LINK

Decision

Last week I was responsible for a good amount of vocabulary for my REL 101 class and my EDU 200 class. In my religion class we had just started a new unit on Islam and were presented with a good deal of new material. A large portion of this material was vocab. As for my EDU class we had a midterm on Wednesday. Both my EDU and REL classes have a good amount of vocabulary words, and both of them have vocabulary quizzes. Vocab is something that I usually do well in; however, there are always those four or five words out of the fifty or so for each class that I always have trouble with, usually because they sound similar or mean similar things. To remedy this problem I used the LINK strategy.

Prep and Application

There wasn’t that much prep needed for the link strategy. For my religion class I simply took my notes from that day looked for the words that seemed the most difficult and used the strategy. For example, I took the word Kitab, which means scripture, and saw that kitab sort of sounds like kibab; then I drew a picture of a skewer impaling a bunch of scripture pages.

My EDU class was a different story. Since I had a midterm that I had already been preparing for, I had a stack of flash cards already. After studying profusely from the flash cards, I realized that there were a stack of at least 5 or 6 words that I was not grasping as much as the other ones. For these words I used the link strategy. I drafted new cards for each word, and before writing the definition on the card I created an image for the term. This helped a lot because instead of drawing a blank or getting flustered with words I didn’t know I could simply picture the image I had created and work out the definition from there.

Evaluation

I am a visual learner so images like this help me a lot. It actually helps me learn the material rather than just memorizing a definition. The actions taken to use the LINK strategy are fairly minimal and can fit in any twenty-minute test prep or after class organization. The materials are even more minimal. All I used for this was my class notes and my flash cards. I evaluate this strategy very highly and recommend it for anyone who is a visual learner or has trouble learning key terms.

CHUNK CHUNK CHUNK

Hello fellow scholastic athletes and welcome back to the greatest study strategy there is. This week I will be talking about a strategy that is the most important and useful for me! And this strategy is called CHUNKING THE TASK. It is one of the simplest strategies that I use but I think it is ridiculously effective. All you have to do is break up your assignment, whether it is a reading assignment, studying for a test, or writing a paper, and schedual when you are going to complete each section (CHUNK) that you have created. CHUNKING THE TASK is a strategy that works exceptionally well for me.

This week I used this strategy in my Writing 105 class and in my Anthropology 111 class. I chose to use this strategy in my Writing class because I have my Unit 2 paper due soon and I knew that I didn't want to wait to the last minute and I also wanted to spread out the work so I wouldn't get stressed out. I used this strategy in my Anthropology class because I had some reading assignments to catch up on and breaking up the reading made it so that I would not lose interest. So far I have kept up with my schedule and I think the main reason why is because of my adaptations that I made so that this strategy is more efficient and I will explain them in terms of LAME.

I chose to write my schedule on my computer desktop using the application STICKIES because I knew that that would be a place that I would see it constantly. And because I am a Visual Learner, the bright colors stood out to me and help me to not forget about my daily assignments. I set up my schedule in advance by seeing what topics should divide up or by page number of my essay. My ANT teacher evaluates my knowledge of the readings on the Unit Test and my WRT teacher evaluates my essay by how I follow the essay instructions.

20 Minute Test Prep & Ranking Priorities !!

This week we had a choice of any strategy that we have learned over the course of the semester, so I chose my two favorites, 20 Minute Test Prep & Ranking Priorities ! I use both of these strategies all the time, the 20 minute test prep is essential to do after every single class, it makes studying for exams so much easier. Ranking priorities is also essential for me because I have terrible task management and I adapted it to help me even more which I will further explain.

I use the 20 minute test prep in all of my classes. I make it a priority to complete the 20 minute test prep before I go to sleep the day of my class because sometimes I do not have time to do it immediately after I get out of class. It is essential to do it DAILY. For my documentation I took a picture of my 20 minute test prep after my IST195 class a few days ago. We have an exam in 8 days so this is going to be very helpful very soon. I keep all of my 20 minute test preps in organizer that has sections for each of my classes. I do not know what I would do without this strategy! It helps me be so much more prepared for my exams !

Every weekend I make a ranking priorities paper and place it on my bulletin board above my desk. I adapted this strategy because just having rankings did not help me much, I needed to schedule a set day and time to get each assignment done. I believe that this adaption will help everyone out and make the ranking priorities strategy more likely to be used by other students.

