Lectures 102 : What not to do

image by osde8info

In the previous post we looked as a few ways you can benefit from lectures. In this post I want to discuss some of the things you shouldn't do in regards to lectures. 1. Skip lecture. Compared to high school, college students have a lot more freedom, and especially in first year where classes may have as many as 300 students, it is easy to skip lectures, especially if you are recovering from partying the night before! 2. Come unprepared. This is a follow-up to our previous post. Often-times, attending a lecture without preparing beforehand can be almost as bad as not attending at all. 3. Trying to write down everything the lecturer says. If you want to do that, rather record the lecture, and then when you get back home you can listen to the lecture again, even at double speed if you want to. We will discuss this in the next posts when I will give you some ideas on how to use recorded lectures properly. 4. Not writing anything at all. If you are going to the lecture, if you haven't prepared, at least try to listen for some key information as discussed previously. If you know someone in your class who is good at picking up important information during lectures, sit next to them or behind them during lectures, and you can see when they may note of something that the lecturer has said.

Lectures 101 (schooledforlife.com)
So who are these lecturers anyway? Seven ways to get to know them better (schooledforlife.com)
Four-Minute Lecture: Professor Viccellio (thekenyonthrill.com)
Back to Uni - and even more determined to help. (mathematicalmischief.wordpress.com)

Updated S4L Principle Page

I just wanted to let you all know that I have updated the S4L Page Principles Page on the website. Please check it out because I give more detail on the seven principles of the Schooled For Life philosophy and what you can expect when the curriculum comes out.

Lectures 101

I want to discuss four ways that you can get the most out of the lectures that you attend. By following these simple steps, you can maximize the effectiveness of your attendance of lectures.

Image by sbarkley

image by denn

1. Read beforehand. This is perhaps one of the most crucial steps you should do. If your course-load is not too intensive, then I suggest that you read the relevant chapter/s a couple of days before the lecture, and jot down any questions that you have. Then, read the chapter and questions again the night before the lecture. If your course-load is heavy (think Medical School!), then read the chapter the night before with a red, green and blue highlighter nearby. Red highlights things you don't understand. Blue highlights things you already knew. Green highlights the main points that you would use as topics for essay questions. 2. The Handouts are never enough.No mater what the lecturer says toyou, I promise you that the lecture handouts are never enough. Use the lecture handouts as the skeleton upon which you build your chunks of knowledge. 3. Listen for points that are repeated. When the lecturer repeats a point more, take special note. When they say it more than twice, take very careful note of it. 4. Listen for points that are illustrated. If your lecturer gives you an illustration to try and explain a concept, pay very close attention as well. This is also usually an important point to know.

image by B Rosen

So who are these lecturers anyway? Seven ways to get to know them better (schooledforlife.com)
Four-Minute Lecture: Professor Jensen (thekenyonthrill.com)

Learning by chunking

Information (Photo credit: heathbrandon)

Chunking information simply means learning information in chunks. In my previous post, I spoke about chunking and about how we store between 5 and 9 bits of information in short-term memory at once. Now let's begin a series of posts on applying this to your learning. 1. Skeleton. Grab you textbook. Open to the chapter you are learning. Write down the main headings in that chapter. Most likely there will be about 7 headings or so. Understand those headings and memorize them. This is your chapter skeleton.

2. Each heading. Read the text under each heading. If there are no sub-headings, read to find out the main point of each paragraph. Write these main points out briefly in your own words. Again, you will be left with approximately 5 - 10 sentences. In your mind, connect each sentence to its heading and learn those sentences. 3. Repeat. Do this over and over again. 4. Revise. Go over each chunk of information the next day, then weekly for two weeks, then every two weeks until exams. We will go into more detail at a later stage on the actual memorizing process, including linking to information already known. This post was intended simply to give you a brief overview of chunking.

The myth of true multi-tasking (schooledforlife.com)
How does your brain create short-term memories? [Neuroscience] (io9.com)
What determines the capacity of short-term memory? (sciencedaily.com)

The myth of true multi-tasking

: Via Amazon

I am reading a book called Getting Organized in the Google Era by Douglas Merrill, former C.I.O. of Google. I highly recommend it. He approaches this multi-million dollar topic of organizing your life in a totally unique and different approach. One of the segments of the book that is very relevant is when he talks about our brains and their short-term and long-term memory.

Short-term memory

Your brain is only able to hold between 5 and 9 things in its short-term memory. But, these items need to be related to each other in some way. If you then shift contexts quickly, the new pieces of information entering your short-term memory will push some of those previous memories out before you have been able to put them into long-term memory. Multi-tasking? So, in essence, the concept of multi-tasking in many contexts is going to make you less effective. That's why the good writers and bloggers will create chunks of information in their writing. Then they will tell a story about it. Then they will re-iterate it in different words, then again a third time from a different angle.

