More Talking

This semester has been brutal! Interestingly enough, the classes I am least excited about always turn out to be really good and the opposite holds true for the ones I am looking forward to. This semester those classes were Philosophy as Conversion and Behavioral Neuroscience. I was dragging my feet about the philosophy class thinking it would suck. However, it turned out to be a great class. Most of the assignments were interesting and the material got me thinking. Conversely, I expected Behavioral Neuroscience to be interesting, but it was the worst class I have had while in college. It was an online course that turned out to be an exercise in memorizing a 600 page book and speed testing instead of actually learning something! There was literally no supplemental materials provided. The only grades came from 16 quizzes and 4 exams which were timed to give exactly 1 minute per question and using notes or the book was prohibited. The exams covered 3 chapters (120-140 pages each) and there was no way to narrow the scope of material. Also, there was zero feedback. If you missed questions on a quiz or exam, you never knew which one. How are we supposed to learn if we don't know what we missed?

After struggling through the first few quizzes and Exam #1, I message the professor for help and received a rude unhelpful response. So, to boost my study skills, I decided to go to Dr. Dula's "How to Study" seminar. Again, I found it interesting and helpful. Even though I am a good student who thought I was an effective studier. However, this seminar made a lot of practical sense and has helped me become a better student. I found the test strategies extremely helpful. The most important tips I came away with are:

1. Don't highlight in the book, but rather write out the important info on another sheet of paper to help consolidation to memory.
2. Prime your brain of important info about reading it before bed and again right before the test.
3. Study by paragraph instead of by chapter.

I'm glad I went as this seminar helped me improve my confidence and pull an A in a really difficult class.