The Main Article
How To Be A Good Student
Good Students - Made or Born?
A good student is made, not born. We learned to walk and talk, and then most of us learned to sit down and shut up and listen. Some of us learned to listen without interupting.
How does one become a good student at college or university? With a sports coach, you know that the coach is trying to help you improve yourself. With his outside eye, and his experience of other athletes, he will guide you towards general fitness and your chosen sport. When he gets you out of bed at 4am after a heavy night drinking, he is not being sadistic. First, you should be up and running at 4am every morning. If you cannot breeze a 4am 10-mile run after a night in the bar, he is helping you to recognise there are choices in life and you made the wrong one. As you were stupid enough to make the wrong choice you need to feel the pain and discomfort to underline to yourself (1) you are an athlete and (2) athletes cannot drink like that (3) you still have to run the 10 miles at 4am come rain, come sun, or come deathly hangover.
Good Student
HOW TO BE A GOOD STUDENT
I know a Physical Education course where students who are late do 50 full body press ups in front of the class before they can join the class. The teachers tell me that even the dim students learn quickly.
How much do you want to be a good student? There are choices to be made. These choices involve
- Your time
- Your finances
- Your social life
Time
Your Time
Everyone, good student or not, has demands on their time. You need to plan your week. If you have to do paid work, plan those hours. If you are on a full time degree, plan to use 35 hours or so in classes and study. If you are on a science or engineering course you may need more hours. If you are in an important relationship you need to plan quality time with your loved one. If as well as study you have some other activity plan that time.
A good student will still have half a day in reserve. It comes in handy for illness, exhaustion, being a good neighbour, or just chilling.
So who are the friends of a good student? In your first week at college, like minded people are meeting up. Everyone knows the jocks, the fashion queens (male and female), the politicos, and the disruptive elements. The good students also float together. Look for the ones who turn up early, have read the textbook chapter in advance of the class, and who do not rush to leave at the end of the class. Some of them ask questions to display their knowledge or ignorance but many do not.
Try to form a study group of people who are brainier than you are. Make it a social event to discuss the subject of the lecture you have just attended. Be a bore, a nerd, or an anorak. An anorak in your subject can justify which is the best textbook and why, has read all the academic writing your professor has produced, has analysed the last six annual examination papers your professor set, and knows where and what to study next. He can actually show you the syllabus and tell you what else should be on it. If you cannot be an anorak, sit next to him and you too will become a good student- seriously! As a lecturer I have been surprised how often it works.
A nerd has all the charm of an anorak, but less actual knowledge and less organisation. He can still be a good student.
Library
Manage Your Time
Everyone has times when they find it easier to study. Some people love the peace of a library after 6pm. Others like to study after their 4am run. Establish a regular pattern that works for you.
One friend surprised everyone who knew him by obtaining a very good law degree when we all thought he was a drunk. He explained that from 1am to 6am, 7 nights a week, he read law books because he could not sleep. He was doing 35 hours a week more study than any of us had realised. I still cannot call him a good student, but he was an effective student.
On most courses, you will be set examinations and assignments. When I was a good student, I thought the professors could ask questions about anywhere on the syllabus and I had to revise it all. When I started to set examination papers, I realised I had to set papers covering the entire syllabus. If you look at the past examination papers, you will see there are patterns. The same questions come up again and again. You can practise answering past examination papers, and ask the anorak to mark them.
In most colleges, there are marking criteria. Ask to see them. When you get a mark, ask the marker to explain why that mark? What would you have to do to earn a mark 5% or 10% better? If you are lucky enough to receive written feedback, read it. Read it again before you hand in the next piece of work because you are probably making the same mistakes. Find out who gets the best marks and ask to read their assignments. What are they doing differently?
Dunce
Lack of Knowledge
The most common problem is simple lack of knowledge. A good student should not have that problem. The typical good student problem is structure. Somehow the knowledge in your head is not getting on to paper. The way round that is to take a big piece of paper and throw down the points you want to make. Once you have done that, which are the key 3 or 4 points you want to make? Number them 10,20,30,40. There are subsidiary points you want to make. Number those 5, 16, 23, 26 etc., wherever they logically fit in. Now you have got all the points you want to make in the order you want to make them. Get on with it.