LAME

I have taken different learners type tests and have came up as a kinesthetic and a visual learner, which is why the 20 minute test prep helps me. Because I am actually writing and answering the questions it helps me remember them, my kinesthetic side. There is very minimal action needed for these strategies, you just need to rank your priorities and spend 20 minutes extra per class making and answering questions. The only materials you need for the 20 minute test prep is a paper, pencil, and you notes or text book. For the ranking priorities strategy you only need your planner which should already have your assignments listed in it. My evaluation of these strategies is that they are the best for me, I use them as much as I need and they help me a great deal. I would recommend them to anyone who needs help with time management or preparing for an exam.

Charlie Reade Smart

Decision

Recently in my religion 101 class we moved onto a new unit, Islam. For this unit we were assigned to read the novel Palace Walk by Naguib Mahfouz. It is a 500 page novel taking place in Egpyt during its British occupation; it follows the lives of a typical Egyptian family of the period and the Islamic culture of the time. This was all swell until my TA told me that I would have to read up to page 195 for the next week, so the lecture on readings in CLS could not have come at a better time. I chose to use the Charlie Reade Smart strategy because this type of reading is much more comprehensive, and I felt more comfortable with this big of a reading assignment to split it up into chunks.

Prep and Application

To start off I had to split the readings into sections for myself that worked with my attention span and schedule, but before I could even create my schedule I had to find out what all of my readings for all of my classes were for at least the next week. Once I had taken note of my various readings it was time to create my schedule. I made a list of all the days in the week and split my reading list into chunks for each day. Now when I use my planner I just write ‘do readings’, so I can just look at my schedule and see what I need to do rather than write out each reading individually.

The next part was actually reading. In my religion 101 class we have been discussing Islam, particularly Islam in Egypt, so I decided to create a reading guide to keep track of and help me find examples of the main themes we talk about in class and the themes of the book.

I’m still in the exposition of this book so I still have to learn an excess of characters and key locations. To keep track of the main and minor characters I decided to create a family tree. The Family Tree has all the main characters and their important traits, as well as a few minor characters attached to the side. Since there is so much reading I thought this would help me so I never had to keep looking back to remind myself who a character was and not waste time.

Evaluation

I think that this reading strategy was extremely effective for me. I thought that the organization would be the most helpful part; however, the most effective strategy I used was the graphic organizer since I am a more visual learner. The action it took was very minimum to set up the Charlie Reade Smart strategy for my large reading assignment, maybe twenty minutes at the most. In the end I only used three basic materials: My reading schedule, my reading guide, and my character sheet. My evaluation of this overall is very positive. I think I will continue to use this method, yet I might add jeopardy questions from the lecture to answer while I read. 

TART Reading Strategy !

Hey everyone! I am back for another week and with another amazing strategy to help you out on your readings! Every single week for my IST 195 class we have to read a chapter in Discovering Computers. Our lectures are not based only on the book, nor are our exams, however we have to take an online quiz every single week solely based on the chapter we read for that week. This has been starting to gethard for me as the chapters have gotten more complex, which is why this lesson could not have come at a better time. In the beginning of each chapter there is a glossary of definitions and at the end there is a practice test. These both helped me use these strategies to the best of my ability. The strategy I used for this class was TART. Each letter in TART stands for a different word, Terms Attend Read Test. Before class, I read the key terms for the chapter and made abbreviations for them accordingly. The next day, I attended lecture and listened for the key technical terms. After class, I read the entire chapter to make more sense of it. After I finished reading I created test questions that I thought my professor would use on the test, using my notes and the chapter. Lastly, I answered these questions and now I have them to help me prepare for my exam. I also used this same technique for my WRT105 course and took the same steps. This strategy helped me with both of these classes, I did not need to make any adaptations because TART was perfect for both of these courses.

