Selecting your Courses

Recommended Classes for College Success

Part 1

Collegeboard.com/student/plan/high-school33.html

The academic rigor of your high school is an important factor in the college administration process. College admission officers see your high school course schedule as a blueprint of your education. They’re looking for a solid foundation of learning that you can build on in college,

To create that information, take at least five solid academic classes every semester. Start with the basics and then move on to advanced courses. Challenging yourself is part of what makes school fun; but you need a firm grasp on the fundamentals before going on to more.

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How to take on college studying

Part 2                                                       

Choose Where to Study

Where you should study depends on two factors: the environment in which you are best able to concentrate and the type of work you are planning to do.

·         The best places to study have good light, a comfortable temperature and enough desk space—usually your dorm room, your apartment or the library.

·         For completing problem sets or brainstorming possible test questions, you may want to study with a group or at least in a setting where fellow students are available for discussion.

·         When you are reading book chapters or working on a research paper, you are probably better off in a less social environment.

Improve Your Study Habits

Here are simple steps you can take to help you get a handle on studying:

·         Have a routine for where and when you study.

·         Choose reasonable and specific goals that you can accomplish for each study session.

·         Do things that are harder or require more intense thought at your most productive time of day.

·         Take breaks if you need them so you don’t waste time looking at material but not absorbing it.

·         Get to know students whom you respect and can study with or contact to ask questions.

·         Keep up with the workload and seek help when you need it.
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7 habits of highly successful students

Habit 5

5. Seek first to understand, and then to be understood because most people don’t listen very well. One of the great frustrations in life is than many don’t feel understood. This habit will ensure your teen learns the most important communication skill there is: active listening.

Why is this habit the key to communication? It’s because the deepest need of the human heart isto be understood. Everyone wants to be respected and valued for who they are – a unique, one-of-a-kind, never to be cloned individual. People won’t expose their soft middles unless they feel genuine liove and understanding. Once they feel it, however, they will tell you more than they want to hear. People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.

Listen with your eyes, heart, and ears. 7 percent of communication is contained in the words we use. The rest comes from body language (53 percent) and how we say words, or the tone and feeling reflected in our voice (40 percent).

Most people are eager to talk and would rather talk than listen. We have one mouth and two ears. This means we should listen twice as much as we talk. We actually learn more while listening rather than when we talk. Learn to listen and listen to learn.

Seek first to understand and then to be understood.

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7 habits of highly Successful Teens

Habits 2

Habit 2: Begin with the end in Mind

If teens aren’t clear about where they want to end up in life, about their values, goals, and what they stand for, they will wander, waste time, and be tossed to and fro by the opinions of others. Help your teen create a personal mission or statement which will act as a road map and direct guide to his decision-making prizes

“Keep your eyes on the prize”. Determine your desired prize and don’t quit until you have realized the achievement of your prize. Then set another prize, another goal or desire that you would really like to achieve. Begin with the achieving of your prize in mind. Visualize and then realize. Start by having a target in mind; know where you are going.

One prize or goal you definitely need to establish for yourself is the prize of an honorable graduation from high school- that you will receive your diploma honestly and with integrity—that you earned it with perfect honesty.

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Ten tips for Student Success

St. Johns University

1.    Attend your classes. Remember in the words of Woody Allen

Seventy percent of success in life is showing up.

2.    Know your faculty. Make sure you know who your teachers are, when their office hours are and how to contact them.

3.    Make sure the faculty knows you. Sit in the front of the classroom. Participate in class discussions. Consult with your teachers during office hours.

4.    Use a daily planner. Note the dates of your exams, assignments, terms papers, etc.

5.    Be organized. Prioritize your responsibilities. Manage your time. Remember everyone has the same 168 hours a week, only some use them better than others.

6.    Know your campus resources. Visit your academic dean office regularly. Become familiar with the service programs offered by the Counseling Center, The freshmen center, the career center, the campus ministry office and the student life office.

