Getting the Best out of College or University (OP)
I thought it might be useful to have a thread that discusses what it is like to be at College or University and what it means to learn and learn well. Learning is wide ranging and will involve your rationality, your emotions, your motivation, your sense of values and for believers of whatever faith - spirituality.
So I will post some idea and tips and maybe you would like to do the same.
In life if one wants to succeed one needs information and motivation. Information so you know what you have to do and motivation so that you do it even if the going gets tough - and it will. So here are two tips for you if you want to succeed BUT if you think you can succeed without hard and persistent effort go and lie down now and be content with where you are now because you will never get anywhere else.
Take Personal and Active Responsibility some students believe that knowledge is passed on from tutor to students in some magical or simple (spoon feeding) way that requires no effort from them. This fallacy is summed up in the old academic joke “the subject matter goes from the teacher’s notes to the students’ notes without passing through the mind of either”. Teachers can pass on knowledge using notes and examples but no one can rationally believe that therefore learning has taken place. Learning cannot be done if we remove individual responsibility, active involvement and choices from the process because to do so would undermine the values of any successful education: personal discipline, independence of thought, worthwhile learning effort and simple curiosity.
Motivated to succeed through effort to improve one’s own intelligence and ready to accept ideas and learn from just about anyone or anything, not setting arbitrary limits on where or who learning comes from. Thoughtful learners KNOW that they can improve by their own efforts so they look for critical feedback on work (not just reassurance that it is right) because they want always to get better; regarding failure or setbacks as a challenge, a means to improve, a reason to plan not as a sign that they lack intelligence.
Negotiation and Persuasion - because a good learner is not passive but seeks to find solution to all sorts of difficulties or obstacles and so must work with tutors and many others to get the best out of a situation in the time available. The difficulties might include class timings, the course notes, you may feel the work is too hard or too simple, you may not like the way it is taught, the equipment might be poor, group work not organised - the list is endless. There are a number of negotiation/persuasion strategies that might be employed.
The win/win Approach – the suggestion is that agreement can be reached if concerned parties consider their underlying interests, requirements; possible decision consequences rather than stubbornly defending their own positions and so can often reach a decision that is mutually beneficial.
Consequences Approach – any decision entails risk and so we can never be sure if our probability estimates are sound or not but what we can do is know about the consequences of each decision and that is often a better guide as to what to do. This of course is not a new idea and King Solomon in the Bible famously used it so deal with an argument between two women and one baby. This is sometimes called ‘creative’ because it challenges you to look at a range of alternatives where each party to an issue ends up with something.
Advocacy – here one works with argument to obtain the most favourable outcome or at least the best alternative that is available. It is generally thought that good advocacy involves persuasion and that might be accomplished in many ways.
Modes of Persuasion – the New Scientist (May 2008) published an article on persuasion and here is a summary of what was suggested there.
Mimic the mannerisms if the ones who are being persuaded.
Framing or leading people to think about an issues or opinion in a way that is advantages to you. Instead of saying inheritance tax say its death tax if you oppose it
Less is more; that is don’t give too many reasons to back up your argument as it can harden opinion against you and it is suggested that often two solid reasons or arguments are the most effective. (tip: I have found this to be the MOST effective means of persuasion)
Grind them down or nagging but do it with care and note the factor ‘less is more’
The medium is the means and in the modern world you will not always be able to pick the most suitable means to negotiate and so you have to factor that into your planning so that you get the best available means.
Style over substance so don’t hesitate or stumble or give them time to think and this means planning what it is you want to say before you say it. One must also exercise some humanity here as it’s not just a matter of getting what you want at any cost.
Get them angry and feel a sense of injustice; essentially anger accompanied by the feeling that there is a solution to the problem then your message is more likely to be persuasive.
Resistance is not futile – move toward a target bit by bit. Sometimes there will be a deadlock and so one might present a position closer to your target’s views and if you do that you are closing the gap but doing it little by little.
This is not about pestering academic or other staff night and day over every difficulty large or small but rather a responsible and reasonable attitude which seeks for help and guidance leading to an improved learning experience. One might note here that the ability to negotiate is something one needs to do right through life and of course others will negotiate with you.
Another point here is that negotiations need decisions at some point and in general it is best if those decisions are arrived at collectively, that way they have a chance of being fair by being more fully discussed. The only real exception to collective decision making is when the decisions requires some kind of expert opinion and in that case one seeks out a relevant expert to help you through the discussions.
