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So, I Graduated... Now What?

5/17/2016

8 Comments

 
This last Sunday, I graduated. I said goodbye to my college years and everything that made them as special as they were to me. I said goodbye to professors, friends, suitemates, bad cafeteria food, and even to the sidewalks I’ve stared at morning after morning for the last three years. But before those goodbyes were even over, before I’d returned my gown or finished packing my car or gotten rid of the food in my fridge that I simply couldn’t, in good conscience, drag home with me, I was looking beyond graduation day. I wasn’t looking at graduation as the day when everything ended or everything began; it was just a day. That’s not to say it wasn’t a great day – believe me, I was stoked when I finally received my diploma. But it was a day that I knew would come and go, a day when I knew I’d be asked questions about my future plans, and a day when I knew I’d want to have answers to those questions. While I was preparing my answers, I learned something amazing: I actually have a plan. Sort of.

Just one day after graduation, I see the countless “graduated and unemployed” posts popping up on my newsfeed, and I see these with sympathy – after all, I’m not immune to student loan debt – but I also view them with a certain level of hope. For my part, I don’t know exactly what I want to do. I recognize that I’ve just graduated and that the clock is ticking for me to figure my life out, but, for all intents and purposes, I have figured it out. I have my plan, and even though that involves not having a paying job for a few months while I apply for jobs (yes, that is, in fact, the master plan), travel, and generally try to figure out a little bit more about who and where I want to be now that I’m not “Hope Swedeen, Student at Susquehanna University,” I’m pretty confident that I’ll be fine. I don’t say this because I did things “right” or because the world is just magically at my fingertips. I say this because I haven’t been looking at graduation as the last day or the first day of my two separate lives. I haven’t looked at graduation with sadness or with regrets or with fear. The most I can say for myself is that I was completely ready to not have homework for a little while. But never once did I think, “This is the end” or “This is the beginning” that day. I simply thought, “Keep going.” And that’s what I intend to do.

I’m going to keep going, moving forward with whatever plans I already have or make along the way, and nothing is going to stop me from moving, from changing, from progressing into new stages of my life. Sure, I may be sleeping on my parents’ couch for a few months. I might even be babysitting my brothers and doing chores around the house as though nothing has changed. But at the end of the day, nothing I’m doing is permanent. I hope to keep changing, to keep making plans and pursuing them as fiercely as possible. And right now, the plan is to work on my blog posts, work on my resume, work on expanding my literal horizons, and work on the indent I’m hoping to create in the couch without having to worry about whether I’m forgetting about an assignment. At least for now. (I just graduated. Give me a break).

So for those of you who are nervous about graduating from high school, leaving behind friends or family or lifestyles to pursue the next step, just remember: things aren’t ending; they’re progressing. You’re not leaving people; you’re welcoming new ones. You’re not leaving home; you’re making a home for yourself somewhere else. You’re not starting down a career path; you’re forging your own path. Whatever you end up doing, wherever you end up going after graduation, don’t be afraid, and don’t be sad; just be you, and just keep going. Keep trying to reach your goals, find new dreams if plan A falls through, and be prepared for changes, whether they’re welcome or not. Whatever you do, don’t pay too much attention to the ends and beginnings. Pay attention to this ongoing thing we all call life, and use each day as a means to an end, a building block for all the days after, not an end in itself.

-Hope Swedeen

What are your long-term goals? What are you doing now to reach those goals?
8 Comments

9 Benefits of Learning With Video Tutorials

5/3/2016

18 Comments

 
1. Great for visual learners

If you’re someone who learns better when you can see what you’re trying to accomplish laid out in front of you, then video tutorials are definitely for you. For pretty much anything you want to learn to do, you can find a tutorial online that will give you an audio-visual experience to help you through every step of the process. Whether you want to learn how to make something as a hobby or solve a certain type of math problem for class, you can find videos that give you a visual learning experience.

2. Independent learning – accessible anywhere, any time


It doesn’t matter where you are; if you have Wi-Fi, you can get online and find tutorials. You have the ability to teach yourself to do something anytime and anywhere you go, so if you need to know how to do something by the time your ten-minute train ride is over, you might be in good shape to know it if you can find a tutorial to help you out. I’ve used tutorials to learn how to do something simple like braiding hair, use fairly complicated programs like Photoshop, play songs on piano, use a function on a graphing calculator and do countless other educational or hobby-related tasks. The great part about tutorials is that you don’t need a teacher or a book to teach you how to do something; a short video will often suffice.

3. Can provide a face-to-face learning atmosphere


Even though you aren’t learning from a teacher when you use tutorials, they can still be a sort of face-to-face learning environment, if that’s something that you feel helps you learn. A lot of tutorials are made so that whoever makes them is on the screen walking you through the steps in their videos. Even though it’s one-way communication, if seeing someone give you instruction is the best way for you to learn, tutorials still might be a viable option for you. This is something that I’ve found to be true of myself, as I often remember pieces of information because I can remember exactly how a professor said something or what they were doing when they said it. So the most helpful video tutorials for me are ones that have someone on the screen talking to me.

4. Easy to find


Simply put, tutorials are super easy to find. All you have to do is search for keywords online, and you should be able to find a video that meets your needs within minutes.

