Make First Year Count
Ellie Patten| 19th September 2015
So you’re made it through “freshers”, you’ve sussed out your ultimate pre-drinks playlist and
you’ve probably met every student within a mile of your flat. Now it’s time to tackle the real
reason you’re at university in the first place: work.
You might have heard that first year doesn’t count. While this might be true in the fact that the grades you achieve in first year don’t usually contribute to your final grade, it doesn’t mean you don’t need to try. The more work you do in your first, and often easiest year, the better shape you’ll be in for the following years of your degree, and the less stress and work you’ll have to cope with in second and third year, when you’ll be wishing you had put more effort in during first year. But this doesn’t mean first year has to be as stressful as the following two. Here are some ways you can maximise your productivity during first year, and minimise problems later on.
My first tip to minimise the amount of work you’re left with at the end of the year, and at the end of your degree, is to take good notes in the first place. It might sound overly simple, but sometimes it can be harder than you think. If you can, print out lecture slides before lectures (most lecturers will either ask you to do this regardless, or do this for you), so that you have less to frantically scribble during the lecture. You can also record lectures on phones, and iPhones in particular have surprisingly good sound quality even in a busy, coughing, sneezing, freshers-flu-filled lecture theatre.
When making notes in lectures, don’t worry about making “pretty” notes: you can make the notes pretty when you go back to your room and write them up later. Another very effective tip is to not text during lectures. It might seem seriously tempting when you know that there’s no way the lecturer will see you at the back of the hall, but even sending a quick tweet can mean you miss hugechunks of lectures that you can never quite recover.
One of the biggest changes in university is that there is very little homework, and for most
courses, a lot less time spent actually being taught. But don’t rejoice yet. This means that rather
than listening to teachers for most of the day and then waiting for them to tell you how to continue learning at home, you will have to make up homework for yourself. As much as you might like to think that lecturers tell you everything you will need to know for the next three years, they often don’t include everything you need to know, and if they do, you may not have time to write it all down.
When setting yourself further reading, or revision tasks, you might feel tempted to give yourself the first week, month or even term off, but if you want to come out of university with a top grade, you’re going to have to push yourself from the start. There’s obviously no need to spend every waking moment learning, but lecturers aren’t lying when they say you should spend at least one hour on independent work for every hour you spend in lectures (though this can vary depending on your course).
Independent work means going through notes you’ve made, looking up anything you didn’t
understand and reading through a textbook or website to find extra information about a topic. This becomes particularly crucial in second and third year, so the sooner you learn, the better, as then you’ll have much less to do when you come to revise your final exams. If you don’t know where to start, lecturers often add references at the end of their presentations, or if in doubt, email them. Trust me, lecturers don’t bite, and if they do, they’re not doing their job properly. Remember, you’re paying £9,000 a year: you had better make the most of it.
Finally, it’s time to kick that procrastination problem. Download one of those apps that stops you from trawling Facebook or Twitter when you should be writing an essay. Even though that essay might be boring you half to death, what should be a simple hour of writing can quickly escalate into three hours of half-writing, half-procrastination, which doesn’t feel anywhere near as productive as work, or as fun as an actual break.
Like this? Check out Ellie's blog here!