Finally, negotiating a better learning situation is not intended to make your learning effortless - if you think that then you have not understood a word I have said and you will never succeed because persistence in education is omnipotent.
I was very interested in rthe mindset quiz answered them and tried sending a private message but it was rejected as I need to post a set number of posts before I can do that!
Any chance of directing me to a link that will give me the results once I complete the quiz? I'd be very interested in discovering my mindset,,,
I was very interested in rthe mindset quiz answered them and tried sending a private message but it was rejected as I need to post a set number of posts before I can do that!
Any chance of directing me to a link that will give me the results once I complete the quiz? I'd be very interested in discovering my mindset,,,
many thanks
It is not permitted to give out email address so either ask the administrator for a special dispensation wait until you have made a few more posts
One or two have asked me what is to be valued in learning so over the next few posts I will offer some suggestions and you of course might add a few yourself.
Learning Incentives are often hard to pin down and students sometimes have only vague ideas about qualifications and better job prospects and that engenders an attitude that treats learning like a visit to the supermarket; get it over with as quick as possible or to put it another way you sign up for a course, you do the course and get a qualification then you stop learning until the next course. Here are some real possibilities but they are not automatic, one has to make positive choices towards effort to attain them:
Investment – learning is an investment for the future and like any investment it needs a good environment in which to grow but also there is a price to pay and a risk to take in effort, perseverance and accepting challenges. A concomitant of this is to act irresponsibly in a learning situation implies you are wasting everyone’s time as well as throwing away a golden opportunity and opportunities once lost may be very hard or even impossible to retrieve.
Private Values – a good education is to be highly prized as it not only helps you with regard to employment but it is a source of pleasure all by itself because with the right attitude you are always learning not just when you are on a course of some kind. This idea was aptly summed up by B. F. Skinner when he said "Education is what survives when what has been learned has been forgotten.”
Here is a continuation of my ideas on why we want to learn or the motivations for learning. Here we just shift a little from practical motivations to what I shall call creative and spiritual ones. The point here is that one cannot expect God to reward you with success if you have no values and do no work or to out it another way it is good to offer prayers for your studies but if that is all you do and start believing the effort is not needed then you are deluded.
Joy – does this sound too strong to you? That learning can be a delight, a buzz, a pleasure, an amusement, a satisfaction, a thrill, an adventure, a stimulus, a self-rewarding experience if you want it to and you are willing to pay the price in effort and perseverance. One might say here that the opposite is true that the experience of learning can be a bore, a turn off, irksome, an irritation, a waste of time, hard work but some of the negative elements might just be part of the price to pay; no one can win an Olympic Gold but just by turning up, no one can be a great pianist without the toil involved in leaning scales and practicing, no one can be a great scholar without hard study, some of which may be a real struggle. But it’s all well worth it; if you don’t think so then that is a choice you make and tacitly you therefore accept any concomitant consequences.
Public Values – someone with reliable learning, educated, will in general be valued. One might note here that this is not just about qualifications and one only has to consider how many people in the world have a PhD or an MSc or a Microsoft Qualification or any number of other qualifications but they do not as of right get well paid jobs or command general respect where they work. The world we live in is market place and the commodity you really have is an education. This idea was perhaps expressed very well by Rousseau who said “So let us excel, never mind in what. I will be sought after, opportunities will present themselves, and my merit will do the rest”.
Here is a continuation of my ideas on why we want to learn or the motivations for learning. Here we just shift a little from practical motivations to what I shall call creative and spiritual ones. The point here is that one cannot expect God to reward you with success if you have no values and do no work or to out it another way it is good to offer prayers for your studies but if that is all you do and start believing the effort is not needed then you are deluded.
Joy – does this sound too strong to you? That learning can be a delight, a buzz, a pleasure, an amusement, a satisfaction, a thrill, an adventure, a stimulus, a self-rewarding experience if you want it to and you are willing to pay the price in effort and perseverance. One might say here that the opposite is true that the experience of learning can be a bore, a turn off, irksome, an irritation, a waste of time, hard work but some of the negative elements might just be part of the price to pay; no one can win an Olympic Gold but just by turning up, no one can be a great pianist without the toil involved in leaning scales and practicing, no one can be a great scholar without hard study, some of which may be a real struggle. But it’s all well worth it; if you don’t think so then that is a choice you make and tacitly you therefore accept any concomitant consequences.