LAME explanation

I am a visual learner so this strategy helped me a lot. It made me write down the key terms and abbreviate them so they were right there in front of me during the lectures. It also helped me because I always create test questions to study from and doing this helped me read and create test questions at the same time. All I needed for both of these courses was my laptop and the required books. This strategy worked out amazing for me in WRT105 and IST195 and I would recommend it to anyone in either of those classes or any other class that has readings. If you have any questions post a comment! Talk to you all next week!

sweetTART

Whats up readers, I'm back this week with another post about a learning strategy that I tried out this past week. This week was all about reading! And the Strategy that I tried out this week is called TART. TART is a strategy that helps you comprehend the reading and also helps you prepare for the test you may have on the reading. You are probably asking yourself, "what does TART stand for?" Well that is a great Question. TART stands for:

T: TERMS A: ATTEND R: READ T: TEST

For the TERMS section, you go through your reading and you look through your reading and you read the bold terms and their definitions. For the ATTEND section, you go to your class and take notes and listen for those words you read earlier. After that, you READ the chapter for the information that you just covered. And lastly you TEST yourself by creating test questions from the reading.

I used this strategy for my AST 101 class and for my ANT 111 class. I chose this strategy for these classes because the two classes are mostly lecture focused and that is what TART is the most helpful for. You use the lecture as a preview for what you are going to read later and that helps you create better test questions to study from.

LAME
I am a visual learner so this strategy was great for me because it is the most effective for Visual and Kinesthetic learners. The order that this strategy goes in is great for me because I first looked in the textbooks to see the key words that I need to know. Then I went to class and I got to see what topics that are important to the professor. After that you read the chapter and you get all of the information and while you are reading you focus more on the topics that were discuses in class because you know that those are the topics that are most likely going to be the most important on the test. And finally you use all of that information to test yourself. My AST 101 class and my ANT 111 class test me on my knowledge of the text as well as what he goes over in class so this strategy works perfect in these classes.

Documentation:

1 Plus 3 Note Taking Strategy !!!!!

I used this strategy in two of my classes, my two classes that are based on lectures. First, I did it with my SOC 101 class. I took a piece of paper and separated it into two different sections on the top 2/3 of the paper, one to organize my key terms/ideas and the other section was for their definitions/explanation. Next, I made a section at the bottom of each page to make my own questions that I believed the professor will ask, which helps me out on my 20-minute test prep because I use those questions. I did this for a few pages of notes in my SOC class and my IST class because they are both based on lectures. You can see one page of notes for each of these classes below. Doing this strategy kept me more focused during class because it gave me something more to do than sit there and take notesand that is the type of learner I am. You did not need many materials to do this strategy, just the lectures. After using this strategy it proved to be very effective. I would recommend this strategy for anyone who needs help focusing, taking notes, or studying.

1 + 3 = Note Taking

Hey everyone, the Group Name Bloggers are back for another week of learning strategies, this past week I used the strategy 1 plus 3 notes. And this week I used it in my AST 101 class and in my MAT 121 class.

The 1+3 Note Taking Method is a process that helps you organize and retain the information from class. What you do is:

DURING CLASS: take notes which ever way you like
AFTER CLASS: on a separate sheet of paper, divide it into 3 sections and label them: Key Concepts, Graphic Organizer, and Test Questions. Then you fill in each of the sections according to that title.

This strategy worked out pretty well for me in my math class but it was awesome for my astronomy class. the graphic organizer helped me understand the information a lot better I am a visual learner.

Here is the 1+3 method in terms of lame:
L- (learner)- I am a visual learner so seeing my notes in a more organized way is much better foe me.
A- (action)- I took my normal outline notes in class then I converted the information to my 1+3 notes.

M- (materials)- I used the notes from my AST 101 lecture and my MAT class.

E- (evaluation)- this strategy is works for me because it forces me to revisit the information from my notes when before, I might not have looked at them until I studied for the exam.

AST


MAT

3 in 1 Notes

Decision

The most important part of almost any class is the lecture. About 90% of all classes primary source of information is the lecture; however, it is not always easy to retain all of the material covered from lectures. This is why people take notes. Note taking is something that everyone does, yet only a handful do effectively. Note taking has an art to it just like anything else. This week I choose to use the 3 in 1 note taking style. I am in the majority of people who take notes but do not really quite take effective notes, so a new approach sounded like a good idea. I used this strategy in my Rel 101 and EDU 200 classes.