Multitasking by stoneystainer (www.flickr.com/photos/stoneysteiner/)

Good Writers? Yes, good writers will chunk the information, paint some pictures of it, then re-iterate it in different terms. Then they will link those 5 to 9 items to a further 5 to 9 items, hoping that you have had time to transfer those first 5 to 9 items into long-term memory. Good Studiers? This is absolutely essential for learners. You learn in chunks of 5 to 9 items at a time. Insert them into long-term memory by linking them to things you already know, and by applying study techniques that work for you. Don't let someone tell you that there is only one way to learn. S4L That is one of the big reasons I am developing the S4L (Schooled For Life) program. My big plans for it are to release a curriculum based on those seven principles. Don't let anyone tell you how you must learn. You decide that for yourself. The S4L program will empower you to do that. Now, where has that novel I was reading whilst writing this post gone?

How I conquered Russia

This will probably be one of my most unusual posts. And I do apologize that there aren't any "three easy steps to..." It's about how I conquered Russia in the weeks before my sixth year finals at Medical School. Sounds weird? Let me back up a little.

I love history. Especially military history and the history of battles, invasions and conquest. World War Two, World War One and the Napoleonic Wars are my favorite. During my final few weeks before finals, I pretended that I was Germany invading Russia in 1941. Each topic I studied was equivalent to a town conquered. I know, I am very strange. Every time I studied a specific topic, or spent a designated amount of time studying, I would highlight the next town as having been conquered. Right, now that I have officially declared my insanity, let me share with you how this helped me.

by Look Into My Eyes on Flickr

A. Visuality.That isn't a real word, by the way. I just made it up. But it explains itself. The map of me conquering Russia was for me a graphic visualization of my study progress. B. Encouragement.It showed me I was actually making progress. Towards the end of the study period I was clocking in about 80 to 100 hours of studying per week, over and above the clinical rotations I was doing. Sleep was minimal at that point. C. Achievement. I can't remember where I have put those maps now, but I am reminded of them every day when I look at my Medical Degree hanging in my office at work. Right, where is my straight-jacket?

5 Hacks to a Study-Body

Image via Wikipedia

Hunched shoulders, clenched teeth, sweaty forehead, racing heart, blurring vision. No, this isn't a description of a Comrades Marathon runner. It was a picture of how I often ended up whilst studying. When you sit down at your desk to study, do you find yourself gearing yourself up for a marathon? I've got five ways you can help alleviate the physical strain that studying puts on your body. 1. Get up and walk around frequently. Sometimes you may need to actually set a timer to make sure you get up and walk around for about two minutes every 30 minutes of studying. Bear in mind, you don't have to stop studying. In fact, often changing position like that kicks your brain into a different frame of reference and what you are studying get a fresh feel about it. 2. Stand up whilst studying. This is a follow-on from point number 1. It is becoming extremely popular at the moment. My Pastor, Clint Archeruses a standing desk and finds it extremely helpful. It keeps your brain ticking over faster than whilst sitting, and you are getting your leg muscles to work, thus improving your circulation. The down side to this is that later in life you have a higher risk of developing varicose veins and osteoarthritis of your hips and knees.

Image via Wikipedia. Donald Rumsfeld working at his standing desk.

3. Do gentle but frequent neck stretching. Having been in two car accidents and having permanent damage done to my Cervical vertebrae, this is an absolute essential for me. The stretches I most frequently use are ear-to-shoulder both sides, nose-to-armpit both sides (don't do that if you have bad BO!), chin tuck. I usually hold each of those for about ten seconds, and try and relax all my muscles into the stretch. It really works wonders! 4. Train yourself, or be trained to sit correctly. All the physiotherapists and chiropractors I know teach their patients how to sit correctly. Lying down on your bed on your tummy with your books in front of you is a recipe for disaster for your neck! You don't have to sit bolt-upright all the time, but relax your shoulders, tuck your chin in slightly and sit as if someone is gently pulling on a piece of string attached to the top of your head. 5. Keep yourself generally fit. This is a no-brainer. Find a sport or activity that can get your heart rate to optimum for about 120 minutes per week. Even if it means taking the kids and the dogs for a walk around the neighborhood twice a week, and a swim twice a week. Do something to get yourself fitter.

The Health Benefits of the Standing Desk (savings.com)
One Year at My Standing Desk (smarterware.org) I highly recommend this one - Gina Trapani really discusses it in detail
Standing Desk (grabshelldude.wordpress.com)

What 2.5 years-old twins have taught me about learning

My twin boys Luke and Nathan are going to be turning three years of age in July this year. The term "twinado" describes them perfectly! I joke with my patients and introduce them as the last two Bin Ladens! But their approach to life has taught me so much about how I think we as adults should approach studying.