Public Values – someone with reliable learning, educated, will in general be valued. One might note here that this is not just about qualifications and one only has to consider how many people in the world have a PhD or an MSc or a Microsoft Qualification or any number of other qualifications but they do not as of right get well paid jobs or command general respect where they work. The world we live in is market place and the commodity you really have is an education. This idea was perhaps expressed very well by Rousseau who said “So let us excel, never mind in what. I will be sought after, opportunities will present themselves, and my merit will do the rest”.
learning is definitely a 'buzz' - mental stimulus and 'engagement' with disentangling and constructing knowledge... In my opinion 'learning' is one of the greatest 'blessings' SubhanAllah.
There's nothing that beats the feeling of finally having 'understood' something esp where days or weeks of thought and reflection and reading have gone into it... the feeling of 'satisfaction' and accomplishment are surreal...
learning is definitely a 'buzz' - mental stimulus and 'engagement' with disentangling and constructing knowledge... In my opinion 'learning' is one of the greatest 'blessings' SubhanAllah.
There's nothing that beats the feeling of finally having 'understood' something esp where days or weeks of thought and reflection and reading have gone into it... the feeling of 'satisfaction' and accomplishment are surreal...
Sorry Hugo not trying to 'hijack' your thread
No need to be sorry at all and I am delighted with your comment. When you study and persist there is nothing quite like that moment of discovery when you finally see through the haze and 'get it' and sometimes what you see is breathtaking - when that happens you don't need a pat on the back or someone telling you how good you are because you know you got there by effort so getting there is it own reward and now you are excited, vitalised to get to the next peak and get the buzz all over again.
it's 'addictive'... once your 'hooked' it's hard to stop... and it doesn't stop - you always need your next 'fix'...
of mental 'stimulation'
learning is definitely lifelong Alhamdulillah! Nothing that quite 'beats' the feeling... always something interesting to 'mull' over or discover....wooow
it's 'addictive'... once you're 'hooked' it's hard to stop... and it doesn't stop - you always need your next 'fix'...
of mental 'stimulation'
learning is definitely lifelong Alhamdulillah! Nothing that quite 'beats' the feeling... always something interesting to 'mull' over or discover....wooow
Critical Feedback
It might sound odd to say that critical feedback, which of course can be both positive and negative, is in fact an incentive. The reason it’s an incentive is that it’s useful information because it tells you what to do next, it forces you to confront issues and make choices. It might be easier to see this if we use an analogy. Think of your learning as if it was a product which you want to bring to market and sell. Well, it’s obvious if you are to be successful with your product you need market information and some of that might be positive and some negative but if you accept it openly it all helps you to know what actions to take so that when you launch the product it will be successful.
One might notice how hard it might be to get negative information about your product (your learning) because there is a sense in which you really don’t want to hear that because it’s uncomfortable and praise is much to be preferred. But it’s obvious that to ignore criticism it is utterly foolish because it means you might end up with a flawed product that no one wants and sadly it implies a tacit choice not to want to learn.
Do not fall into the trap of only wanting positive feedback because that is just another way if asking for praise and often work is of such poor quality that it is hard to find anything good to say about it. Face it, if I were your tutor and responded to your work by just saying "very good" then your ego might have been stroked but as far as usefulness in moving forwards it would be next to worthless. Nabokov in his lectures on Russian literature aptly summed up the inestimable value of criticism when he said
“next to the right to create, the right to criticise is the richest gift that liberty of thought and speech can offer”.
Shared Knowledge and Experiences
Learning is not private, there is a whole community that you can access; a community that values learning and where you can give and take. There is a vast amount of information literally at your finger-tips and its all more or less free, a kind of gift to you from Socrates, Newton, Al Gazali, Hodja, Hawkin, Darwin, Churchill, Feynman, Turing, Von Neumann, the Beatles, Mozart, Bobby Moore, the list is endless and awe inspiring when we think of such giants gifting their thinking to you! Sharing is a vital aspect of learning. One might recall what the Dali Lama said “share your knowledge; it’s a way to achieve immortality”.
If we examine the latest research in social grouping of various kinds, you will learn that we are all influenced by those around us and also more surprisingly those around them. It’s as if a virus is let loose so good humour and kindness can spread through a group just as much as grumpiness, hate and unkindness. So be mindful of your social grouping and inject good things into it and its more or less certain you will be rewarded.
Here are some further thoughts on what is the benefit and value of education and leaning.
