need a notebook for every class you take or a binder. A laptop, iPad, maybe 1 notebook will be fine. On your first day of the semester you will see that a 90% of the students uses either a laptop or an iPad to take notes. The remaining 10% will use a notebook to take notes. It is always good to carry a notebook and a couple pens/pencils, you'll never know when they will be needed. Depending on your major or classes that you take, a notebook might not be needed. 

If you are a science, exercise science, math, or kinesiology major, an iPad is ideal for classes as there will be lessons where you will need to annotate. If you are a communications, psychology, business, engineer, computer science, finance, liberal arts, political science, or criminal justice major a laptop will be the most ideal. I have seen students from the listed majors have a laptop, iPad, or both to take notes or do their assignments in and I can tell you right now that it is also a preference in which item you want to use. Some people prefer an iPad because it is lighter and easier to take with you. Others prefer a laptop as it is easier to be have an overview of all your tabs being open and it is easier to be working on reports/essays/papers. 

Night Before

Prepare your backpack/tote with any supplies that you may need. Have your iPad/laptop fully charge. If you are staying in campus for a long period of time, it is handy to have you chargers with you. The chargers can be for your phone, laptop, iPad, headphones, etc. If you're taking lunch, have that ready too. Sometimes getting food on campus can be a bit pricey. For my college women who are commuting, please please please have an mini emergency bag with you at ALL times. Carry any hygiene products that you use because you never know when you or someone else will need it. I always had one and I think I barely used it for myself but I was always prepared to help others. Always have cash with you, it is a lifesaver!!