building blocks end of semester schedule

Building Blocks

With the school year rapidly coming to a close, Eric and I decided to use the BUILDING BLOCK strategy and apply it to all of our courses to plan out our last two weeks of the semester. While doing this, we plugged in the times we would study for what finals, and what subjects we would pay more attention to as the semester nears its end. We found this strategy to be effective because as of now, we are keeping up with it and it is helping us stay organized and calm as finals approach.

-Nicholas DeVito and Eric Cirangle

Stress Pie Chart

Stress Management

With finals coming up and summer on the horizon, I think it is safe to assume that the stress level of college students is at the highest point its been this semester. Both Eric and I are stressed out about upcoming finals the most. There we decided to each create a pie chart and list our sources of stress to see what things we need to address or what events should be paid the most attention. The pie chart was effective for both of us because it allowed us to visualize what is the cause for our stress in these last couple weeks of school and what we can do to address them. Another strategy we use was listing our Stress relievers. We found this effective because if we were overwhelmed with our stress we could use the list as a way to get away from the stress for a little while.

-Nicholas DeVito and Eric Cirangle

Procrastination

Procrastination is the biggest obstacle for college students. With so many friends and activities consistently surrounding you, it is extremely easy to get distracted and shy away from your work. Schoolwork is very intimidating; especially for young college adults/teenagers who are not fully mature yet. Because of this, some tend to avoid these looming responsibilities of studying and gravitate towards unproductive activities. They use this course of action as a coping mechanism. This helps them clear their mind and minimizing the significance of the work they have to do. This makes the student feel better and more comfortable, but this results in them having to “cram” their work in if they actually plan on turning it in. It is much better to manage your time wisely. There is plenty of time for extracurricular activities in college, but you should always be planning ahead and segregating time for work in order to be a well performing student. Therefore we decided to use the target planner and chunking the task to help us study for upcoming AST 104 exam. We found it effective because it prevented us from putting the studying off till the very last minute.

-Nick and Eric

Motivation

This week I identified what my motivation is, and my sources of motivation. I did this by filling out a couple of surveys that I found while going through the class slides. What I learned from this was that I am highly motivated to do well in school so I can get good grades and that my main source of motivation is my parents. Whenever I am struggling I always seek insight from my parents for what I can do to help myself do better and by doing this it will allow me to accomplish my goal of getting good grades.

-Nicholas DeVito

Set 24 hour goals

This week I tried out the strategy of setting myself twenty four hour goals in order to stay on top of the coursework. I used it in my two history courses that I am taking which is HST 102 and HST 112. Due to the similarities of the work required in each of these courses I group the work i have to do for each of them quite often. This week I made three twenty four hour goal sheets as I only have two lectures and a discussion a week. It helped to get me started as well as motivated to get the work done as then I was able to spend the rest of these days doing whatsoever I preferred.

APP #6

The two strategies that I have used consistently throughout the whole semester are D's Do and Due and the Target Planner. They are both beneficial to me because they help me get my assignments done on time, and if I use these strategies, they will prevent me from falling behind. This week I used the Target Planner do plan out my CFS 388 paper so I can have it done in advance and not leave it off for the last minute. I also used the D's Do and Due for the week to plot what assignments are due this week and when I should get them done.

-Nicholas DeVito

X minute reading

I used this strategy for the multiple readings I am given weekly for my HST 112 class as well as my HST 102 class. I found that the time management incorporated with this strategy helped make the strategy less daunting and also ended up making it quicker as I found that I was not becoming as bored of the short intervals during which I was actually reading. This summary of the reading will help make reviewing it much less time consuming.

Note Taking Strategy

Eric and Nick both used the Plug-It-In technique for our Astronomy104 class. There are a lot of lecture notes that pertain to stars, planets, asteroids, and other terrestrial features. Therefore, every time we learn about a new outer space object, we both found it helpful to draw a picture of it and potentially a diagram to help point out important structural features. For example, we recently learned about Earth’s orbit around the sun, and how the Earth tilts as it rotates. The earth’s tilting rotation is what makes certain parts of the earth bright or dark at certain times. Because of this complex system, Eric drew an intricate illustration under my notes, explaining how the Earth tilts, rotates, and moves including arrows and other directional lines. With our midterm coming up this week, we both found this note taking strategy effective. It allowed us to get a better understanding of some of the concepts that will be covered on this test. Nick also used this strategy for his PHI 107 class that he has an upcoming test in. He found it effective because it helped him gather more information to support his arguments on the task at hand. Lastly, Max used the plug in technique for HST 102. His upcoming midterm is his first test of the semester so he found this strategy effective because it helped break down large amount of information that will be covered on his exam.

The experiment project technique I used was the Q&A map. I take a lot of notes on my computer in class, so it is easy to quickly jot down a potential test question after the teacher stresses an important fact in class. This technique works particularly well in fact-based classes, for example, my AST104 class. The teacher uses a powerpoint lecture every class that always last until the last minute of class. With so much constant note taking, there are always key points from class that eventually wind up being on the test. I found the technique very helpful, and wound up having a lot of quality sample questions. Before the next test, I will print out my notes, highlight my best potential questions, and pay extra focus focus to them and their answers when I'm studying. I fully predict that this tactic will prove useful for this class and in my study technique arsenal in general.

Exam Prep

The two test prep techniques I used this past week were the Q&A MAP and the SOURCE AND TOPIC OUTLINE. Through the Q&A MAP I learned what to type of questions to expect on my next Astronomy exam by looking at my previous test. Through the SOURCE AND TOPIC technique I learned that my major source of info for my PHI 107 class came from lecture notes. Currently I am preparing for exams in each class with these techniques so I chose these strategies hoping they will help me score better on each of them then I did on the previous tests.