Life Long – learning stays with you throughout life and it touches all parts of your life and in general enhances its quality because it opens a wide window on what life is about and how it’s to be enjoyed and made useful.
Expanded Choices – if you learn well and become educated then that will give you more choices in what worlds you can enter, jobs you can do, what people you get to know, what clubs or organisation you join, what entertainment you can experience, what good works you can do and so on. In simple, terms a good education expands your horizons and let you live just that little bit more. It is not guaranteed of course as we cannot know what the future holds but it’s certain you will be better able to deal with whatever it might be.
It is tempting to think that life is fully defined in much the same way as Ohms law, Archimedes principles or gravity is – they don’t change with time and no decision you or anyone else makes will allow you to avoid them. So for some, perhaps many people it’s as if the past fully defines their future and whereas it is obvious that our own past has some effect it is not an iron law. In short the past is over, you cannot change it and whatever happened there cannot be undone. But the future is a different matter and YOU can make choices and therefore make a difference to your own life and that of others. So don’t stand idly by lamenting or praising the past make a choice and make a difference for good.
God in his infinite wisdom has made the Universe to obey unfailingly the natural laws of nature but at the same time he made us rational thinking beings who are able to make choices and I think God expects you to exercise the brain you have.
Now of course one cannot know the future but for every choice of action you can know the consequences and by looking at those you can evaluate your choices. For example, if you make the choice not to do work (and make no mistake about it, it is a choice) then you can easily work out the consequences.
I notice there are other threads in this topic but it seem a good idea to post my thoughts here.
Finding a subject major can be difficult but it’s not the end of the world if you get it wrong either and most Universities will be flexible if you find when you get there that the subject you chose is not quite right. It will almost always be possible to see a tutor and change course; you lose a little time but at 19 or 20 it's not that important even if you take a year out. Some points:
1. It is also important to be aware that the study choices you make will not necessarily ruin your whole life so although you must make choices rationally it is not the end of the world if you make a wrong one and all that may happen is that you lose some time but its best to do that than persist with something that is not right for you.
2. It is also quite well known that as you move through life many many people change careers many times so again at this stage one cannot predict what will happen to you so don't get over-worried but don’t get lazy about choices either. I know personally people who started out as Engineers and ended up as teachers, medical doctors who became writers, bankers who became retailers, teachers who became actors and so on.
3. It is fine to talk over your choices with anyone who will listen sympathetically to you, that way you will get a chance to explore your choice in an open manner. However, there are plenty of people who will tell you what or what not to take - listen to them and question them as to why they take that view and see if they have any real knowledge of the relevant subject and again that will help you form up your own opinion. However, I would steel yourself against automatically accepting such suggestions no matter who they are from because they are not you and they will not suffer any consequences however well-intentioned they are.
4. You can try inventing criteria such as: subject difficulty, job prospects, level of personal interest, university cost, parental suggestions, is the subject rapidly changing, do you want to go on to research, do you want a challenge, where are you friends going etc. But these must not become a kind of algorithm, they are just another way to explore your choices.
5. It is probably always best to choose a subject that you like in some way but look for a challenge also. You want something that inspires you because it is bound to get more difficult as you progress and that is when you need a reason to fight and persevere and if you don’t like the subject it’s all too easy to give up on it.
6. In some communities and some families there is pressure to move into certain areas such as becoming a medical doctor and that is fine if that is what you want but if everyone was a doctor who would look after our libraries, plumbing, car, cooking, food production and so on. It’s a fallacy to believe that say a medical doctor is better that a poet or car mechanic or mathematician – we all will end up eventually with our place in the world and the world needs all sorts of people.
7. Be aware that some directions mean a long long academic study period to get to the top. For example, if you want to be a top flight physicist then it’s going to take you about 10 years moving through undergraduate studies to doctoral work and then into a major a research team and publications. There is no short cut.
8. Accept that you might not make the best choice, there is no way to be 100% certain that your choice is right because the future is unknown. But as I said earlier, there is no shame and no great loss in going a step or two back if that becomes necessary; see such an event as a challenge not a setback - better to do that than face years of drudgery and disappointment, always wishing you had chosen something else.
Learning and knowledge are gifts that must be treasured not regarded as prizes to be won or simply a means to an end; so love learning for its own sake. Always be ready to encourage when you see learning in others and see it as a spur to greater personal effort not being afraid to abandon old learning strategies even though they might work but always on the lookout for new ones or improvements to old ones. Recognise that self esteem comes from knowing that you honestly worked hard and put real effort into something not in seeking constant praise for achievement.