Prep and application

The strategy itself mandates that the user split their paper into three separate sections. First splitting the paper horizontally into two thirds/one third sections and then the same thing vertically. The column on the left is used to document key ideas or facts of a certain class. The column on the right is used to organize key terms and their definitions. Lastly, the section on the bottom is used to create possible questions that the teacher might ask in the future similarly to the jeopardy questions strategy. To maximize the effectiveness of this strategy I made three in one note skeletons for next five pages to give myself a comfortable amount to work with without having to worry about possibly running out. This note taking style forces one to pay attention more in class, because it focuses the information being recited into two possible categories: key facts and key terms.

LAME

This strategy was actually very effective. Instead of making a futile effort to record all of the information being passed on by the professor, I could focus on key bits of information rather than trying to decipher the entire lecture. Being a kinesthetic learner, note taking is a very important part of my learning process; however, if I do not create some sort of critical lens to funnel the main source material appropriately. There is very little action required to complete this style of note taking, just a few brief minutes before and after class. If this strategy is combined with the twenty-minute test prep, i.e. making the questions afterwards and creating flash cards with the key terms, it can make any evaluation fairly stress free.

Topic and Source Outline

Decision

Preparing for exams is always difficult. I have always been a person, who when trying to study for a test, looks at the class as a whole trying to pick out what I believe are key facts or ideas from the class but without any real direction. This is why I chose the source and topic outline because it funnels the material into specific organized sections based on the main ideas of the class. I used this strategy with my EDU 200 class as well as my Rel 101 class

Prep and application

First I started off by looking at the syllabus given to me by my teacher. My EDU 200 teacher in specific gives a nice overview of each lecture's topic as well as the readings associated with each class. This made a very easy and direct way to approach the source outline. I looked at the title of the lecture for the day and then listed the sources for the lecture under that. Creating the topic outline was a bit more difficult. Going through the description of each lecture, I picked out key words in conjunction with the patterns in my annotated syllabus to see what the overall topics were. Then I filed the readings from the source outline under each of the topics. I have a midterm for EDU 200 at the end of the month and this will definitely help  in conjunction with the twenty minute test prep.

LAME



I am the type of learner that needs a clear visual map for source materials, and the topic and source outlines help organize the materials from the readings into concise sections. Now all I have to do is take the actions necessary to become fully prepared i.e. studying a head of time. My evaluation of this strategy is very positive. In conjunction with the annotated syllabus I feel this is a very effective tool to pinpoint exam questions and study more effectively

Anticipating Test Questons for MAT 121 and ANT 111

That's right... its time for another week of learning strategies from your favorite blog THE GROUP NAME BLOGGERS! This week is especially important because we are going to be talking about EXAM PREP. The exam prep strategy that I chose to use this week is ANTICIPATING TEST QUESTIONS. I had a Anthropology test last Wednesday and I have a Math exam coming up so I felt that this strategy would be the most beneficial for me and once again I used L.A.M.E. to figure out the best way to use this strategy.

L- (learner)- I am a visual learner so SEEING test questions before I take my tests will help me be more prepared because I will know what type of questions to expect.

A- (action)- I created two practice test that asked questions about the material we have learned, one for my ANT 111 class and one for my MAT 121 class.

M- (materials)- I used the syllabuses of each class, along with the class notes and the information from the textbooks to create my questions.

E- (evaluation)- Many of the test questions that i created on my ANT 111 practice test turned out to be similar or even identical to the ones on the test. My MAT 121 test is not for another week but I feel prepared for the test because of this learning strategy.

When I was creating the test questions for my ANT class I knew that I should get them from either my lecture notes or the textbook because this class is mostly lecture and individual reading focused. And for my MAT class I know that the class is mostly lecture focused but the tests have similar types of questions to the ones in the exercises from the textbook, so I created to types of questions, concept or vocabulary questions and I picked out random questions from textbook.

ANT 111

MAT 121

I found that by anticipating test questions and completing my practice tests I became much more prepared for each of my tests. I have not gotten my test back for my ANT class but I feel like I did well and I will let you know How I did in next week's blog post, once I get my grade. I am sure that I will be using this strategy again and if you want to try it out, comment and let me know how it went.

See you next week!

C.O.P.E.R.

