[bstone]

So I have returned to school after many years of not being in school. While not the best student, I attempt to try hard. My most difficult area is taking the time to study. Motivation. Anyone have any statements of inspiration?

And I am preparing for what I know will be the wacky comments of my MacNN brethren.

[iLikebeer]

Study dates w/ hot, younger, experimental coeds.
Don't know if that will actually help you study though.

[lavar78]

Grow up and hit the books.

"It's like my father used to say: 'When I was a child, I thought as a child and spoke as a child... and when I became a man, I took that child out back and had him shot.'" -- Bill McNeal, NewsRadio

[MacMan4000]

I hate school... and studying. thats why i don't study. Which is probably why I am currently failing 3 classes.

Man I am way to lazy....

[the_glassman]

I don't think I've ever studied a day in my life. So I know where you are coming from. Amazingly enough I'm pretty good and getting through things just from what I remember going over in class, or something I've read off the net. I think I have ADD or something lol. I even took a big out of the library called "How to Study", haven't had the chance to read it yet. lol

[wdlove]

You should take classes of interest. I find that I do better when I'm interested in the subject. That usually motivates me.

[Sage]

I believe in two things: 1) If you're taking a class that you truly love, you shouldn't have the need to study, except maybe looking up a few things that are fading out of your mind, and 2) Do all of your homework as thoroughly as possible… it's really easy to go into auto-pilot when doing homework, but resist the urge to do that, because you'll learn and retain so much more if you actually focus on it and put effort into doing it perfectly.

Ideally, you shouldn't even have to study that much… I usually study for no more than 10 minutes for tests (often times less than 5 minutes), and I'm still maintaining a 4.something average (high school, just so you know). The only time I ever study for long periods is before Finals… 2 hours per subject.

Anyway, point is, you should be using the concepts and what not throughout the unit – so much so that it becomes ingrained into your brain without actually having to sit down and "study". Studying should really only be for the things that you can't recall or do off the top of your head, which, in theory, shouldn't so much that it's unbearable.

[lavar78]

I never studied in high school. Like someone said, I used my great memory to do well. However, when I got to college, I quickly realized I needed to learn how to study. I guess it depends what your major is, but mine (engineering) required a fairly large amount of studying.

[brapper]

study with the good looking smart girls.
They'll motivate you to participate in the studying.

[D'Espice]

Just follow these instructions:

1) turn off computer. Yes, off. No, don't just turn around and stop looking at it, turn it OFF
2) hit the books

Motivation is a tricky thing. You will always be like "meh, I'll start at 05:30" and at 5:35 you'll be like "meh, I'll start at 05:45". Few hours later it's midnight, you gotta go to bed and haven't done nothing. Just do it, turn off the radio/iPod/TV, turn off your computer, go find a comfortable place to sit and hit the books. That's the only motivation there is

[Mastrap]

Be interested in what you study.
Motivation will come without effort.

[- - e r i k - -]

Get. Off. The. Internet.

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally posted by D'Espice:
Motivation is a tricky thing. You will always be like "meh, I'll start at 05:30" and at 5:35 you'll be like "meh, I'll start at 05:45". Few hours later it's midnight.

Wow, you must have a serious motivation problem if you start that early in the morning and a few hours later it's midnight.

[D'Espice]

Originally posted by - - e r i k - -:
Wow, you must have a serious motivation problem if you start that early in the morning and a few hours later it's midnight.

OK lemme rephrase that.

You will always be like "meh, I'll start at 5:30pm" and at 5:35pm you'll be like "meh, I'll start at 5:45pm". Few hours later it's midnight

Better?

[- - e r i k - -]

Originally posted by D'Espice:
OK lemme rephrase that.

You will always be like "meh, I'll start at 5:30pm" and at 5:35pm you'll be like "meh, I'll start at 5:45pm". Few hours later it's midnight

Better?

That's a much-a bettro.

[voodoo]

Originally posted by wdlove:
You should take classes of interest. I find that I do better when I'm interested in the subject. That usually motivates me.

Absoloutly.

If the course interest me nothing holds me back. Studying is fun!

[Thilo Ettelt]

Originally posted by bstone:
So I have returned to school after many years of not being in school. While not the best student, I attempt to try hard. My most difficult area is taking the time to study. Motivation. Anyone have any statements of inspiration?

And I am preparing for what I know will be the wacky comments of my MacNN brethren.

You need the right environment.

For me it's like this: when i have bought new music i'm not open for books etc, because i'm only concentrating on the music. So generally studying without music works better.
Next is sleep. Sleep enough, at least 8 hours! This way you can better remember what your classes dealt with (which then can mean that you have to study less). You will also be more concentrated. This goes for studying from books too. When I have not slept enough then I tend to focus my attention on anything but the book, my thoughts just drift away from the book.
And finally a quiet room/house is essential, as well as good lighting.


