How to Take Better Notes and Do Well on Tests

Something I figured out early on in high school and later college is that note-taking plays a major role in how well you do in a class. In this article, I'll show you a few idea that helped me and that will hopefully help you as well.

1) First, it's very important to find out how a teacher or instructor bases his or her tests.

You can find this out from other students or sometimes by asking the teacher yourself. This will save you a lot of time on studying things that won't help your grade. I enjoy learning, but at the same time I remember how time-pressured I was with multiple classes that I learned you have to be practical about these things.

2) When you get home or need to study, change your notes to fit your own personal learning style.

I'm a very visual person, so while I was in school I often drew pictures whenever possible. I could recall images better than just words on a page. You can get really creative with this, using symbols to remind you of certain words and concepts.

3) If you're more of an auditory person, buy a recorder (or an attachment for your IPod) and record the lecture.

I had a friend who did this and listened to the .mp3 files in her car during her commute to and from school. The repetition of it helped her remember the information naturally.

4) If you have a lot of hand-written notes, consider retyping them to reduce the number of pages you have to deal with.

This helped me a lot, and I considered them better than the "cheat sheets" you can buy because they're personalized to the particular class.

More Tips:

• In college, a syllabus given at the beginning of the semester may give you clues on where to focus your note-taking: on lectures, the textbook, or a combination of both.

How to Pick a College Major

When I was in college, part of me wished there was some way to major in "undecided." For many students, it's hard to make a decision in your late teens and early 20s on what direction you want to go in life. In this article, I will hopefully take some of the stress off of this and give you some ideas that will make the decision easier.

1) First, you're going to have to do some searching in yourself on what you really want out of life.

Different careers have different lifestyles, and your major does have some impact on certain jobs you'll be qualified for after graduation. For example, some careers are high income but also require more hours of your time than other careers that may have more flexibility. Giving your career goals some thought will help you finding out what you need from a formal education standpoint.

2) If you're at a point where you don't really know what you want to do (I've been there), focus on a major that will help you across many different career fields.

When you think about skills employers really want and that can also help you in self-employment (people skills, ability to communicate well, leadership ability), there are multiple majors out there that you can gain these skills and will hold your interest. I personally majored in psychology and communications, and the flexibility of both of those majors has helped me a lot. Other majors may have similar benefits.

3) This shouldn't be your main factor, but something important to consider is how long you want to be in college.

There are some majors that are structured to take 5 years now for a traditional 4-year-degree (due to the availability of required classes). If you're on a scholarship or other type of funding for 4 years, you may need to keep this in mind to keep from going into extra debt.

More Tips:

• There's nothing wrong with taking an introduction class in a major to see if you'll like it or not. I originally had no intentions of majoring in psychology, but the intro class was so much fun I decided to pursue it.
• Get as many of your "core" classes done within your first two years. It buys you more time to make a decision and gives you more flexibility as opposed to jumping into a major starting out and then changing your mind mid-way.
• Don't pick a major for the wrong reasons. Whatever you do, don't pick a major that makes you miserable. It establishes a way of thinking where you'll settle for a career that makes you miserable, and that doesn't work long-term. How much money you want to make is important, but believe me in that you can make money doing something you love because you'll put more into it than the average person.

How to Find Ways to Pay for College

It's difficult when finances interfere with your desire for an education, but you need to plan your decisions well if you want to win. With the costs of a college education rising roughly 7-8% a year (compared to general inflation at around 4%), I can definitely understand why many adults can feel divided on the issue of going back and some recent high school graduates hesitate.

Growing up knowing that my parents could not fully afford to pay for my college education, I had to do a lot of planning to be able to go. After going through the whole process, I hope I can offer advice on things I did right as well as thing I wish I'd known about earlier:

1) Stop by the financial aid office of the college long before you plan to start.

With many forms of financial aid, you need to give yourself plenty of time to apply. If you're not aware of it already, you should definitely fill out a Free Application for Student Aid (FAFSA) to find out if you qualify for any federal or state grants. You can find more information about this at www.fafsa.ed.gov

2) Apply to any scholarship the college offers that fits you.

It's tedious sometimes, but think of it as getting paid a lot of money to fill out some forms-the more you fill out, the more the odds are in your favor that you'll receive some of them. It is also good at this time to research any off campus scholarships or tuition reimbursements through your job. Be careful when researching scholarships on-line and definitely never pay for a service that claims they can do all the searching for you because you can do the same thing yourself for free.

3) Even if you've never bought anything on-line before, it is worth checking the Internet for your textbooks.

Allow plenty of time for the book to get to you if you use standard shipping(at least 2 weeks if possible) as media mail seems to get slightly slower due to high volume during textbooks seasons. E-mail the merchant ahead of time before you order and request postal insurance to protect your purchase if it's over $20.