They Delight in learning new things. Anything they learn that is new to them is an adventure. It's exciting. It's full of mystery and enjoyment. When they listen while we are teaching them something, they look with such expectant faces, such eager expressions.
They Delight in being praised. When they do something well, and they show they have learned something, they love it when we praise them and give them hugs for learning something. This is especially true if they show they have learned something about what is right and wrong. When they have learned to obey mom and dad. We never compare their performance in a task, but we compare behavior. When last did you stop, look back at the work you have done and thanked the Lord and told yourself "Well done"?
They Delight in doing the learned activity over and over again. And sometimes they surprise us by blurting out something they learned a few days previously, but are still thinking about and processing what they learned. How often do you let your learned material go over and over in your mind?

I fear that as adults we lose that sense of wonder and amazement at learning new things. Life makes us so jaded that something profound like the formation of a baby in the womb is reduced to a textbook of embryology. We lose sight of the beauty around us, and in the material we are studying. When last did you stop in the middle of the section you are studying and say, "Wow, Lord! This is amazing. You and your creation are amazing!"

The value of a large piece of paper

We live in a paper-less world. Well, actually we don't. If anything, since the advent of computer-driven business, we are probably using more paper than ever. But, the good news is that most of that is re-cycled, and in South Africa, most of the office paper we use comes from sustainable forests. Why this ramble? I just wanted an introduction to something that I have recently started doing and should have done while I was studying. Namely, using large pieces of paper. Currently I am using large A1 pages - the type used on flip-charts, to do all of my brainstorming for my Schooled For Life Principles. I have found them helpful for the following reasons :

I am not limited by space to put more information on the page
I can see all my ideas on one page
I can easily inter-link ideas
I can be as messy as I want to be
I'm the only person it needs to make sense to - most other people will look at them and not be able to work out what I'm trying to do!

There are a few disadvantages, though :

It isn't on my MacBook
It's tricky to carry around without folding it to fit into an A4 file/folder
The more information you put on the page the more difficult it is to make sense of, especially if you leave it for a while and come back to it at a much later stage.

What are your thoughts?

Five things I have learned about learning in the operating room

As a family physician, one of the activities I am able to take part in is assisting surgeons in theatre. Every Thursday I assist an Orthopaedic Surgeon, Dr Roloff at Hillcrest Private Hospital. I learned a number of principles watching him work, and only yesterday realized how these can apply to study skills as well.

Proper setup.Dr Roloff is absolutely meticulous about preparing the patient's position on the operating table. He will not scrub until they are perfectly positioned. Once they are positioned correctly, he checks again. What I learned from this is that you need to know what you
Image via Wikipedia
need to study before you study. I will go into this in great detail when the Schooled For Life Curriculum comes out. It sounds weird, but unless you know what is expected of you before you study, you are going to get it wrong. It reminds me of the story that our pastor, Clint Archer told about a friend of his who spotted for his exam the day before, and one of the essay questions was not what he had spotted. But he wrote out the one he did spot, and the lecturer told him it was the perfect answer for the wrong question and gave him 0%!
High expectations of himself and his staff. He demands a very high standard. If the scrub sister has not prepared properly, he will let them know about it and expect it to be corrected next time round. While you are studying, don't settle for your second-best effort. You will always live in regret for not making the best use of the time and opportunities that studying at college gives you.
Planning for every contingency. He knows where major mishaps can happen in each procedure he does. He anticipates them and takes precautions to prevent them from happening. In your studies, you need to take control of your time before life controls you. Yes, there will be the odd Hurricane Katrina, but there are a number of situations you can plan for. If you know your house-mates throw a long, loud party every Friday night, don't think that you will be able to study at the house at the same time. If you hang around students that don't take their studies seriously, very soon you won't care either. Plan for these types of contingencies. Work around them. Be intelligent about it.
Checks himself at every step and especially before a major part of the procedure. In the last case I assisted him in we did a Total Hip Replacement. One of the big steps is when the head of the Femur bone is sawed off. He checks his positioning repeatedly until he is satisfied everything is in line. And only then does he do the actual sawing (it's actually quite awesome to watch - just like carpentry!). In your studies, regular class tests are a good way to measure how you are doing. The same goes for assignments and practicals. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that your assignments are un-important. They are all essential to help you gauge your progress. If you aren't sure of your progress, ask your tutors and lecturers for feedback.
The more he does the better he gets. Another way of putting this is by saying 'Every procedure he does helps add to his experience'. And the only way to do this is to keep doing it. In Anatomy in my second year of medicine, there was simply no way around it - I had to just remember stuff. Lots of stuff. The only way you are going to be able to do that is to revise, revise and revise. The same was true during our clinical rotations. The only way we would become prepared for our clinical exams was to practice clerking a patient and presenting those patient to each other or to our tutors. The more you do, the better you will get at doing it.