5. Short and to the point


Video tutorials can be long or short, but they’re typically short so that you can find specific pieces of information very easily. For example, when I was looking for a tutorial to teach me how to make the background of an image transparent in Photoshop, I didn’t watch an hour-long video about all of the tools in Photoshop. Instead, I found a video that focused solely on how to make a background transparent, and it was less than five minutes long.

6. Ability to skip unnecessary parts and watch important portions multiple times


When you’re in class, you can’t very well tell your teacher to skip over content that you understand because there might be other students who need some extra instruction. At the same time, though, if you’re the person who needs repetition, you might not always get it; your teacher might move on to a new topic too soon. When you’re watching tutorials, you face neither of these issues. You can fast-forward and rewind as many times as you need to skip over information that isn’t relevant to you or review something that you didn’t understand the first or second or third time around. You can do this when you’re using a book to teach yourself how to do something, but it’s much harder to know what you can skip without having already read it, and it takes much more time to reread a section of a book to review than it does to replay a video.

7. Can be paused and saved for later


Just as you can fast-forward or rewind tutorials, unlike in class, you can pause your tutorial lessons and come back to them later. This is beneficial for obvious reasons, especially if you’re using a longer tutorial or a tutorial set to learn how to do something more extensive.

8. Free or cheap alternative to courses and books


Although there are websites that offer tutorials for which you have to pay to have access, there are thousands of free tutorials online that can serve your needs just as well. This is a much cheaper alternative to taking a course, either online or in person, or buying books to help you learn how to do something.

9. Endless supply to help with every aspect of whatever you’re trying to learn how to do


If you have a question that one tutorial doesn’t answer, you can pretty easily find that answer elsewhere. That’s not always the case when you’re reading a book or taking a course that doesn’t answer a question you have. Once you finish a book or course, that’s the end unless you search for another and hope to find that bit of information you’re missing. But with tutorials, you can always search for a specific question, and you’ll typically find your answer in a few short minutes.
 
-Hope Swedeen
 
What websites have you found that offer useful tutorials? What have you learned to do by watching tutorials?
18 Comments

3 Tips to Help You Stay Focused and Motivated

4/26/2016

6 Comments

 
I hear all the time (and sometimes I’m the one saying it), “I don’t want to do this right now.”
There’s no escaping it. There will always be times when you’re forced to do something that simply doesn’t interest you. In school, it might seem like this is all you spend your time doing. Regardless, though, you still have to do it – unfortunate as that might seem.

So how do you deal with schoolwork that feels mundane and irrelevant? In other words, how do you make yourself work through assignments that in no way relate to what you plan to do in the future?
Personally, I have three answers to this, and each of them has worked at different times to help me get through school with my motivation (more or less) intact.

Any of this could be relevant someday; stay focused on it now to benefit yourself in the future 

I know it’s absurd to think that everything that you’re being taught will one day have a use, but it’s equally absurd to think that none of it will. Whether it’s weeks or months or years from now, at least some of what you learn in high school will serve a purpose – and serve you well. You never know what you might end up doing, and anything could be relevant someday. It might be difficult for you to believe that, especially considering that in a previous post, I spoke about a similar idea in an almost opposite way. In that post, I wanted to highlight the fact that not everyone is great at everything or will use everything they learn in high school. I stand by that, but I also know that, on the flip side, there are things that we learn in high school that might seem irrelevant at the time but are useful later.
 
There have been many times in college that I’ve looked back at what I learned in high school and realized just how much I gained from my classes. Sure, there were the useless bits of information – I will never in my life need to know the difference between igneous and sedimentary rocks (I hope) – but there are also classes that serve as a solid background for my studies now. For example, I took a government class in my senior year of high school, which focused on the political system and the way in which the government is set up and functions. At the time, I had absolutely no interest in government or politics, and even though I found parts of the class interesting, overall, I assumed I’d need to know very little about the setup of the federal and state governments. But now I’ve decided to go to law school. I’m taking a course called “Law and Politics,” and some of what we discuss in class and need to know for tests and papers is content I already know because I learned it in high school.
 
This is only one example, but I could give countless others to help you see just how much you will take from your high school education despite what you might think now. Thinking of my classes this way in high school got me through many assignments because, even though I felt that I would never need to know the things I was learning, I had plenty of teachers telling me how they continuously use random knowledge sets to their benefit. Especially in college, I’ve constantly assumed that everything I’m learning will be useful – if even just for a test or to apply it to another class. If you can think of what you learn that way – as a means of understanding a bigger picture or succeeding in a class in the long run, this just might help you work up the motivation to finish an irksome assignment on time. It’s not the easiest way to motivate yourself, and it’s definitely not the most attractive, but it’s something to keep you going if these next two options don’t help you stay focused.

Find something interesting about what you’re learning, and make the most of it 

You might be thinking this just sounds like a half-baked excuse for advice – if you don’t want to do something, there’s a good chance it isn’t interesting, right? But everything that is boring or annoying or just unpleasant either has interesting aspects or can be made interesting. It’s a cheesy concept, but it’s honestly helped me get through classes in which I struggled to pay attention – science, math and history, to name a few – and finish the work assigned for those classes. In classes like these that hold no interest for me, I’m always searching for something to keep my attention.
 