-Thilo

[Amorya]

I've found that studying is great as a distraction from other stuff! If I'm worrying about paying the bills, I can easily go to the library for a few hours and write half an essay.

The other thing that's helped me is learning LaTeX. It makes all my writing so pretty that I write more just to look at it!


Amorya

[D'Espice]

Originally posted by Thilo Ettelt:
You need the right environment.

For me it's like this: when i have bought new music i'm not open for books etc, because i'm only concentrating on the music. So generally studying without music works better.

Pretty much same here. But then that only works at night, living downtown means that I usually have a lot of background noise - cars driving by, dogs barking, kids playing, construction sites, etc. And having this irregular sounds distracts me pretty bad but then again, so does listening to music.

I found out though that classical music is the best thing for studying since... well maybe not sliced bread but certainly since the Turks brought coffee to Europe. With classical music, I don't have any lyrics to listen to so I don't get distracted and concentrate better. It also makes the city background noises vanish almost completely - I know they are still there but I just don't notice them anymore.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Originally posted by bstone:
So I have returned to school after many years of not being in school. While not the best student, I attempt to try hard. My most difficult area is taking the time to study. Motivation. Anyone have any statements of inspiration?

And I am preparing for what I know will be the wacky comments of my MacNN brethren.

I went back to school at age 28. It's hard. I think the biggest problem for a returning student is the sudden change in the amount of free time you have. If you are a student and your friends are not you will get a lot of times where people will try to drag you away from your books to go play. You will have to train them to not take offense when you simply can't do that. Otherwise your friends will be your number one reason to procrastinate. I find this especially hard at about this time of year. Working people start to shift to party mode around Thanksgiving. Students start getting exam phobia.

Most times when I have seen returning students drop out it has been because they can't trim down their social expectations (or expenses) to that of a student. But if you can get past that, you will likely find your greater maturity will be an asset in school.

[Sage]

Originally posted by Amorya:
I've found that studying is great as a distraction from other stuff! If I'm worrying about paying the bills, I can easily go to the library for a few hours and write half an essay.

Wish I had the luxury of several hours for half an essay. For the AP Lang/Comp test, we have to write 3 essays, 30 minutes each… thus, our teacher has us write all of our essays in under 30 minutes. Actually, I kind of like it in a way, because it's nice to have the ability to finish an essay that quickly.

Oh yeah, about music – good point about having music without lyrics. Never try to do homework with They Might Be Giants playing… you'll never get anything done.

[alligator]

"It costs so much to be a full human being that there are very few who have the enlightenment or the courage to pay the price... One has to abandon altogether the search for security, and reach out to the risk of living with both arms. One has to embrace the world like a lover. One has to accept pain as a condition of existence. One has to count doubt and darkness as the cost of knowing. One needs a will stubborn in conflict, but apt always to total acceptance of every consequence of living and dying."

Morris L. West, The Shoes Of The Fisherman

[spiky_dog]

first off, why are you in school? if you don't have a good reason, a goal of some sort, and you don't feel like studying, there's really no point to it.

second, no one truly studies in high school -- some people go through the motions, some don't even bother with that. get that 4.0 in a non-fluff major in college without studying and then i'll say your schooling was inadequate, as no worthwhile course or test will cover material that was covered completely during lecture.

[Psychonaut]

[Rev-O]

Hey, Redhook helped me thru college. Okay, so maybe not the studying part...

[d4nth3m4n]

chances are you will have dirt under your fingernail or be hopelessly underpaid unless you finish college.

though that incentive didn't work for me. i didn't even go to school until i was 21 then after three years that got progressively worse i dropped out of cornell. but this blue collar thing is killing me. that much i do know.

[SSharon]

Why am I reading this thread this late when I have a 10 page paper due in the morning? I have no idea. However, I find that I can concentrate better when listening to music of any kind. Unfortunately turning off the computer isn't always an option because I depend on it so much for my work, and all my music is on my computer.

[MilkmanDan]

I find the best way to get a paper done is put it off as long as possible. Oh wait.. yeah, this would explain my last three papers being turned in at 5:30 the day they were due...

[D'Espice]

Originally posted by MilkmanDan:
I find the best way to get a paper done is put it off as long as possible. Oh wait.. yeah, this would explain my last three papers being turned in at 5:30 the day they were due...

HAHA that is SO me Last tuesday I had to do a 20-minute oral report on a newspaper article I considered worth reading. It had to be something really interesting, too. I realized that I had to do that on monday, around 9-10pm, bstone may remember how I started swearin' my guts off after I suddenly remembered
But hey, got an A. I's working on that thing all night long, first I had to FIND something worth reading which is not easy at 9pm on a monday night... then I had to actually write my report on it and try to memorize it. I had to skip one class in the morning in order to get it done but eventually managed to finish it on time.