mathematcs

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(Messy) desk situation: trying to stay hot and cozy while studying for finals

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Day 2 (9/30): What are you excited about?

(Pictured are my molecular biology textbook notes for the week)

I’m excited about my bioengineering physio class.  It’s an upper division course that has both undergraduate and graduate students.  Not only is the TA my former BE mentor, but the class is also about 30 people, which is significantly smaller than any other class I have taken before.  It’s more refreshing to know that the professor might actually know my name by the end of this.

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room interior

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ig: studylustre

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How I Format and Use Flashcards

1.  Less is More: no need for a paragraph to define a term, choose the simplest and most efficient one. Also, don’t include common sense things or things you know by heart, you’ll waste time and space by writing them down.

2. Sketch it Out: Sketches can be helpful in allowing you to visualize the term/concept. 

3. Say it Out Loud: When reviewing through the cards, try and say the definition out loud. It will require you to think about it more, and it also helps with memorization. If I try and define a term in my head I usually speed through it and leave something out. 

4. Write them as you go: Don’t sit down right before finals and try and write down every term/definition from the course. It takes forever and you will kill your hand. As you finish a chapter in the course finish that set of flashcards. You will thank yourself later. 

5. Repetition: I go through my flashcards before a test maybe a thousand times (exaggeration but very close). Remember to focus on the harder ones, you’ll most likely remember the easier ones during the test. 

Here is my method:

Round 1: Go through every single card. Don’t set any aside. I usually don’t know a majority of the terms at this point, I most likely just finished writing them down.

Round 2: Go through every card again, this time setting aside ones I didn’t know or had trouble with.

Round 3: Go through the harder ones I missed.

Round 4: Add the harder ones back in with the original and shuffle.

Round 5: Go through them all and repeat the process until pleased!

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01.21.16 Microeconomics study session at the library 📚

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//19.5.17//

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hello and welcome to my first studyblr post!! i’ve seen a ton of these around, but not many have all the tips i’ve learned throughout high school. i go to a private preparatory school and i’m top 5 in my class and i lead many extracurriculars. last year was the CRAZIEST year of my life, but with a certain mindset & only a few all nighters, i managed all A’s in all advanced courses. So, here are the tips i’ve learned!!

write stuff down!!!! i know it is the most obvious thing, but writing down anything you need to remember, whether that be homework, tests, quizzes, events, due dates, reminders…anything! checking off these things at night is so satisfying and you won’t forget anything important. when i’m in the #zone, my mind often thinks of stupid questions/thoughts. I’ll jot these questions/misc. thoughts unrelated to what i’m focusing on to come back to later and explore!! (for example, i was doing an frq for econ and i thought of doing this post, so i wrote it down in my journal.)

organization. there are so many masterposts out there to help you with organization. my method included binders & comp. notebooks.. that’s about it! i’m not very organized

get to know teachers. this is probably what helped a lot my junior year. not only is maintaining good relationships with teachers good for you, it can be beneficial to your grade as well. when you make friends with teachers you always have someone to talk/rant to & they always give you the inside gossip about teachers/other students. have coffee/lunch w them, or talk about theories from the class they teach. they give you a lot of perspectives on the course and cool ideas!

manage your time. again, another broad statement. but what i did every night kept me sane. my schedule every day after classes (including saturday) was: 

practice until 5 

extracurriculars until dinner (6:30-7) 

minimal homework until done (usually 1-2 hours)

study for 1+ hours if needed (8-9 pm)

enjoyment time (at least 30 min)

while this may not be a lot for most people, it was a lot for me and i needed time to make myself happy. school and friends make me happy, but so does alone time. putting this minimum of 30 min a day (if i don’t fall asleep before that) really helped me get through demanding courses because i had an incentive. this schedule also helped me avoid procrastination!! ALSO, I prioritized like hell. Honestly, if homework was a completion grade, I wouldn’t try at all unless i needed the practice. Same goes with classes. the ones i had high A’s in, i would sometimes sacrifice a homework grade in order to get enough sleep or study for another test. while this is not the most ethical way of doing it, it helped.