While in class, I focus on things like the way a teacher speaks and presents and the way other people react to what the teacher says. While doing homework and in class, I try to pick out small bits of information that are interesting and focus on those when I can; I find something that interests me within what I’m learning, even if it’s small, and I latch onto that. In an economics class in my senior year of high school, I was bored so often. There was no getting around it. But at least once a class, the teacher would say something that either related to me or intrigued me or went against something I had previously thought was true. I really knew nothing about economics, and I really didn’t want to, but I ended up enjoying several sections of what we learned because I focused not on the boring aspects (of course you have to pay attention to those to understand them) but on the parts of our discussions and lectures that interested me. When I felt I could let my thoughts drift a bit – if the teacher was still explaining something I understood or had stopped to answer a question that I knew the answer to, or at any time where I knew I wouldn’t miss something I needed to know – I would think about that small piece of information that interested me and try to apply it by scribbling little notes all over my notebook. Ultimately, I found that fixating on pieces of information this way helped me understand the concepts to which I paid so much attention as well as the concepts surrounding them, which usually played a role in my understanding.
 
Sometimes, though, I never “find” anything that interests me, so I make something up. I take each question and wonder how I could make my answer as extreme as possible – the wildest answer my teachers might get but still correct. I try to think of ways that something my teacher is saying might not work or be true. I treat my homework with a sense of sarcasm when it doesn’t interest me, making most of what I do into a joke. Even if it means I’m not taking a concept seriously, it at least means I’m paying attention to it, and it means that I might be able to push through an assignment by making my answers more of a joke, more sarcastic, and as outlandish as possible (though still right). But that could just be my sense of humor talking. If making a joke out of your work doesn’t help you get it done, try taking it more seriously. Try finding something about it that interests you because it’s so true you can apply it to your own life or so wrong that you can find no application. Overall, the goal when finding or making something interesting is to make the time go faster and to hopefully give you something that you can think about to keep you focused.
 
Keep the end goal in mind
​

What you have to remember while you’re getting through school is that you’re not just getting through to get out. You’re getting through to get somewhere better – to open the door at the end that will lead you to your future. No matter what’s behind that door, keeping it in sight is always helpful. All through high school, I was kept motivated a lot of times by the thought of graduation and college. I knew that, at the time, it didn’t really matter if I failed or succeeded, but I wanted to go to college, so I knew that my GPA mattered – I knew that how I performed in high school would affect my chances of getting where I wanted to go later. This was probably the best method of motivation I had and still have. It helps you focus on why you’re doing something; and when you have a reason, it’s much easier to do it.
 
If you’re hoping to get into college, if you’re hoping to get a job that expects you to have a relatively high GPA, or if you’re planning on doing anything that will want proof that you can succeed in an environment where you have to do things you don’t want to and you have to complete assignments on time (pretty much every job, ever), then what you do in high school matters. How you do in high school matters – at least to some extent. So keep this in mind always. If you can’t wait to graduate, don’t just think about not being in school. Think about what’s beyond that. Think about what comes next for you and how you can ensure that you get there. Because if you stop caring about where you want to go and focus only on why you want to be done with high school, chances are you won’t do as well as you could – because you won’t have any motivation to do well.
 
-Hope Swedeen
 
How do you stay motivated to stay focused and finish your work? How do you make learning interesting for yourself?
6 Comments

2015 Gallup Poll Offers Insight Into the Factors That Help Produce Engaged, Hopeful Students

4/12/2016

1 Comment

 
The Student Gallup Poll is a survey taken every year that reaches hundreds of thousands of students. It was developed in 2009, and since then, almost 4 million students in grades five through 12 have responded to the survey, answering questions about their experiences in school. The fall 2015 Student Gallup Poll alone reached over 900,000 students in 3,300 schools nationwide. This expansive survey is used as a means of showing educators how students in general feel about school so that they might create programs and adopt or improve teaching strategies to help students better meet the four criteria by which the survey measures student success: engagement, hope, entrepreneurial aspiration, and career and finance literacy. These four criteria are then broken down by the questions students are asked in the survey.

The first two criteria, engagement and hope, are related in that the two factors interact to determine what a student’s experience in school might be like. Overall, it appears that students who are engaged and hopeful while in school can be compared to those who are the opposite – disengaged and discouraged. Students who are engaged and hopeful appear to be more likely to pursue a college education, miss school less frequently, and not only earn better grades but also feel that they are successful in school in general than students who are disengaged and discouraged.

It might seem obvious that students who feel that their education is serving them well and who might enjoy being in school would be more successful, but what does it take to be an engaged and hopeful student? Is it really as difficult as it seems to be a student who meets the criteria that say “you’ll be successful?”
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In the Gallup Poll, students were asked nine questions to determine their level of engagement, and it defined engagement as students’ “involvement in and enthusiasm for school.” The questions are listed below with the percentage of students in grades 5 through 12 who responded that they strongly agree with each of the nine statements about their engagement in school.
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Overall, 50 percent of students surveyed were classified as engaged, 29 percent not engaged, and 21 percent actively disengaged based on the answers received for the 9 questions regarding engagement. Although the survey is geared toward helping educators understand how they can better serve students, it can be a helpful tool for students themselves to look at and perhaps understand why they’re struggling to remain engaged in their learning. If you look at the 9 criteria of engagement and think “nope,” in response to most of them, you’re not alone – not even close. Based on the survey data, the students who strongly agree with the statements are not the majority, and 50 percent of students aren’t considered “engaged” for one reason or another.