7.    Take care of your health. Get enough sleep. Eat well balanced meals. Exercise regularly, Make informed and mature decisions about alcohol, sex and drugs. Visit the health office as needed.

8.    Work only as necessary. Try not to exceed 20 hours during the school week. If possible, work on campus. Apply for financial aid and loans if you need them. Manage your expenses very carefully.

9.    Get involved in campus activities.  It will help you learn valuable skills, expand your social network and enhance your self-confidence. Seek out opportunities to apply what you have learned in the classroom.

10.                       Keep your eyes on the prize. Clarify your goals. Knowing why you are in (high school or) college in the first place. Visualize your success on a daily basis.

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Profile of a Successful Student

Part 2

Work Together. There are a number of ways that you can ensure you get the most out of your educational experience. First, participate fully. Engage regularly in the discussions and be willing to share your personal experiences. You can get to know your classmates through the dialogue that is created in a course environment – sometimes even better than in face to face class. And the same goes for your instructor. Be sure to contact your professor – especially if you are having problems. He/she is still your instructor and will be there to guide and assist you as needed

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Profile of a Successful Student

Part 1

A successful student…

… Takes responsibility for his/her own learning

Online learning can be a powerful stimulating, engaging experience for the student who can work and think independently. However, since most--- if not all --- if all of the learning takes place in your own time, you will not have the kind of direct supervision you would in a classroom. Online learning therefore requires a significant commitment from you. All education comes down to what you’re willing to invest in the experience—this is practically true in the online environment. Commitment, self-discipline and self-motivation are all key qualities to ensuring success in an online course! … Is comfortable and confident with written communication reading and writing are the basis if most online courses, so its critical that you feel comfortable with this form of communication. While some courses contain modules that include videos or other activities, all of them require significant amounts of reading. And nearly all of you communication with your classmates and your instructor will be in writing. if these are week areas for you, you will want to address those issues prior to enrolling or while enrolled in an online course. The PSU writing center is available to assist you.

… is willing to be a member of an online  community

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Successful student

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9 . … Don’t cram for exams. Successful students know that divided periods of study are more effective than cram sessions, and they practice it.

If there is one thing that study skill specialists agree on, it is that distributed study is better than massed, late night, last-ditched efforts known as cramming. You’ll learn more, remember more, and earn a higher grade by studying in four, one-hour a –night sessions for Friday’s exam than studying for hour hours straight on Thursday night. Short, concentrated preparatory efforts are more rewarding and efficient than wasteful, inattentive, last moment marathons. Yet, so many students fail to learn this lesson and end up repeating it over and over again until it becomes a wasteful habit. Not too clever, huh?

When you cram, you are taking the shortcut, and shortcuts never produce any real worthwhile results, Also, when you take shortcuts, you feel rather rotten knowing that you could have done better but didn't  Shortcuts cut you short. You can’t plant watermelon seeds and harvest fresh watermelons the next day. It takes time. Cramming for a test or project and expecting to make a high score the next day is like planting watermelons seeds and expecting to harvest and eat fresh watermelons the next day. Plus cramming for a test or project does not help you academically, so why even do it. Plan ahead, prepare ahead. Give yourself plenty of days and weeks to prepare for the upcoming accountability opportunities

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Successful students

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7. … Understand that actions affect learning. Successful students know that their personal behavior affect their feelings and emotions which in turn can affect learning.

If you act in a certain way that normally produces particular feelings, you will begin to experience those feelings. Act like you are bored, and you will become bored. Act like you are disinterested, and you will become disinterested. So the next time you have trouble concentrating in a classroom, ”Act” like an interested person : lean forward, place your feet flat on the floor, maintain eye contact with the professor, nod occasionally, take notes, and ask questions. Not only will you benefit directly from your actions, your classmates and professors may also get more enthusiastic and excited.