Avoid procrastination. procrastination is your worst enemy. I used to be so bad, but now i’m getting better. this is key. in order to beat procrastination, you have to have self discipline. simple as that. get inspired. for many of you, it’s your studyblr community, for me it was for personal pride and competition. you must execute to get the job done. it will be worth it in the end.

do the little things. put away the phone. put music on if it helps. stretch a little. get some water. get as content and comfortable as you can when you study.

SLEEP!!!! that’s all i can say. sleep sleep sleep. it’s important. i know life is busy, but make time for sleep if you can. mental illness is a bitch, and sometimes it can make falling asleep hard. i know. just try your best & that’s enough. anytime i had free time during the day, i slept. nothing is more important than sleep, and if i didn’t get at least 8 hours of sleep the night before, i tried to catch up as best as i could. your brain needs a break to refuel and you will feel refreshed the next day. 

Eating healthy. i rarely see this tip around (maybe i’m not searching hard enough) but i think it’s important. eating healthy is excellent for your brain function & body function. it’s hard, especially in college, to have to motivation (or money) to make your own dinner, lunch & breakfast everyday. but. it’s. worth. it. i can’t stress this enough. i feel more awake and energized at school and workouts and your body has to have these nutrients to keep functioning well. 

Exercise. gross i know, please don’t hurt me, but exercise goes right with eating healthy. the better you feel about yourself, the better you will do in school. simple enough. you will have more motivation, energy, and happiness with a good diet and exercise. running daily and occasionally swimming gets me though the week, and while sometimes i don’t want to workout, i always feel good in the end. find something you like doing and stick to it. try to work out 3 times a week. after every workout, i am always motivated to study

UNDERSTAND THE MATERIAL. it’s so obvious, but so many people just memorize. while you have to memorize any new thing you learn in the beginning, there is a time when you must apply what you memorized. you must actually think about why this term/concept is what it is based on memorized facts. you must see the whole picture and how little things relate and why they do. last year i realized this and it worked wonders. for me, if i understood the big picture, i knew the facts by heart. it dawned on me that you must train the mind to think. when going through notes, quizzes, tests, and studying i always asked myself why is this important and what it relates to. retention. is. key. understanding, and not memorizing facts will help so so much!!

STUDY BUDDIES. i can’t stress enough how much this helped me. coming from a boarding school, it’s easy to work on homework with friends all the time. to review for a test, my friends in the class would all meet and discuss the material. i’m an auditory learner, so this worked 10x better. what i’ve learned is that if you can teach it, you know it. when i could explain concepts to my friends, i knew i didn’t have to study that. if questions came up when i was trying to discuss my line of thinking, i revisited my notes and tried to understand why i didn’t get it. if we had study guides, we would all do the question and discuss why we got our answers after. for me, discussion is the best way to get new perspectives and ideas as well as understanding the topic better. (i also love talking so).

ask questions. even if its stupid. even if you’re just curious. always ask them. 

study environment. outside (if it wasn’t terrible weather) is where i love to study with friends. if it is snowing or raining, i go to the library or a local coffee shop. it really just depends on my mood. find an area where you feel the most productive!

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8.14.17// this week’s bujo spread, continuing my b&w theme

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new resolution: post to motivate myself ( + hopefully others) and not give a shit about how many notes i get // the note taking style is inspired by @tbhstudying! and the lettering style is inspired by @peachystudy, as well as seo :)

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college note taking 101: how i take notes and use them to study for exams

in lecture:

i like to take quick/shorthand notes because i think learning to discriminate between what is and isn’t important material is a good skill to have so i’m not drowning in useless information when it’s time to study for a midterm or final.

i like to bring my ipad and use the notability app. it’s easier for me to just carry an ipad mini and stylus than it is for me to lug around a heavy notebook/binder and several pens/pencils.

if the professor makes lecture slides available to students online (via a class website), i like to download them onto notability and annotate them as the professor goes along. that way, i can focus more on what the professor is saying and less on merely writing everything down.

if lecture slides aren’t available, i type out my notes as i find it faster than handwriting them.

at home:

once i’m home, i take out my ipad and copy down my lecture notes into a specified notebook for that class, explain everything more thoroughly, make them neater, and organize them in a way that makes more sense to me (as opposed to copying them down exactly as how they were presented in lecture).

i like to use lots of colors, highlighters, and etc. and make them as pretty as possible so i actually want to use them to study from in the future.