If you look at this list, what sticks out to you? What do you find yourself disagreeing with? If you look at a list item like “I have at least one teacher who makes me excited about the future” and feel like that’s not true for you, try to do something about it. Find a teacher who you like to talk to, and start talking about the future. Start asking questions, start getting engaged for yourself – you don’t have to wait around for your teachers to make you feel engaged. The same goes for the other items on the list. I used to think that if a teacher didn’t teach me anything new or interesting, that day of school was pretty much a waste. But if you don’t feel like you’re being challenged or you’re learning anything interesting, challenge your teachers. Make things interesting. Ask questions about things that intrigue you or things that confuse you, and you just might find that school can be as interesting as you make it.

The same goes for the “hope” category on the survey. In this section, students answered 7 questions to determine whether they were “hopeful,” which the survey defines as “the ideas and energy students have for the future.” The results here are broken down into three groups. Forty-eight percent are hopeful, or students who are “more engaged with school, positive about the future, goal-oriented and can overcome obstacles, enabling them to navigate a pathway to achieve their goals. They possess the requisite energy to achieve their dreams,” according to the survey. Thirty-four percent are stuck, or students who “may lack ideas and have difficulty making progress toward their goals,” and 18 percent are discouraged, or “have difficulty identifying goals for the future and lack the motivation, energy or resources needed to achieve their goals.” Looking at these descriptions, how would you categorize yourself? Are you hopeful for your future? Are you discouraged? Are you sort of “stuck” somewhere in the middle?

The seven questions asked of students along with the percent who strongly agree with each statement are listed below.
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The statement that sticks out to me is “I have a mentor who encourages my development.” This has the lowest percentage of students who strongly agree, when to me, it’s probably the most important question on this list. Only 33 percent of students, on average, feel that they have a mentor who encourages them, but it seems to me that if the number of students who did have a mentor were to increase, the other percentages within the “hope” category would increase as well. Setting goals, believing in your future, believing you’ll have a great job one day, and even knowing you’ll graduate are really tough concepts to tackle independently. It’s difficult to do or believe any of these things without feeling that you have reason to – without having someone who supports you telling you “you’re right; you can do it.” Not everyone has this luxury – some have to find the courage and motivation on their own. But if you’re someone who has access to supportive teachers, use that support. They are there not just to teach you but to prepare you and launch you into your future.

Your teachers can have a huge impact on your learning experience throughout your entire school career. In college, I’ve seen that having relationships with my professors is not only beneficial, it might as well be required. Constant communication and support have gotten me to where I am today whether it be with my high school teachers or my college professors. Although many of the teachers with whom I’ve built these relationships have sought me out and taken an interest in my education, I have still made an effort to reach out to teachers who I know will be helpful to me and have strived to maintain relationships with teachers who I might not have in class anymore but still want to remain close to. Often times, it is the job of teachers to check that their students are engaged and hopeful for their futures, succeeding as much as possible.

This survey is targeted toward teachers so that they can adjust their teaching methods to better help students get the most out of their education. But, ultimately, there is little that teachers can do if their students are not actively trying to be engaged or trying to find hope. If you want to be a student who is engaged and hopeful, who feels successful and gets good grades and is driven to pursue a future that will mean something to you, then get engaged. Do your part – take stock of your own educational needs, and start adjusting. Start demanding the education you want and building the relationships you need to further your own future rather than waiting for your teachers to make school everything you want it to be. Because once you leave school, no one is going to be adjusting to meet your needs – it will be up to you to go after what you want on your own. It just might be easier if you set yourself up for success in advance.

-Hope Swedeen

Are you happy with your grades and level of success in school? How could you become more engaged in and hopeful about your education?
1 Comment

6 Things You Need to Know About the New SAT

3/22/2016

5 Comments

 
If you’re preparing to take the SAT this year, or if you’ve already taken it, you’ll know that, as of March, 2016, the test changed rather dramatically. Students and teachers must now adjust to the new test, and if your school offer test prep for the SAT, they’re probably trying to implement and understand the changes as well as they can. If you haven’t been exposed to these changes yet, or if you’re confused about what they’ll mean for you as a test-taker, I’ve listed six changes that I feel are most important and that sum up the basics of what you’ll need to know about the SAT before you take it.

The information can be found on several sites, including the Princeton Review, College Board, and Veritas Prep, but I’ve consolidated and combined that information so that, hopefully, you’ll be able to understand the changes without having to flip between sources, as I did. College Board also provides a page that explains why changes were made and what exactly they will entail, so if you’re looking for some information on that, visit the “Key Content Changes” page.