8. … Talk about what they are learning. Successful students get to know something well enough that they can put it into words. Talking about something, with friends or classmates, is not only good for checking whether or not you know something, It is a proven learning tool. Transferring ideas into words provides the most direct path for moving knowledge from short term to long term memory. You really do not know material until you can put it into words. So, next time you study, don’t do it silently. Talk about notes, problems, readings, etc. with friends, recite to a chair, organize an oral study group, pretend you are talking to your peers. “Talk Learning” produces a whole host of memory traces that result in more learning.

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Successful students

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5. Don’t sit in the back of the room. Successful students Minimize classroom distraction that interferes with learning.      

  Students want the best seat available for their entertainment dollars, but willingly seek the worst seat for their educational dollars. Students who sit in the back cannot possibly be their professor’s teammate. Why do they expose themselves to the temptations of inactive classroom experiences and distractions of all the people between them and their instructor? Of course, we know they chose the back seat classroom because they seek invisibility or anonymity, both of which are antithetical to efficient and effective learning. If you are trying not to be part of the class, why then, are you wasting your time? Push your hot buttons; is there something else you should be doing with your time?

6. … Take good notes. Successful students take notes that are understandable and organized, and review them often.

Why put something into your notes you don’t understand? Ask the questions now that are necessary to make your notes meaningful at some time later. A short review of your notes while the material is still fresh on your mind helps you learn more. The more you learn the less the less you will have to learn later and the less time it will take because you won’t have to include some deciphering time, also. The whole purpose of taking notes is to use them, and use them often. The more you use them, the more they improve.

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Successful students

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3. … ask questions. Successful students ask questions to provide the quickest route between ignorance and knowledge. In addition to securing knowledge you seek, asking questions has a least two other important benefits. The process helps you pay attention to your professor and it helps your professor pay attention to you. Think about it. If you want something go after it. Get the answer now, or fail a question later. There are no foolish questions, only foolish silence. It is your choice.

4. … Learn that a student and a professor make a team. Most instructors want exactly what you want: they would like for you to learn the material in their respective classes and earn a good grade.

Successful students reflect well on the efforts of any teacher; if you have learned the material, the instructor takes some justifiable pride in teaching. Join forces with your instructor they are not your enemy, you share the same interests, the same goals- in short, your teammates. Get to know your professor. You’re the most valuable players on the same team. Your jobs are to work together for mutual success. Neither wishes to chalk up a losing season. Be a team player!

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Study for multiple exams

Part 1

How I study for multiple exams, deal with multiple projects: Really it is my time management that I explained above. If I see that I have multiple things to do or study for all the same time I spread out my time beforehand. For example, If I have a test Monday and two test Tuesday then I will study for my Monday test Thursday and part of Friday. Start studying for my next test the second half of Friday and part of Saturday, then my second test I will study for on Sunday. Then Sunday night I can review for my Monday test. When the test is over I can begin reviewing for my other tests. I get bogged down if I try to pull an all-nighter. How I have overcome an initial bad grade: If I receive a low grade I probably knew it was coming because I did not prepare properly or I did not use the right study habits for that class. I usually try to get over what I did wrong and sometimes discuss with the teacher what I can do differently on the next exam or what they suggest I do to study for the next exam.

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Academic Success

Part 1

My great academic success: In my principals of marketing class, we had to come up with a new product and sell it. My group ended up with a couple of supposedly bad students according to our teacher since they were the last ones picked. In the end, they helped out more than needed since I was the team leader I assigned them certain pieces of the project that became solely their responsibility. Delegating work always helps since it allows a group member individual work without separating the group.

English, Math, Foreign language tips: Math basically just takes practice. I always tell students to take a blank piece of paper and write everything you know about what you've learned or what you are studying in class. If you don’t remember everything or start drawing blanks, then you need to study more and review your notes. Note cards work really well for foreign language. Here are my final words of wisdom for students who want to get better grades in college: Go to class, make friends with people in class just in case you’re absent, and remember that you should want to learn.

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