4) Consider getting your "core" classes at a smaller community college.

If I had not gotten scholarships to a 4-year university, I would have done this. Most states have standards where larger universities will accept credits from community colleges. Often you can get the same courses for half the price and then move on to your major at a more expensive college. This takes some research, so you may have to make some phone calls and talk to people at both locations to make sure things will work out right without any hassles.

5) Find a job that provides tuition reimbursement.

This can vary by field, but companies such as UPS often offer tuition reimbursement to even part-time employees as part of a benefits package.

6) Borrow only if you need it.

Student loans are very low interest, but they can still impact your cash flow as you pay them off. It's better to try to have some money saved up or work while you're going to school if you can handle it. It's harder at the time, but you'll be in better shape long-term.

7) Consider your purpose for returning to college.

Learning is a very worthwhile thing to do in life, and I'm definitely in favor of people going to college if it helps them achieve their goals and dreams. What you have to be careful of however is spending a lot of money in relation to what you're going to get back in return. For example, I've had friends spend $100,000+ on a education and end up with $20,000/yr jobs in that field. That's obviously a harmful situation financially. There are ways of turning it around, but I think a person should factor that into their decision-making.

More Tips:

• Unless you find them helpful, I was able to do without study guides for most subjects. In most cases, the actual textbook will be needed however. Don't risk not getting them and later finding out you need them for assignments.
• If you're really on a tight budget, sometimes college and university libraries will keep spare copies of the textbooks that you can't check out but can use inside the building.

How to Make the Most of College Classes

After spending a lot of time, effort, and money to get into college, one of the strangest things I've seen people do is treat it like a chore instead of something valuable. The closest thing I can compare it to is buying a high-performance sports car and never leaving your driveway. If you're going to college for the wrong reasons and with the wrong attitude, a degree alone is not going to mean as such as you may think.

Whether you're financially paying for it now or later, you need to be a smart consumer when it comes to your education. If it helps to imagine yourself "paying admission" every time you enter a classroom, then approach it that way (though sometimes I wanted my money back when it came to certain instructors!) For the most part however, thinking of it from that perspective helped me when I was in college. There are also other things you can do which will help you:

1) Take the Time to Be Prepared.

At the beginning of the semester, most instructors will give you an outline called a syllabus. This is so each meeting you'll know where you are and where the class will be heading. Preparing could just mean looking over and reading the chapter before the instructor discusses it. This will make the lecture portion a way of making your learning more solid, as opposed to going in hearing everything for the first time. This will also help you if you have a different learning style (like reading over hearing, etc.)

2) Think and Ask Questions.

Have you ever been in a class where a student is asking questions for the sole purpose of getting attention? Being an active learner is not about showing other people how smart you are-that comes across as fake. If you have a genuine question however, don't be afraid to ask it. Remember, you're paying your instructors to help you learn.

3) Go the Extra Mile, Beyond What the Average Person Does.

I'm not saying to do this with everything because it can get overwhelming. If it's something you're interested in however, go a little deeper into learning more about it than the average person. It's this quality that separates the experts from the people who have a basic knowledge of a subject.

4) Put Quality Into Your Work.

With class projects, you're always going to have people who want to do the minimum to get it done. Breaking out of that attitude will not only make you a better grade in that particular class, but it's a good life lesson to carry outside the classroom. Plus I think a lot of other people have that inner desire to do well. Don't let the fear of standing out stop you from that. There's a saying I've heard a few times that "a rising tide raises all ships." You'll be helping someone else in that classroom along with yourself, whether you realize it or not.

5) Take Notes and Remember to Review Them Later.

What worked best for me from a test-taking standpoint is taking notes in class and then later typing them up. If you combine this with being prepared, you'll be seeing and hearing the same information multiple times. Repetition in different forms leads to real learning, not just memorization and later forgetting.

6) Enjoy the Experience of Learning Something New.

Obviously there's going to be certain classes that have serious material, but in general try to have as much fun as you possibly can. The best classes I remember most are the ones where everyone was able to learn and laugh at the same time.

I hope these tips have been helpful to you. Good luck and best wishes for your future!

More Tips:

• While you're in college, take advantage of resources your college or university offers. You're paying for them anyway, but you sometimes have to do some research into what is available to you.
  

How to Achieve Learning Goals as an Adult

Learning is a life long process if you want to be successful, and sometimes as an adult it's harder to make learning a priority in your life. It's worth pursuing however. Right now there's still a message in society that your education ends with your final diploma or degree. Several independent studies have shown that somewhere around 20-30% of adults out in the U.S. never read an entire book after they graduate from high school or college.