Welcome back to the Group Name Blogger's Blog (sorry about the name... we were a little rushed when we came up with it). Once again we are here to tell you about the learning strategies that we used this week. This week's learning strategies are all about PROBLEM SOLVING and I chose to try out the strategy C.O.P.E.R. in my CLS 105 class and in my ANT 111 class. I used L.A.M.E. to help me chose what strategy to use and for what classes I wanted to use them in.

L- (learner)- I am a visual learner so I needed a strategy that was some thing that I could see and hold in my hand. The C.O.P.E.R. strategy was perfect.

A- (action)- I decided to find a project that I needed to work on and a test that I needed to study for.

M- (materials)- My project was my Faculty Interview Project for my CLS class and my test was for my ANT class.

E- (evaluation)- I was able to complete my project and I will take my test next Wednesday and I am confident that I will do well.

If you are not familiar with the C.O.P.E.R. strategy, this is what it is. It is a chart that is divided up into 5 sections.

Current Condition
Options
Plan
Execute the Plan
Reflect

You then fill out the chart and your problems will be solved in no time.

My favorite thing that I did on my C.O.P.E.R. chart was my "Execute the Plan" section. I made a checklist with things that i needed to do and I also put the days that I would do them. It allowed me to visually see my progress and it made sure I was on track.

Here are my C.O.P.E.R. charts

ANT

CLS

Ranking Priorities

This week I used the ranking priorities strategy to use in my WRT 105 class as well as my CLS 105 class. The ranking priorities strategy works by creating a list of all the work that needs to get done in a certain class, and then placing the letters A, B, or C next to them to signify the importance. A being absolutely essential, B being important, and C being optional. After determining the importance of each assignment, one rearranges the assignments in each letter category according to the priority of each assignment.

My writing 105 class has a lot of weekly assignments that often feel like busy work, so the ranking priorities strategy is actually quite effective for this class. Each week we are given a readings and a assignment based around that. We also had a worksheet due that week, but an essay was also assigned for the near future. To me the most obvious way to prioritize the assignments for this class was by the due date itself. The weekly assignments as well as the worksheet were categorized as absolutely essential simply because they were do in two days. The essay, on the other hand, I listed as important because it was not do for two weeks or so and as much as I would have liked to get a start on it there was no real sense of urgency surrounding it. I combined the Ranking priorities strategy with the ten minute technique with writing 105 because the work is very monotonous. It includes defining vocabulary words and other things that make me want to get up and go do something else, so the ten minute technique proved to be beneficial because it helped me power through the work I needed to do. Combined with the ranking priorities, which helped me visualize my goals, I finished under 40 minutes.

The ranking priorities actually helped less with my CLS class, simply because, the homework I needed to get done was all absolutely essential, so it was hard to really make a list and understand what truly needed to get done because it all needed to get done.

I picked the ranking priorities strategy because it is a great tool for me to use because I always find myself jumping from task to task and accomplishing a lot less in a small period of time rather than just getting all my work done at once. The ranking priorities strategy gave me a clear trajectory for accomplishment

Ranking Priorities

First, I used ranking priorities for CLS105 considering we have a lot of work to do for it for the next week. I adapted the strategy to suit me better. Instead of going by Letter than Number for priorities I just did a list of numbers and an order of when I have to do it. For number 1 I put this blog, because it is due first and I know doing this blog usually helps me out with getting the rest of my work done. Next, I put the reflection for the faculty interview project because it is the most important part that I have left to do. Third, I put going over my syllabus annotations to make sure they were good. Then I put a fourth number for putting my project together. Next, I put a fifth number for printing out grading rubrics for this blog and grading myself. I did another adaptation to this strategy by putting hours and days for me to do certain things. You can see that in the picture I uploaded to this blog.

I also used this strategy for my WRT105 class. We have many readings to do and papers to start and such. I did not use the same adaptations as I used for CLS because they did not seem to be fit for this class. I used the classic ranking priorities where I used letters and numbers. A was for what was necessary to do first, B was for what was semi necessary and C was for what I would do if I had extra time. Under the A section I put that I had to do things such as watch my movie for class. Under B I put readings that I had to read for the next week or so. For C I put the 10 minute test prep and other things that were not essential but would be good for me to do.

This strategy helped me see what I had to get done and combining it with putting hours/days of what I had to do helped me complete everything on time. It helped me a great deal this weekend and I hope it helps all of you as well. Try my adaptations if you think they suit you as well!!!!