The Art of the “A” Pt. 1: Classroom Etiquette, Organization, and Notes
A new school year has begun! After splurging on fancy pens, highlighters, and notebooks, you’re confident that this is the year you will become a straight A student! You walk into school ready to tackle the new year. And then the first assignment is passed to your desk. No worries! You feel prepared to handle it. But then more and more and more assignments come piling in. You realize that the cute supplies are not enough to motivate you to complete your assignments, and within the first week of school, you’ve already completely given up on your straight A goals. You are left feeling unmotivated and stressed.
But I’m here to tell you that this will not happen! Not this year. With my last article series, How to Master Self-Management, and this new, two part series, The Art of the “A”, you will become a master at organizing and studying, the two skills needed to get through every assignment, test, and *shudder* group project. In this article, we will discuss certain behaviors and habits that help students understand concepts even before they begin to study those concepts, such as proper classroom etiquette, how to organize their time efficiently, and how to take notes. Below, I’ll discuss each of these three points in more detail.
Classroom Etiquette
While this may sound stupid, classroom etiquette is actually very important. Think about it: you’re in class and you’re paying attention. The act of listening and attempting to understand what your teacher is saying almost acts as a first round of studying. Instead, if you don’t pay attention and ask questions in class, you have to study more than those who paid attention in class. Now, this is not to say that you can’t goof off with your friends at all when in class. You absolutely can! You just have to make sure that when you goof off, the teacher isn’t saying something too important, i.e., don’t goof off when the teacher is explaining a fundamental concept for that unit.
A big reason why paying attention is so important is that people who don’t pay attention in class don’t understand the concept that they are studying, and they end up memorizing instead of understanding. I cannot emphasize enough the drastic difference between memorizing and understanding!
Memorizing is learning something by rote without understanding the theory behind it, whereas understanding is done by comprehending the concepts that build up the topic you are studying. Once you have understood, you automatically remember the topic, so understanding is a more efficient way to remember things in the long term. It’s difficult to explain how to understand, but the best I can do is this: use study techniques that promote active recall. I will elaborate more on this concept in the second part of this article series, which is entirely dedicated to study techniques and how to study without memorization.
Knowing if you’ve understood or memorized a concept is difficult, but I have found one way that always proves to me whether I understand the topic or not. Pretend that you’re teaching the concept you’ve just studied to a class, and you (in your own words) need to find a way to explain it clearly and cohesively, while still hitting on all of the important points. You can even up the difficulty by pretending you’re explaining the concept to a five year old, and using simple terminology to explain it. If you are able to explain the concept in your own words, then you have understood the concept. If not, it's much more likely that you’ve memorized the concept.
Notes
Notes are the most important first step when it comes to studying. Having good notes already eliminates one of the struggles when it comes to studying: what do I study? With good notes, what you need to study is all in one place, and this allows studying to be faster than if you didn’t have notes that highlighted what you needed to study. The problem is that every person learns differently, and each subject requires a different type of notes. Therefore, to generalize what strong notes are supposed to look like is unreasonable and impossible. However, I can highlight some key points that, if implemented into your notes, help your understanding of the subject. Please note that I did not include English in my list below because I believe that doing well in English has to do with your verbal, written, and analytical skills, which can only be gained with practice, not notes.
Math, Physics, and Chemistry
Math, physics, and chemistry are very similar, in the sense that there are many equations and practice worksheets. In general, writing down formulas, what they mean, and the steps required is the right way to go. Even writing down a few examples that are done in class can help show you a sample of what you need to do in practice questions.
Biology
Biology is 100% understanding. Notes should include important terminology (with their definitions), steps of biological purposes, and drawings/diagrams that outline parts of the body, so as to aid your understanding and subsequent memorization.
Social Studies
When making notes for social studies, it’s important to include not only the event in history, but also what caused it and what resulted from it. It’s also important to try and tie the event into a major theme. For example, in Social Studies 10, the major theme is globalization; in 20, the major theme is nationalism; in 30, the theme is liberalism. These are the key topics that form everything you learn that year, so trying to find a connection between any historical event you learn and globalization/nationalism/liberalism is incredibly useful. I also find making timelines extremely important in aiding my understanding of historical events, as, unfortunately, this class is not taught in chronological order.
Organization
This. Is. Crucial. As I mentioned throughout my previous series, How To Master Self-Management, organization is the key to all productivity. To know what you need to do, when you need to do it, how long it’ll take, and how to stick with your schedule allows you to complete everything you need to complete before the deadline. If you would like more information regarding any of the topics below, more in depth explanations are provided in my article series How To Master Self-Management.
The first step towards productivity is to free your mind from everything other than what you are currently working on. This can be achieved by writing down every single small thing you must do, no matter whether you think you’ll remember it or not, because this act frees your brain from having to remember dozens of small things. This, in turn, allows you to focus on just the thing in front of you, without being preoccupied with anything else, which boosts your productivity.
Then, one must identify their strengths and weaknesses in terms of subjects and types of assignments. Once this is done, it becomes easier to identify your priorities, because you know what is more difficult for you (and therefore requires more time) and what is easier for you (and therefore requires less time). From here, you can organize your calendar based on the due date and difficulty of the assignment/subject.
After that, you need to learn the skills of willpower and focus. Willpower can be learned using the out of sight, out of mind technique, or the if-then technique. Focus requires you to reach The Zone, which requires you to eliminate all distractions, both from internal and external triggers. Distractions from internal and external triggers can be eliminated by identifying and then eliminating the root cause of the trigger (feeling, location, event, person, etc). In addition, since external triggers are commonly caused by phones, you can use the out of sight out of mind principle.
Finally, you must eliminate the desire to procrastinate. The next time you find yourself procrastinating, try this simple trick: interrupt your procrastination by counting backwards from 5, and then force yourself to work for just five minutes. 80% of people continue to work after doing this. By counting backwards from 5, not only are you interrupting the habit, but you’re also forced to activate your prefrontal cortex, which is the part of your brain in charge of logic, reasoning, and comprehension. Because procrastination is a habit of avoiding work, not disliking the work, by forcing yourself to work for five minutes, you’ve stopped avoiding work, and you tend to continue working because you’ve passed the hardest point - the starting of the work. If you are interested in a more in-depth explanation of this concept, click this link. If, however, you are in the 20% that this technique does not work for, I would suggest you break a project into more manageable chunks or impose time constraints on yourself to get the assignment done earlier.
There you have it! Three pre-study techniques that aid your understanding concepts so studying can take less time. So don’t give up your straight A goals! You’ve totally got this! I know that the beginning of the school year can feel difficult, but don’t give in! And, if these pre-study habits aren’t cutting it, don’t worry! I’ve got you. Stay tuned, as shortly, Pt. 2 of this series will arrive, answering all your questions on studying techniques and what studying method is best for each core class, to help maximize your time, and turn you into a straight A student.