-Nicholas DeVito

fritter finder

This past week has been a very hectic one as I had two papers due this week as well as the faculty interview project due Monday and another paper on Tuesday. My strategy that I found to be most useful this past week was the fritter finder along with once again chunking the task. I personally find chunking the task to be extremely useful when it comes to scheduling what parts of the general assignments I would like to have finished by certain points but the fritter finder is much more useful in helping me schedule when I have the time to do said work. This work I was generally very efficient when it came to making acceptable usage of my spare time during the week as well as utilizing my weekends effectively. Conclusively I found fritter finder to be generally extremely useful in the ways of assisting me in the time management portion of my schedule as I do have trouble putting time aside in order to finish my assignments that are due as I never look at my schedule and mark time as to which I will be doing work during.

RANKING TECHNIQUE

This week I applied the Ranking Technique to multiple classes. I found this technique to help me set priorities on work that NEEDED to get done which made up the "A" level. It also allowed me to group work that was also important in the "B" level. Other activites or work that did not need to be done but would be beneficial for me if I did complete it I put in the "C" level. Ultimately I felt this technique was beneficial to me because it helped me  organize my work load and get the most important assignments out of the way first.

                                                                                                                             -Nicholas DeVito

This week was a very stressful one in terms of schoolwork. The weather has still held out, being pretty moderate on campus. Because of this, I have been motivated to handle many tasks around campus and visit the library often. The most time consuming project that I have approached this week has been the CLS interview project. I looked up all of my professor's office hours so I could visit them for interviews. I handled all of my interviews and and took down as much of my professor's answers as I could in order to revert back to the information and integrate it into the three page summary. I learned a lot from these interviews. At first I was annoyed I had to travel all over campus to talk to my teachers. However, after handling the task, I realized the reasoning behind the project. I had not realized how smart my professors actually were until I talked to them one on one. I am an English major so I take ETS115 and WRT205, both are very writing intensive courses. Because of this, my professors are very articulate and wonderful thinkers. From asking them questions such as "what is the most important part of an essay?" and "what are the life advantages of being a good writer?" I learned a lot about a teacher's point of view on the world and their classes. They told me that writing is so important because if you can put your ideas down on paper, you can more easily reiterate them in words during conversation. My teachers explained to me that essays are not supposed to summarize the text or topic that you are studying. They are meant to argue a certain point of view about the subject. It is important to be very opinionated. However, the more opinionated you get, the more facts you need to back up your reasoning. Without backup, an argument holds no weight. My teachers also told me that a good essay starts with the introduction and thesis. If you do not present the beginning of an essay well, you will lose the reader. Therefore, if your body paragraphs are great, they will be less convincing if they are not opened up well in the introduction. After taking down all of this crucial information, I compiled it into the summary, and then worked on marking up the syllabi. Marking the syllabi was also a very useful task because it made me aware of what my teachers expect of me in their classes. I was updated on due dates I had not realized before, and protocol my teachers enforce. This project really opened my eyes to how teachers think and operate. Sometimes it is hard to get a read on teachers just from attending class. Speaking to them personally and developing a personal relationship gave me a new perspective on academic performance.

Week 2 Journal-Eric Cirangle

THIS IS ERIC'S

This week was the first very hectic one in terms of school work. The workload picked up dramatically, and I found myself using every technique at my disposal in order to complete everything on time. Since I am an English major, I am enrolled in a couple very writing intensive courses. I had a paper due for ETS115 (Shakespeare) and WRT205. My WRT205 paper was 4-6 pages so I focused heavily on that. The prompt was to construct an essay that pinpoints masculine trends and feminist stereotypes within an advertisement. Because of this, I had to first find a worthy advertisement, and then dissect its contents. I picked a commercial for AXE cologne where a man sprays himself with a new "chocolate" flavored fragrance, then turns into a giant chocolate man, and lastly has every female in town flock to him because chocolate is so "irresistible" to women. I made it through the essay by constructing a target planner. I made the target planner a week in advance, carefully calculating my tasks day by day. I wound up having a full day to pick the ad, a day to dissect and take notes on the ad, a day to make an outline, a day to write a draft, and then a day to finalize the draft into a well thought out paper. The target planner truly mapped my progress for the task and allowed me to complete the assignment on time while being confident in my work.
-Eric Cirangle 

My strategy for this week was chunking the task. This involves breaking an assignment into manageable parts and putting dates by which you want to finish them in the form of a circle around a circle for each following step. i found this strategy to be extremely useful for the writing of my papers for classes history 305 and history 112. It helped make writing the papers more manageable and helped with the completion substantially. By keeping myself on a rigid schedule by which I wanted to finish each individual step of writing each of these papers I was never rushed to finished each individual part and made my life a lot less stressful.

TIME/TASK MANAGEMENT

Two TIME/TASK MANAGEMENT strategies I used this past week were TARGET PLANNER and CHUNKING THE TASK. Each technique helped me get work done with time to spare. I applied the Target Planner toward my math homework for the week. This allowed me to complete the whole assignment due at the end of the week by doing about one assignment each night. I had to adapt to use the target planner because I often used to complete all of the assignments in one sitting at the last minute. Before I could draw up the target planner, I had to Chunk the Task. This strategy allowed me to break down the complete assignment into 4 different "chunks." After doing that i slotted it into the target planner and ultimately completed the weeks math homework successfully and scored a 100/100 for the assignment.

-Nicholas DeVito