Tertiary Study Skills

Tertiary study skills For the newcomers, university can be like a foreign country, with its own language, rules, regulations and expectations. The new students don’t know how to study in tertiary. Study in university and high school have different learning methods. Today will talk about what’s he differences and offers a range of suggestions designed for tertiary student to improve study practices. This essay will talk about four important study skills. (Lectures, Tutorials, Note-talking skills, Time management skills) Firstly, the most important study skill is lectures; many of your lectures will be traditional lectures. The lecturer will talk about without a break for 50 to 60 minutes, and will provide little in the way of lecture handout. (Burdess, 2007,p10) Now, this essay will talk about how to preparing for lectures. Listening to the lecture, like any other form of learning, involves reconstruction and interpretation from the learner for meaning to be absorbed. Concentrate on what the lecture is saying, but also make connections with the previous lecture, with material you have read, and discussion you have had with others. Many lectures are not intended to be question-and answer sessions but you should keep asking questions silently with a view to following up possible answers yourself or with others. Try to arrive before the lecture beings speaking so as to gather your thoughts and be there to hear the overall at the beginning. The second important study skill is tutorial. At its best a tutorial can provide an important learning experience, rich in critical comment and diversity of views. For a tutorial to work effectively each student needs to take some responsibility. And how to preparing for a tutorial? Usually, the main of the tutorial is to help you develop a better understanding of each week’s lecture. Consequently, it’s important to attend the lecture, and do the associated reading, particularly from the textbook. Firstly, you need to get a general ideal of what’s in the chapter. Having got an overview of the chapter, you then need to read each section in detail, highlighting the most important points. At the end of each section, note down the main points. Try to do these notes form memory rather than copying from the textbook. Then check your notes against the textbook to make sure that you haven’s missed anything important. (Burdess, 2007,p16) At high school, you may well have used only class notes and your textbook when you writing essays. At university, however, lectures expect you to read much more widely. How to take notes? The type of note talking will vary from lecture to lecture, topic to topic and student to student. On the whole, it is better to take too few notes rather than too much. If you take no notes you way lose concentration. if you try to record too much detail you will not be able to keep up. Make sure you have collected any handouts. If the lecturer is using overhead transparencies, try and establish either form the lecturer or from your own judgment how much it is absolutely necessary to take down. It is easy to lose the thread of the lecture whilst busily copying the contents of the transparencies. In any case, the transparencies may be available in the library for student use afterwards. If not, ask that they be made available. When you to make notes would be guided by the lecturer’s approach. Listen for key words and ideas. Build a logical framework of headings and sub-headings. Indent from the margin; find ways of highlighting important points, capital letters, and underlining, using a highlighter pen. Leave plenty of space for a missed point or later additions of your own. Distinguish main points from examples. Follow up points with fellow students, teachers and textbooks. Take down details of any reference texts, which are mentioned. At the end, edit for clarity and logic and if you can, glance over the lecture notes again to ensure you understand a particular point. Finally, the time management skills are also the important study skill in tertiary study. As a student, time management can help you to avoid the nasty surprise of discovering that an assignment you thought was weeks off is in fact due next week, to manage your overall workload, to achieve higher grades if these are important to you, to take a reality check on just how much time you can spend on each stage of assignment and to balance your study and your personal life. Also, as a university student, you have to manage your life to make sure that you balance your non-academic activities with your academic work. To help you maintain a balance between your academic and non-academic activities you need to plan your time. (Burdess, 2007,p6) Before you can decide on priorities or when you are going to tackle various tasks, you need to have a clear ideal of what needs to be done. You need an overview of what work is due in a semester, even if you are averse to planning. It is more effective if you make this plan on single sheet that you can carry with you rather than simply entering items in a week-by-week diary and having only a hazy idea of what is due when. Keep your plan somewhere visible-in the folder you always carry, next to the bathroom mirror, above your desk-and look at it each week. In conclusion, there are many differences between high school study and tertiary study. Before your class you need preparing for lectures and tutorials. And during your class you need take class notes. After class you need review the tutorial and also need to manage you time, to balance your study and personal time.

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References Burdess, N2007, Good study, Person Education, Sydney.

References: Burdess, N2007, Good study, Person Education, Sydney.