integrating reading notes:

normally, what professors will do is assign reading from a textbook and base their lectures around the reading (or have the reading be based on the lectures). usually exams/tests will rely mostly on what was said in lecture instead of in the reading and this is partly because they overlap so much. what the professor says in lecture, you should consider the “important points” in your reading. sometimes, though, there are things in the reading that seem important and weren’t mentioned in lecture.

what i’ll do if this is the case is take post-its, write the piece of information down, and stick the post-it in my notebook in the corresponding section (i.e. where it fits best with my notes)

i like this method as opposed to taking notes directly in my textbook or having a separate notebook for only reading notes because 1) i’ve consistently found that reading material is not as heavily focused on in tests as lecture material and 2) i like to have all of my information in one place

using my notes to study:

when an exam is coming up, what i like to do is take all of the information in my notebook and condense it into a study guide that i can use to study from.

the format of my study guide varies depending on the class and which type of study guide and method of studying i think will help me best. my study guides range from flash cards to mind maps to sheets of paper with a bunch of condensed information.

if i come across a concept on my study guide that i can’t completely explain to myself/don’t fully understand, that’s when i’ll look back in my notebook for a better and fuller explanation of it.

i also like to give myself some time before an exam to completely read through my notebook and look at all the notes i’ve taken (not just what i have on my study guide) because i think it’s a good refresher of all of the lecture and reading material and all of the information will be brought forward in my mind.

[* a few of you have asked me for a advice on note taking: how i take notes, methods i use, how i study from them, and etc. i hope this post was helpful to you! feel free to message me if you have any other questions. happy studying! ^_^]

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My fav athmospheres for study

There’s this website http://www.ambient-mixer.com/ that’s so good for study athmospheres, but also for RPC or writing ones. Honestly, they have such variety of all kinds of ambient sounds, it’s great (RPG, relaxing, fandom, gaming…) I’m listing my fav athmospheres for study and classwork as a reference for me and for people who might want to try them out (note: I have a predilection for relaxing, urban, and summery).

(Rec: some of these include music tracks, it’s recommendable to mute them if you’re also sitening to your own music)

Elizabeth’s Paris - yes it’s from Bioshock infinite, but honestly you could just take it as a 20s Parisian cafe. It’s my all time favorite. 

Study like a Slytherin - the only slytherin common room athmosphere that’s calm but doesn’t feel like you’re in a submarine

In Rivendell - I usually lower the sound of the waterfall bc I feel like it’s too loud but one of my all time favorites too, I don’t even like lotr

A Library, 1732 - y’all know me and how I love to feel rococo in everything I do

Calm Sunday in New York - I tend to lower the sound of writing on paper. Yes, another one with La Vie En Rose, sue me

Cafe Terrace at night - I tend to lower the sound of miner’s pub and turn the piano a bit louder for a bit more of a surreal feel

Venice Cafe - again, I tend to lower the volume of the pub voices

Suburban Summer day - so calm but I recommend lowering the sound of grasshoppers because it’s too high

Home for the holidays - because I lvoe feeling like I’m inside a Hallmark film

Anime Afternoon - super relaxing if a bit unsettling? idk how to explain 

A London Flat - another favorite

London Streets - I tend to lower everything so that it sounds like it’s coming from outside a window

Urban rainy day in traffic - yes, I love cities you all know

Fairy wedding in the woods - incredibly beautiful and calm and surreal

Hufflepuff common room - Another good one for study, I tend to lower the cat purring bc it sounds too loud

A book by the sea - what it says in the tin

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The weather today is amaaaazing so I’ve been studying outside the whole time! 
A friend of mine said: ‘If I don’t get a ten, at least I’ll have a tan.’ I’m aiming for both but I fear I’ll only get the last one ;-) 
I hope everyone has an amazing day! ☀️