When it is written, ask a friend to read it for style and clarity. Choose someone who is not on your course.
Another good student mistake is not answering the question that was set. You spend a third of your permitted words on something that can only gain 3% of the marks at best. What is the question about? Answer that.
Money
Your Finances
Work out what it costs to be at College for a year. Add the tuition fees, your living expenses, and how much more you could earn if you were not a student. It is a lot of money. Divide into that figure the number of classroom hours you could attend. Each classroom hour is costing you a lot more money than you had realised. A good student will maximise the value s/he gets out of every classroom hour. How?
Prepare for the class thoroughly. You usually know what will be covered, so read that chapter of the textbook before the class. Then when the professor tells you things he is consolidating the knowledge you have, not trying to convey raw information in a lump. If you are lucky enough to have seminars and tutorials, they are red meat for a good student. You prepare well, you work with the information you have, and you bounce information around with the professor and any students who have also prepared. You really get something out of it.
If you can, get a job that fits in with what you are studying. It builds your CV, helps you network, and you are being paid to gain useful experience. A good student can make the time for relevant paid work.
You may have some activity or sport. At College activities and sport are often subsidised, so use that subsidy to get really good.
That library? If you are there 8 hours a day instead of 1 hour a day, what is the extra cost to you? How much do you save?
Social Life
Everyone needs a social life. You may not want the company of nerds and anoraks 24/7. Go bowling. Do something mindless or fun and meet people. Even a good student is interested in meeting a possible life partner. Many would settle for a considerably shorter period!
Drinking, drugs, and relationship problems will adversely affect your studies, so try to find other ways to fill your time. If you must spend time in bars, be there as paid bar staff or musician.
A good student is usually a good person. If you are not a good person, that again is a matter of choice.
If you are already a good studenr, read how to be an excellent student.
The Seconder Article
How to Be a Good Student
By Tammyrose, eHow User
Be a Good Student Have you ever wondered why some students get all the A's? It's not luck, and its not their relationship with the teacher (I hope!) Good students have consistent, productive behaviors that work. If you would like to know what they are, read on.
Difficulty:
Moderate
Instructions
things you'll need:
- Reliable transportation
- A watch
- Three ring binder with lined paper and divider pages
- Hole puncher
- Pens/ pencils
- Highligter
- Thesaurus
- Study guide (if needed)
- A good attitude
1.
- 1
Use your reliable transportation to come to class on time. Students who walk in late are not only disrupting the teacher, they may be missing valuable information or the best seat in the classroom. Arriving a few minutes early is a lot different than arriving a few minutes late.
- 2
Sit in the front row. Not only will you be able to see and hear the teacher better, you will also be far away from mooching students who tend to sit in the back.
- 3
Be sure that you get a syllabus and then study it carefully. If your teacher goes through it during class, be sure to write down any additional information he or she may provide. Put your syllabus in a safe place and DO NOT LOSE IT. Refer to it throughout the semester whenever you have a question about due dates or class policies. This will save your teacher a lot of time and trouble.
- 4
Write down all pertinent class information such as: meeting day and time, room number, professor's name, and class section number and code (such as PHI 10, 28779) This will prevent you from getting lost on campus the first few days and will come in great handy if you need to add/drop the class.
- 5
Learn your professor/ teacher's name and what he or she likes to be called. "Mr." "Ms." "Instructor" or "Dr." may be appropriate. Unless your teacher requests otherwise, use his or her last name to convey the proper respect.
- 6
Come to class ready to learn. TURN OFF YOUR CELPHONE, PAGER, OR OTHER ELECTRONIC DEVICE. Do not leave your cell phone on vibrate; it is still a disruption to the class. Be sure that you have gone to the bathroom, gotten something to eat, and have all your necessary books, pens, and paper. You should not be getting up and leaving in the middle of class on a regular basis, even just to make a phone call. Save those types of behaviors for an emergency.
- 7
Be prepared by taking good notes. What if you never taken notes before and you're not sure how? The only answer is to practice. Some guidance classes will teach you how to write notes if you need help, but mostly, learning how to listen for and write down important information comes from the experience of actually doing it. You should be taking notes every time your teacher lectures and then storing them in a safe place. Refer to your notes just after leaving class; this way your mind will still be fresh.