When you willingly put yourself in a position where you're ignorant of changes going on around you, it impacts you financially and can hurt your overall quality of life. Many people want to do better, but it can sometimes be hard to know where to start. I want to offer a few ideas that helped me through college and later when I became a business owner and writer.

1) To Achieve Any Goal, You Need a Plan.

Don't go blindly into college, a new career, or a new business without having some idea of where you are, where you're going, and how you're going to reach your goal. I think half the battle in learning is knowing what you want. It's through this that you develop a passion about learning certain topics that both interest you and will help you become a better person.

2) Don't Fear Doing Something New.

Though failure is often seen as bad in the academic world, it is a form of learning. You can talk with successful people in any field and a lot of them will tell you they didn't get things perfect the first time. Learning and success are both processes, not destinations. You're never going to reach a point where you feel like you've "arrived." You can however continue to set more challenging goals as you meet your existing ones.

3) Take Some Time to Figure Yourself Out.

I wasted a lot of time in college trying to be just like everyone else around me, and it only made me miserable inside. In my case, I had an entrepreneur mentality and was surrounded by people who wanted jobs. It doesn't make either option bad, but my point is don't let what makes you unique be a curse when it should be a blessing. Don't be afraid to pursue your passion in life even if it makes you stand out from the crowd a little.

4) Find a Learning Pace that Works for You.

In college or just studying things on your own, don't get yourself to the point you're so overwhelmed with information that none of it is sticking. Trying to do too much not only doesn't work, but it will cause you to associate learning with negative stress.

There's nothing wrong with challenging yourself, but keep yourself in check when it comes to that issue. Don't feel like you have to compete against other people younger or older than you to prove yourself as a student. The whole point is to learn, not to compare yourself to others.

5) Make Learning Fun.

Like anything else in life, the more you enjoy learning the better you'll become at it. There are aspects of learning that are skills that you have to develop, but how you do that can be very flexible. There's no point of forcing yourself to do something if you can come up with a way where you can look forward to it.

I hope these tips have been helpful to you! Good luck and best wishes for your future!

More Tips:

• Want an alternative to spending a lot of money on college? Consider "real world" educational sources as well such as books written by people in the field you're interested in, getting mentored by someone in that field, and accessing Internet resources.
• There is a danger in feeling like you're too busy to learn when you become an adult and get out of formal schooling. The sad thing is a lack of knowledge may be holding you back from an extraordinary life. You're never too "grown up" to learn.

How to Quit Worrying About Your College Grades and Still Do Well

A little anxiety over your grades can be motivating, but too much stress can cause more harm than good. I was the first person in my family to go to college, so this is an issue I pretty much had to figure out on my own until I developed friendships with students older than me. I think that's what makes freshman year the toughest in that you haven't had a lot of time to get to know people yet. I'll try to give you the best general advice I can as far as what helped me and what kept my grades up.

1) Being prepared will lessen the anxiety.

I had to work my way through college, so I had to get creative when it came to studying and preparing for tests. What I ended up doing was reading chapter summaries just before a class, taking notes during lectures, and then later typing those same notes up when I went to study.

Hopefully before the test I had seen and heard the same set of information several times (which leads to actually learning it), and the typed notes serve as my own personal "cram" notes since they were a condensed version of everything needed to know for the tests.

2) Find out how your instructors grade.

Most of the time you'll find this out on your first day, and it helps you come up with a plan on where your focus should be. For example, I've had instructors based 30% of a final grade on a midterm and only 5% on class activities for the whole semester. Obviously it would be in my best interest if my time was limited to spend more time preparing on the mid-term, even in the situation where I may lose a point or two for not being as prepared for a class activity.

In other classes, it may be the reverse and better to focus on class activities to keep your grades stable if they're a big percentage.

3) Realize you don't have to be a "perfect" student to succeed in life.

Successful people fail more than the average person because they know it's a part of learning and a price you have to pay for success. If you let fear and anxiety control your life, you're limiting your own potential for all the wrong reasons.

What makes college very different from high school is that you're paying for it-either currently or later. Even if you earned scholarships, it was still earned. You need to look at college as an educational product-you've paid x amount of dollars for x amount of classes. You want to make the most of it as if you were paying admission as you were entering the classroom door. To get the most out of college, focus more on learning and not so much on grades since genuine learning will naturally raise your grade anyway in most cases.

Additional Tip:

• If an instructor is rude to you or has an ego-driven policy to fail a high percentage of students each semester no matter what they do, it's usually all right within a certain time frame to "fire" them and switch classes if that's where the pressure is mainly coming from. You just have to learn how to detect whether an instructor really cares and just wants to give you a challenge or if something else is going on.