1. No penalty for wrong answers 

In my opinion, this is one of the most important changes to the SAT. On the old SAT, test-takers were penalized 1/4 of a point for every answer they got wrong. This never sat quite right with me because it not only penalized those who didn’t have the knowledge base to figure out the right answer, it penalized those who are serial second-guessers. I know so many people who, myself included, sometimes, second-guess themselves on every answer because there’s so much at stake. On the SAT, it’s easy to view the test as a gateway to college or financial aid, so it’s already stressful enough. But when you’re also told that you’ll do worse if you guess than if you don’t, it makes it so much more difficult to be confident when you aren’t guessing. Now, though, the test is made to be much easier for second-guessers or even just guessers, taking off no points for wrong answers.
 
2. Each question offers 4 multiple-choice answers rather than 5 

This isn’t a huge change, but, hopefully, this will mean that it will make it easier to find the correct answer and you’ll have an easier time guessing if you need to.
 
3. Total score range: 400-1600 for 2 scored sections 

The total score possible used to range from 600-2400, which included a 200-to 800-point score in each of the three sections. Now, however, there are only two sections, but they are still scored between 200 and 800 points.
 
4. Two sections: Evidence-based reading & writing, and math with new standards 

Whereas the SAT used to be composed of three scored sections: Math, reading, and writing, plus a required essay, it is now only two sections. However, these two are broken down into two subsections each.
 
The evidence-based reading and writing section is broken down into one reading test and one writing and language test. With this change comes several changes to the theory behind what types of questions should be asked and what test-takers are expected to know.

  • There will be no questions that ask test-takers to complete sentences using “SAT words.” Instead of the test focusing on whether you know what one word means, it will expect you to have a grasp on a more widely-used “professional” or “collegiate” vocabulary (much more basic than the SAT words that no one actually uses) and the ability to understand words with multiple meanings that can be applied to different sentences depending on those meanings.
  • Reading passages will draw from “founding documents,” or significant historical, literary, or scientific documents that test-takers are expected to understand whether they have studied them extensively or not (The United States Constitution, for example, is not something that everyone has studied super closely, but it is something that everyone is expected to be able to understand if they ever need to). This means that reading passages will not only be less arbitrary, they might even be texts that you’ve read before.
  • The SAT now includes some questions that will be prompted using graphs, tables, and infographics, whereas, before, there were zero graphs throughout the entire reading and writing sections. This is a spectacular change for me because, as a visual learner, graphs make everything so much easier to understand. While they will likely be complex graphs, I would still prefer to look at data rather than read it in paragraphs and try to lay it out in my head to give it context. If you’re a visual learner like me, I have no doubt that this change will be beneficial for you.
  • You might have to “show your work” on some reading and writing questions, and this is where the idea of “critical thinking” comes into play. While before you could answer questions without sharing how you reached your answer, when you’re completing the reading section, you might face some questions that ask you how you found the answer to previous questions. This will ask you to either choose the logical reason that would have led to a previous conclusion or will ask you to specify which part of the passage you used in determining your answer. While this won’t be complicated if you know how you got your answer, if you were a little fuzzy on what the right answer was to the first question, the second might be nearly impossible. Luckily, you won’t be penalized for guessing, so just try to connect the dots as best as you can.
 
The math section is broken down into one subsection that can be taken using a calculator and one that cannot. The math section will be more difficult than before, in all likelihood, because the level of high school math that is expected to be understood by test-takers is higher than before.

  • The section focuses on algebra, geometry, and some fundamental and advanced math like trigonometry, so be prepared to meet some difficult questions that you might struggle with. Trigonometry was difficult for me in high school, but I know several people to whom it came easy. Just make sure that you spend extra time studying for the elements of the test that you know will be most difficult for you.
  • The math section has never been easy, but now most, if not all, questions will require you to go through several steps to solve them. This means that you’ll need to be able to find the right answer after going through several steps that you might mess up, and these questions will likely take more time because there are multiple steps.
  • Fundamental or foundational math skills are more important than having extensive knowledge in one type of math or another. If you have a deep understanding of basic concepts that are seen throughout or used as the basis for a specific type of math (like angles in geometry), then you are in decent shape for a large portion of the test, but there will still be questions that ask about harder concepts that are specifically designed to differentiate students who have a higher level of understanding of mathematics and those with a more basic understanding.
 
5. The test is now 3 hours long rather and 3 hours and 45 minutes – with more questions per section and more time to complete each section 

This does come with a few caveats, as the test writers didn’t simply decide that the test was too long for students to handle. Now, there will be a break between the reading and writing subsections and again between the two math subsections (with and without calculators). There will be no break between the end of the evidence-based reading and writing section and the math section, which may prove difficult for some test-takers when trying to switch gears from English to math. The test might also be longer if students choose to stay for the essay section of the test, which lasts 50 minutes. The SAT will provide varied amounts of time for each section, and each will include a set number of questions to be answered. Overall, test-takers will have 180 minutes (3 hours) to answer 154 questions. I’ll lay out the time limits for each section, but if you want a comparison to the old SAT, go to collegeboard.org and check out an article in the Time Magazine.

