It’s almost a guarantee, no matter what your major, that your classes will eventually begin to overlap and build on each other. That is why it is so important to take full advantage of the work you’ve already put into past classes.

REUSING PAST PROJECTS

An important aspect of this system is the direct reuse of past projects. For example I remember taking an English class in which I needed to write a persuasive essay, in writing this essay I spent hours and hours researching a specific topic (in my case Nuclear Energy) and ended up doing very well on the paper. As a naive first year college student I discarded the paper once I received it back from the teacher. The next semester I needed to make a persuasive speech on a topic of my choice, and it hit me: I had already researched a topic (Nuclear Energy) the past semester and that there was no need to do it all over again. Fortunately, even though I had thrown away the paper, I had not deleted the file from my computer and was able to find it. Reusing the information I had previously found saved me hours of research and increased my confidence in the project because the original grade ensured the quality of my research.

REUSING PAST CLASSES AS A WHOLE

A chilling realization is taking a sequential class, such as calculus II, and discovering that you’ve forgotten most of calculus I. Fortunately, there is a very simple and effective way to avoid this problem and it consists of three steps:

1. Make sure you keep all of the tests/classwork/homework throughout a semester.
2. As you have each test in class, keep the relevant classwork/homework with that test and file it away.
3. At the end of the semester take each test and it’s appropriate classwork/homework and put it in a manila folder labeled for that class.

If you follow these three easy steps it saves an incredible amount of time backtracking in future classes, and makes reviewing entire classes worth of work organized and simple.

REDUCING THE AMOUNT OF WORK YOU SAVE

In the above step 2. I make it a point to keep the relevant work only. This is where the reducing part of this system comes into play. If you end up with a huge unordered pile of paper and just file it all away, you’ll likely waste a substantial amount of time sorting through to find what you want in the future. Reducing the clutter to only what is absolutely necessary for understanding is crucial in streamlining the entire process so that you can spend the most time concentrating on the class you’re actually taking.

Full credit to Pascal Venier who posted a review of his Easy-read.

So what is it? According to their web-site,

Easy-read is an ergonomic book holder that allows its user to read in real comfort without the aching hands and discomforts we usually experience holding our book open.

As Pascal said, “I do not know how I managed before without it.” The Easy-read works flawlessly as described. They provide a set of easy, understandable picture instructions with how to setup the Easy-read (it’s actually easy). It has made reading and taking notes from textbooks much more efficient and less painful. It also makes practising speed-reading a lot easier because you don’t have to hold the book with one hand while using your other hand as the pointer.

It also serves as a copy holder when working at the computer. This comes in really handy when you’re writing a paper from an outline.

I can’t think of anything bad to say of the Easy-read because it just works. You can buy one from their site for only $19.95 + $2.95 shipping (USD). It also makes a great gift for anyone (especially fellow students).

This post was inspired by my recently received horror of a schedule for my second semester as a freshman. I had Mondays off, but was greeted with two 8 AM starts and one 9 AM start (I have to commute), a 6:30 PM to 9:30 PM course, and large gaps between courses (up to 4 hours). However, my friend had a bomb dropped on him. His Thursday started at 10:00 AM and ended at 9:30 PM with only a single hour break from 5:00PM to 6:00 PM. That is 2/3 of his entire course load in a day. Needless to say, we are both seeking to change our schedules. Fortunately, Google Calendar is there to lend a helping hand.

Step 1: Create a calendar for each course you have to take next semester. In addition, create a calendar for your “desired schedule” and an “alternate” one in case an option is full.

Step 2: Create an event for each course on your pre-assigned schedule to the first week of the semester. In the event name, include the professor, section #, and the class location. Add these to your default calendar created by Google (usually titled “first name last name“).

Step 3: Pick one course by displaying only its calendar. This makes it easier to add time slots because your screen won’t be filled with entries from other courses.

Step 4: Create an event for every time slot available for that specific course (remember to include the professor, section #, and class location). Add these to the first week of the semester. Repeat for all your courses. Once done, you may have a crazy, colourful mess. In my course below, there are multiple professors and multiple tutorials.

Step 5: Display only your pre-assigned calendar and copy any time slot you like to your desired schedule as seen in the picture below.

Step 6: Display both your desired and pre-assigned schedules. Note any time slot you don’t like due to time, professor, or location on campus. Also display that course’s calendar. Look for the options that don’t overlap with your desired schedule. In my course below, I had ACC406 at 6:30 to 9:30 PM (in orange). I only had one other option (Monday at 8 AM), but I’d much rather wake up early than commute back home only to fall asleep without any productive time left.

Pick your preferred option and copy it to your desired schedule (same as Step 5). You should also copy “decent” options to your “alternate” schedule just in case your #1 pick is full. Once done, uncheck displaying that course.

Step 7: Repeat step 6 for each course until you’ve created your optimal (but probably not perfect) schedule. You can view your final result by displaying only your desired schedule (same as step 3). You can see mine below.

I ended up moving 5/6 courses. I no longer have a day off, but only have one 8 AM start and no night classes. I also removed all gaps from my schedule, but have five continuous hours on that 8 AM start. However, it was my only option to dodge the night class. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been finalized yet because the online enrollment appointment is scheduled during the winter break.

Remember to plan this ASAP so that you aren’t fumbling around with decisions during the enrollment period while others are snatching up all the good time slots.

Snag-it is an extremely useful piece of software that captures sections of a screen, scrolling windows, menu items, etc. and allows you to fiddle with the images, including call outs, effects etc.  I use it all the time, particularly for putting together presentations.  If you can find it somewhere and show it on your screen, you can capture it and use it easily and elegantly.

GTDWannabe posted about it today.  You can get a fully licensed version of the software for free.  Now, it’s a version behind, but it is fully and legally licensed.  You can try it out for as long as you want.  If you decide to buy the upgrade, the price is half the new purchase price.

You can download (English version) and request a license from TechSmith’s site.  I have done everything I’ve ever needed with the version they are now giving away for free, so while I will be evaluating the new version the free version is fully featured and includes most of what a student will ever need.

Cal over at Study Hacks beat me to an article on how to take notes from PowerPoint slides. Some of my professors use PowerPoint to create their lecture slides, but distribute them to students as a PDF file. Fortunately, we can still take notes without printing out the PDF using the free Foxit Reader.

The trick is to enable Foxit’s full set of annotating tools. You can do this by right-clicking anywhere on the toolbar and checking “full toolbars” as seen below.

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Citastic is a simple “MLA citation and bibliography creator.”

You start by picking the appropriate source in the left sidebar.

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If you haven’t visited your library’s website lately, you probably should. The resources might surprise you. They certainly surprised me. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m a university freshman this year. One of the biggest transitions has been the responsibility shift of homework. I attended a high school with a strong academic reputation. I believe this was largely due to the emphasis on homework, complete with daily checks. However, in university, there are no teachers scolding you. Non-submitted work is much easier for them to mark.

Fortunately, I found Cal Newport’s post on the GTDCS (GTD for College Students) system. In this system, he designates a project called “Weekly Assignments,” which makes each piece of homework a date-specific action. GTDCS has been critical to surviving the transition, while many of my classmates routinely let homework fall through the cracks. Following is how I’ve implemented this portion of GTDCS using Vitalist.
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