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august 21, 2017 - stationery haul

i recently picked up some new stationery from daiso and the art supply store near my school for the new school year! here’s what i got + swatches:

daiso:

oh! pineapple washi tape (set of 2)

lovely flamingo washi tape (set of 2)

word cards (set of 4)

dual line highlighters (set of 4)

zebra disposable brush pen (black ink)

art supply store:

pentel energel (0.5mm, black ink)

sakura pigma micron 02 (0.3mm, black ink)

pilot g-tec-c4 (0.4mm, black ink)

sakura glaze gel pen (white ink)

tombow dual brush pen - light ochre (991)

tombow dual brush pen - sand (992)

currently listening to: “hi hello” - day6

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study less study smart

I decided to share my notes taken from this amazing 1 hour Youtube lecture by Marty Lobdell. i really liked him and his tips, i think they are super effective and cover a lot of situations! i highly recommend it!!!!! wow

but here are the tips and examples Marty mentions, so if you don’t have the time to go through the full hour, you can just scroll down. hope this helps somebody!

Break your study time in chunks with breaks

most students lose focus at 25 minutes

it’s a mistake to keep going once you do, since you won’t actually learn anything and you’ll hate every minute of it

so when you start losing focus take a 5 minute break

do something nice like talking to someone or listening to music

it’s something you practice so with time you’ll be able to work for more time without losing focus

in the end of the study session have a big reward you look forward to

Create a study area

environment highly affects the way you act. Bedrooms are for sleeping, kitchens for eating: you’ll feel sleepy in your bedroom and hungry in the kitchen. So if you have a study area, it’ll be easier to start studying and staying focused.

study in a specific room like an office or school library if you can

if you have to study in your bedroom use a specific object you only use for studying: a lamp/desk. Make it a no-distraction, away from your bed, blank walls area.

 The more active the learning, the better

80% active learning 20% passive

ask yourself: is it a concept or a fact?

learning a concept: understand/grasp/know it

put it into your own words

really think about the meaning of it

relate it with something you already know

teach somebody else. Recapitulate what you’ve learned. Talk out loud even if you don’t have anyone to teach - talk alone. Or at anyone that listens.

learning a fact: memorize it

use mnemonics

Acronyms (e.g. colours of the rainbow RoyGBiv – red orange yellow green blue indigo violet)

 Coined sayings - anything popular or sayings you’ve heard since you were a child.

Interacting images – work even better if they’re weird. Creative associations make you never forget specific details. (e.g. 1 gram of fat has 9 calories: picture a fat cat – each cat has 9 lives)

any time 2 things are highly similar but not the same you will get maximal interference!! USE mnemonics!! (e.g. afferent vs efferent neurons: SAME - Sensory Afferent Motor Efferent)

Be a part of  study groups

others can help you in ways you never thought before

Recognizing VS remembering

never confuse the two

while reviewing a chapter you may recognize concepts but not actually know them

and when you get to the test you won’t be able to remember any of it

so quiz yourself without looking at it

or stop in a page of your notes/textbook and ask yourself what is the concept immediately after and before it

Get your REM Sleep 

get ~8 hours so you don’t undo your studying

this is how your brain stores permanent memories

without it you’re ability to remember seriously decreases

most people don’t even begin to take the advice but it’s simple: sleep better. Do better.

There’s 162 hours in a week. There is time.

reflect on what you are doing with your time and what activities you have to prioritize to succed as a student

Taking notes is vital.

right after the class take 5 minutes to expand everything you’ve jotted down, give it depth.

NOT hours later. You won’t remember half the things you wrote down.

Ask your questions to class mates and teachers.

teachers want you to succeed and it’s more than ok to ask your question in the teacher’s office or in the next class

How to use a textbook: SQ3R technique

Survey Question Read Recite Review

Survey: skim through the entire chapter in a couple of minutes.

Raise questions: e.g. what is osmosis? What is this graphic about? What is a prototype?

it causes you to look for answers and you’ll find the information better once you actually study it after. If you intend to find something you learn it better.

Start studying for tests early.

don’t undo yourself. You should only be reviewing the days before the test. don’t leave it till the last minute!

(don’t just scroll through this!!!! really think about these methods and how you can actually implement them so you can benefit from them!!! these actually work but only if you put them into practice boo good luck!)

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august 24, 2017 - that moment when even the cafe of the hospital is more aesthetic than you

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my chemistry SOL review sheet *:･ﾟ✧

(p.s. if you see any errors, please don’t bother telling me. i probably left it like that cause i don’t want to see any erasures and stuff lmao plus i’m all done with sol’s. gladly.)