Reading: 65 minutes for 52 questions
Short break
Writing and language: 35 minutes for 44 questions
No break
Math (without calculator): 25 minutes for 20 questions
Short break
Math (with calculator for higher-level problems): 55 minutes for 38 questions
Short break 
Essay: 50 minutes for one essay question

6. Optional Essay (scored separately) – 50 minutes instead of 25 

The new SAT offers an optional essay at the end of the test (while the previous test's essay was required), and test-takers have to pay an additional fee to take this portion of the test. You may be asking yourself “why in the world would I pay more money to write an optional essay?” Excellent question. You wouldn’t. Unless the colleges you’re applying to require it. Make sure that you know before signing up for the SAT whether the schools you’re applying to suggest or require that you write an essay on the SAT, and if they do, be sure to sign up for it or your application probably won’t be considered.
 
You can find a list of which colleges and their essay requirements on collegeboard.org. If your school isn’t on their list for some reason, contact the admissions office directly or look online. It might be a good idea to check anyway just in case the website’s list isn’t up to date for some reason. If you’re not sure which schools you’ll be applying to, spend the extra money on the essay portion just in case. If you end up not needing it, it’s about $10 wasted, but if you do end up needing it, you’ll save yourself from having to spend money to take the entire SAT again just to write an essay. You can also add the essay portion onto your account later if you don’t do it when you first register for the SAT, so if you’ll know whether you need the essay before your test date, feel free to leave the essay off until then.
 
The essay has changed in that it has become substantially more complex and thought-provoking. While there used to be a single, short prompt, which would ask you to agree or disagree with a particular quote or statement, now, the essay asks test-takers to read a 600-to 700-word passage and evaluate how an argument is organized and built, essentially analyzing what literary techniques make a passage persuasive. To learn more about the essay portion and what has changed, go to College Board’s “SAT Essay” website page.
 
If you’re looking for resources to help you prepare for the new SAT, there are the typical courses and tutor packages that you can purchase from any SAT prep website, but there are also some free online resources that you should take advantage of, especially if you’re not looking to spend hundreds of dollars on test prep. Khan Academy offers articles with tips for preparing for the SAT from time management to study habits to what to expect on the test day, and it also offers videos that demonstrate how to complete problems in each section. There are currently only four practice tests out for the new SAT, but because it is so new, they are all free and readily available to everyone on collegeboard.org along with several other resources for SAT prep.

-Hope Swedeen

What are some concerns you have about taking the SAT? How are you preparing?
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Is High School Really Easier Than 'Real Life?'

3/8/2016

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         Last week’s post, “What Do You Do When You Realize ‘Life Isn't Fair?’” looked at two items on the list of “Rules Kids Won’t Learn In School,” written by Charles Sykes. This week, I want to talk about another item on that list because it’s something that gets discussed almost constantly but about which many people have mixed feelings.

“Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but life HAS NOT. In some schools, they have abolished failing grades and they’ll give you as MANY TIMES as you want to get the right answer. This doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance to ANYTHING in real life.”

         This point is, from some angles, correct. It’s true, for example, that there are still “winners” and “losers” in life. It’s true that your teachers and schools do try to give each student ample opportunity to succeed despite the number of times they fail an assignment. Often, if you’re doing poorly enough in a class, you can probably talk your way into extra credit work, re-writes and re-do assignments, and maybe even just arguing for a higher grade. Most of the time, teachers also take participation into account when determining grades, so it’s, theoretically, easy for students to pass a class if they participate and do just enough work to get by.
         If we take this quote to heart, we would have to believe, as many people actually do, that school is 100 percent easier than “real life” because school requires little to no effort and has no consequences for poor work. Is this really true, though? How many times have you struggled to pass a class because it’s just not a class that plays to your strengths? How many times have you been behind and tried to catch up and simply failed? Whether people believe it or not, the school system does have the potential to leave students behind, and, unfortunately, it does it all the time. School is as much a part of “real life” as is the job you’ll get when you graduate. You might not have the same responsibilities, but students are struggling with far less specific challenges than those that people face in the work place.
       
         If you’ve ever wondered why your school expects everyone to be good at math or science or English, you’re not alone. Does it really make sense that everyone could be good at everything that the state standards say is important? Does it make sense that if you struggle with Trigonometry, it’s automatically your fault for not applying yourself? I would argue no. Not entirely. Sure, there are students who simply don’t apply themselves. But there are also students who do and fail constantly. There are also students who apply themselves, fail once, and stop trying. Defeat is a discouraging prospect, and once you’ve encountered it once, it’s difficult to believe in yourself – especially when everyone tells you it’s your fault you’re failing. So if you’re one of these students who tries and fails because something is genuinely challenging for you, you’re not alone. I was there in high school, and I still am sometimes. There are things in life (and school) that we simply don’t have a natural aptitude for. Whether it be because we haven’t encountered anything like it before or we can’t quite wrap our heads around how something works, there are things that feel simply impossible to conquer. But have you ever thought about why you’re expected to be good at all of these school standards?
         It’s always math and sciences, and history - classes that require memorization - and English reading and writing, which require constant practice and at least some natural talent, that we're required to take and pass. But, in the back of everyone’s mind, or maybe more toward the front, is the question “When will I ever need to know this beyond high school?” When you find yourself asking this question, a lot of times, you won’t be needing it. I can’t say for sure, and no one can, but there are some things that just won’t be useful to you – and by the time it is, you won’t remember it anyway. So why, if I’m graduating with a journalism degree and never took a math or science class in college, would I have needed to excel in math and science when I was in high school? To be perfectly honest, I might not have needed to. I can’t remember one thing from my high school math or science classes, and there hasn’t come a time yet when I’ve needed to. Yes, it’s good to be well-rounded and immersed into a variety of subjects to make sure that every student has a chance to pursue his or her passions, but, at the end of the day, if someone spends their entire high school career failing math, are they likely to ever pursue a career remotely related to math? Absolutely not. People like what they’re good at, and they pursue what they like.