- 8
Get the phone numbers of at least two other class members. That way, if you miss a class, you can call to find out what you missed. Remember, it is your responsibility to know the information that your teacher presents and that is covered in the book. Don't expect a teacher to regive a lecture that they already gave in class. If you haven't spoken to anyone in the class, simply approach them and ask, "Would you like to exchange phone numbers? I always like to have someone's number in case I miss anything." Most students are happy to have a buddy they can rely on. Its a win-win situation.
- 9
Start working on an assignment as soon as possible. Time goes by faster than you expect it to, and we can't always foresee incidents that will get in the way of our homework. Also, if you plan to get an A on your assignment, you will probably need to spend hours working on it. A lot of people aren't willing to do the work required to get an A. Others are. If you have any questions about how to do the assignment or when to turn it in, consult your syllabus and then your teacher.
- 10
Turn in all assignments! (extra credit is only optional if you are earning a good grade.) This would seem like a no-brainer, but many students fail to do this. Also, be very familiar with assignment make-up policies. If you have a special situation, talk to your teacher.
- 11
If you are assigned to do group work, whether its discussion or turning in a presentation, be a good group member. That means that in a group, you are working just as hard as if you were on your own. Bring your ideas and your feedback to the table. Be serious about the assignment. Taking the attitude of, "I'm so bad at this stuff; you guys can handle it. Your ideas are way better than mine," is not being modest; it's being lazy. In the case of discussion, you are depriving your classmates of the feedback they should have received from you. And in the case of an assignment, you are making your group members do all the work! Don't cop out. In contrast, dominating a group and not allowing everyone to contribute ideas is just as bad. Even if you don't like someone else's ideas, you may need to compromise and go along with it, because group work is supposed to be a group effort.
- 12
Learn from your mistakes. That means if your teacher writes, "Use better grammar" than you should study grammar. If your teacher says, "Excellent! But I feel your conclusion is a little weak" than study how to write a conclusion. If you completely bomb a test, that should be a wake-up call to you. If you procrastinate so long that you are not ready with your project, and it turns into a humiliating experience, you need to ask yourself, "What went wrong? Why did I fail, and how could I do it better next time?" Go to your teacher and ask for feedback if you need more clarification.
- 13
Have a good attitude. People who show up to a class and complain all the time, talking on their cell phone and behind the teacher's back, are really only displaying their immaturity. Leave your personal problems at home, show up with a smile, and try to imagine why you might need to know this information, if it doesn't seem obvious.
Analysis
I agree with Charles James’s opinion about the good student is not born, but made. According to his opinion, to be a good student there are some choice to be made, involve our time, our finances, and our social life.
He said that everyone, a good student or not has demands on their time. Yes, that’s right if hard to arrange the time. In our life, be hard to arrange our time nicely. But, there are some student can arrange their time nicely. For student that can’t arrange their time nicely, they usually spend their time to do something that not useful. That’s very different with the student that can use their time nicely. A student that can arrange their time can divide flatly. For example: plan time with family, holiday, study, etc.
One of the problems to be a good student is lack of knowledge. So, one of the activities nicely is read the article, media mass, and read the all of thing that have a relationship with knowledge.
According to Charles’s opinion, a good student must have to arrange their finance. Although the condition of their economic is bad, but they must arrange their finance. How to pay their school cost by their self without make another people feel disturb. More useful than we spend our time to shopping, we can spend our time in a place that make us get the knowledge. For example: library, museum, etc.
Everyone needs a social life. Although most of our time we use for study, but we need the time for interaction, socialization with environment. But, a good student can keep their society. Can choose a good friend, and lived at the good environment. A good student has a good personality. So, if they have a friend that has a bad effect to them, they will not be influence because they have a good basic personality. And it will be they use in every step in their life.
A good student usually has a good attitude, like respectful, discipline, and diligent. There are some step to be a good student. And it will be explain at http://www.ehow.com/how_2039704_be-good-student.html .
Charles said that if have become a good student, the next we must know how to be an excellent student.
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