There is a very odd phenomena and that is that if you give students a questionnaire on learning ideas and in that questionnaire you ask students “do they value success” unsurprisingly they will say “yes”. Similarly, if you ask “do they think effort is necessary for success” they will also say “yes”. However, if you try to correlate these two responses in the questionnaire for a group of students it almost always turns out to be zero; implying that although they value success they have no value at all for the effort needed to get it – in other words the only thing that matters is success. Sadly, such an attitude is destructive to ones personality and to use an analogy it would be like saying only the gold medal winners in the Olympics are any good, and if you are not one of them then you are rubbish. The message is then, that you must learn to value the necessary effort because only then will you begin to appreciate what it takes and be willing to give it to get success.
Sadly, our teachers and parents are very good at praising and rewarding success but very poor at doing the same for effort as if the success cost you nothing and that is I think a bad attitude.
Reflection
Is an essential learning tool and it is tied in to our emotions and feelings because whilst taking time out to look back it can also be a bit painful because it often will disturb our certainties. The trouble with certainties is they can shut our minds down and we stop reflecting (because we are afraid we might lose our certainty) and this cuts off the possibility of new insights and learning that might follow.
Learning demands one to slow down from time to time and reflect because any learning may require that you modify what you already know or even get rid of what you know in its entirety. This can be very hard to do even traumatic that is why one needs to slow down and give yourself time to absorb the learning. But one also needs to understand that this ‘time out’ also allows you to enjoy the moment, the now as one savours (just like good food) what it is you have learned.
It is interesting to consider how the brain works here and the very latest research suggests that as soon as you stop focusing on the particular it switches over automatically into a self-reflective mode, it’s as if the brain is daydreaming but at the same time sorting things out for itself. Indeed when the brain is in this daydreaming state it actually consumes more energy that when focusing on a given problem or topic. It follows, that it is a good idea to take breaks from learning to give your brain time to sort out all the information that has been passing into it; in fact if you don’t do it deliberately the brain will do it for you and you will find your thoughts wandering or suddenly wake up because you have fallen asleep. A concomitant of this is that cramming, leaving everything until the last minute is actually impossible and almost always leads to very poor learning and failure.
So try taking a walk, read a novel, do some gardening, chat to your neighbour, play table tennis at lunch time, read a newspaper, have a cup of coffee, go for a swim, listen to music and so on the list is endless. As the English saying goes “all work and no play make Jack a dull boy”
It might help some of you to think of the Arabic word 'Ijtihad' which is similar to the English word reflection but also has the idea of effort, struggle attached to it. This means you must take time to do it because there may be new things to learn, there may be modifications to what you know and even disposing altogether what you know and it is obvious that often any of these activities will be a real struggle.
Be Inspired by Effort seen in yourself, those around you and those from history who have often struggled and gone through pain to achieve something and appreciate that effort is invariably worthwhile, be inspired also by those people who often selflessly gave their time and knowledge and skills to help and aid you to get where you are or want to be. Learning as Gladwell suggests, involves autonomy, complexity and an unbreakable connection between effort and reward. Autonomy because only you can do the learning and complexity because one has to manage a whole set of factors but most of all understanding, a really deep understanding that effort, persistent effort is the key and will bring its own rewards.
Effort and practice imply perseverance and that quality in terms of success is both omnipotent and sacred. I wonder, do you found it odd that I say ‘sacred’ here – but the reason I say it is that you must be devoted to learning not because it will get you a better job or massage your ego but because it is a gift that must be treasured. In every society, its constitution will only give you the right to purse learning but you have to catch it yourself and as Benjamin Franklin said “without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning”
Franklin also said “being ignorant is not so much a shame, as being unwilling to learn". But how would I or anyone know you are 'unwilling' - well its easy, they would just look at how much effort you put into it. You see if you ask ANY student "are you willing to learn", they will of course say 'yes' but willingness is proved by action not platitudes.
This is not a new idea and indeed it is as old as learning itself and we find the idea in the Agamemnon by Aeschylus, one of the oldest plays (and some say the best play) ever written about war, sacrifice and pain when at its start we hear the watchman signalling that all is well to a chorus of elders from Argos reflecting “Tis Zeus alone who shows the perfect way of knowledge: He hath ruled, men shall learn wisdom, by affliction schooled.” In the same manner Seneca writing in Rome some 2,000 years ago said "No man was ever wise by chance”.
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