         On the flip side, how many people do you know who are bad at art – just awful – can’t even draw a decent-looking house? I can name quite a few (myself included). But were we ever told in high school that we were inadequate or that we were going to fail a class because of our ineptitude in the arts? As a matter of fact, how long do we actually have to take arts classes? I elected to take band and choir, and even an art class because I thought I’d give it a try, but I was only required to take choir until ninth grade and art only one year in eighth grade. Band was taken entirely by choice and never required. So what does this tell us? Personally, it tells me that the school system values the sciences, math, and reading and writing much more than it does other subjects that fall in the “arts” category. Even language classes were electives after taking a language for about three years. This tells me that whether students are good or bad at the arts, it doesn’t matter, but having an aptitude (or lack thereof) in “required” classes will make or break them. Does this seem fair to you?
         I could argue all day that schools put too much stock in a broad curriculum compared to the curriculum of life. Because, honestly, when do you need to know how to identify rock types unless that’s the profession you choose? However, you can’t figure out what you want and love to do if you don’t experience as many options as possible before choosing a college or career path or both. So this central curriculum that we all hate so much – while overstated – is necessary. The way that students are graded in these classes, though, is another story. In art classes, almost entire grades are based on participation and attempts to complete projects. So why are math and science different? What if, instead of docking points for every wrong answer, students were just shown why their method of solving a problem was wrong and how they might improve for next time? If real effort is there – if students take the time to complete assignments and just don’t get the answers right because of a failure to understand a concept – should people be penalized for their ineptitudes? Unfortunately, they are, and students will probably continue to be penalized for wrong answers regardless of how hard they worked to get them right. To students, this means that you need to try as hard as possible to get the grades you deserve. Just because you’re not good at something doesn’t mean you can’t get an “A.” Ask teachers for help, try memorization strategies, study as long as it takes, and do all of the homework twice, if necessary. This is a tall order, and it’s not something that will happen easily, but if you want to succeed in a system that isn’t working for you, you need to do the work yourself.

​         So to Sykes, and anyone else who believes that school is easy compared to “real life” because of the opportunities students are given to succeed, I say no; no, it is not easy. Sure, there are easy aspects. There are classes that people are good at and do well in, but there are also classes that make it impossible for students to keep their grades up. I do agree, though, that school “doesn’t bear the slightest resemblance” to “real life.” In “real life,” we have the opportunity to only do something we love for the rest of our lives and avoid everything we’re bad at. We have the chance to spend our professional lives doing math if that’s what we’re good at. If we want to write and avoid math and science as much as possible, we really can – not one person in a job interview or on the job has ever asked me to solve a math problem. If we want to be musicians and never write another MLA style essay again, we can. The fact of the matter is in “real life,” we don’t get graded for doing poorly on something we don’t understand. We get paid for doing something we chose to do. So the next time you find yourself failing and losing hope, just remember: if you can make it through high school, you stand a great chance of making it through life. Because “real life” can be so much easier just because of the control you’ll have over your own path.
         In the same breath, though, I have to say that this control comes with much more responsibility. Yes, you have the opportunity to only do what you want to do, professionally, and so it is easier to succeed in “real life” in this respect. But keep in mind that making it through high school and knowing what you want to do won’t be enough. It’s going to take so much more to succeed than determination and talent. As I said in my previous post, life isn’t fair, and it’s up to you to keep pursuing your goals despite that fact. You’ll face financial hardships, challenges in the work place, difficulties actually getting a job, and so many more obstacles after leaving high school, so, in many ways, real life is so much more difficult than school. But what I think can sometimes be forgotten is that these challenges are meant to be age-appropriate.
         When we graduate high school, we’re supposed to be ready for professional life, but we’re spending our days being graded on things that we just aren’t good at and won’t need to be good at rather than learning actual life skills or just being exposed to what our futures might hold. For me, it’s difficult to think of high school as easy simply because we face so many challenges that we might not be able to completely overcome because of our skills. We might not be ready to make the decisions that will shape our futures, but we’re required to make them nonetheless with only high school as a measuring stick against which to judge our academic abilities and our professional options. So, for me, high school was exceedingly difficult at times. When trying to get through classes that were particularly challenging and that I couldn’t get an “A” in no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t wait for “real life” to start. But then again, once I started making decisions that would determine what that life would look like, it became apparent that I wasn’t ready to make those decisions; that’s when high school got so much harder. Instead of worrying about just school or just my career, I had to focus on both, and there are only a few times in life when we’re required to do that and even fewer when we’re actually prepared to do it. It’s a challenge that high school students may or may not be prepared to face, but they have to face it regardless. And this – this challenge to determine what your future will hold when all you have to base it on are your successes and failures in high school, which gives little indication of your potential for success – is what can make “real life” easier than school.

-Hope Swedeen
 
What are your thoughts on the expectations schools have for students? Are students prepared to face the challenge of determining what they want for their futures? Is an emphasis on math and sciences good for all students?
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5 Free Websites Designed to Help You Study More Effectively

1/20/2016

1 Comment

 
In a previous post, I talked about several tips to help you study effectively. However, I never talked about how you should actually be studying. There are several studying methods that are widely used, and most of them require help from someone or something else, whether it be flashcards, someone to ask questions or list vocab words, or games to help with memorization. The best studying method will vary by subject, so what works for one class might not work for another. No matter what method you choose, be aware that there are countless resources available to help you online.
Websites designed to help students study all have different approaches and offer different forms of assistance, and some are more helpful than others. Below, I’ve listed five websites that I have found helpful in the past and that I prefer to other websites I’ve tried. Each offers different studying methods as well as unique features that can make them more helpful than others when studying for different subjects.
 
1.  GoConqr

GoConqr offers several different methods of studying, which is ideal if you have multiple subjects to study for. When you create a free account, you can create flashcards, mind maps, quizzes and slides, and share them with other users. The website hosts a huge database of information generated by users, so every set of flashcards, slideshow, quiz, etc. created by other users will be available to you to use as well. While this database of content hosts fairly general information that might not all apply to what you need to study, you can also create groups to share information more easily with students who are studying the exact same content as you. GoConqr is also a great website because it allows you to set goals and events and see your progress as you study.

2.  Quizlet

Like GoConqr, Quizlet allows you to create study tools like flashcards and practice tests, and with the information you input, the website creates study games for you. There is a large database of public study tools created by other users just like on GoConqr, but these are generally more specific and less helpful than on GoConqr because sets of information are typically created for specific chapters of a book covered in a class. Because of this, Quizlet is really only useful for inputting your own information or connecting with a group of people in your class to create and share information and study tools.

3.  Study Blue

This website’s main function is collaboration. Just like Quizlet, the information created by other users is very specific to classes and chapters, so creating content individually or in groups is really the best way to use the site. You can also chat in groups, save notes, and track your progress as you study. There is also an app available for Study Blue, so you can track your progress and send messages to groups more easily.

4.  Study Stack

Study Stack is primarily a website for creating flashcards. You input your information just as you would on all of the other sites, and it will generate flashcards that you can flip through and track which answers you know and which you don’t. The cards that you press the “don’t know” button for are set aside and will repeat once you get through the set so that you can spend more time on the ones you don’t know. This is my favorite site for flashcards for this reason because I like to review information more if it’s difficult for me to remember. The site also builds several games based on flashcard sets, including hangman, crosswords, matching games, and more. As with the other sites, you can use information provided by other users, but it’s most helpful for creating your own flashcards.

5.  Study Guide Zone

​
Study Guide Zone is completely different from the other four websites. It’s not made for collaboration or inputting information or providing any flashcards, games, or other memorization tools. Instead, this website is simply a resource for taking practice standardized tests, including the PSATs, SATs, ACTs, LSATs, MCATs, and so many more. If you’re gearing up for a standardized test, this is the place to go. They break the tests down into parts so that you don’t have to do them all at once, which is super helpful, and they explain what each part of the test will entail and how much of the test it is worth. I’ve used this a few times to study for the SATs, and I’ve begun using it for the LSATs, and, if nothing else, it gives you a feel for the test’s format, which is crucial to know before you actually take the test so that you don’t waste any time and you know what to expect.
 
-Hope Swedeen
 
What websites or tools do you use to make studying easier and more effective for you?

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Tips for Finding and EvaluatingĀ Research Sources

1/6/2016

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When you begin a research paper, the most difficult task you’ll have is conducting the actual research. If you’ve written one in the past, you’ll know that finding somewhere with reliable sources is tricky in and of itself, but then you have to look for sources that actually address the argument you’re posing in your paper. It can seem impossible when you’re looking at a 40-page scholarly article to decide whether it will be useful to you, but hopefully by using these tips, research will be made easier for you, and you’ll be better able to determine which sources you should and shouldn’t use based on content, reliability, credibility, and accuracy.

Tips for conducting research

1.  Have an idea for a thesis

Although you might not have a completely solidified idea starting out, you should at least know the general topic and know why you’re interested in that topic. Knowing why you’re interested in a general idea will lead you to finding that “seed idea” inside of your “watermelon idea,” as my teachers used to say. The more specific your topic, the easier it will be for you to know what to search for, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that you’ll be able to find information on that topic either, as it could be too narrow to have been written about by scholars. Make sure you are flexible when formulating your idea, and don’t be afraid to let the sources shape your thesis, especially if your original idea isn’t yielding results.

2.  Use Wikipedia to get started

Your teachers have probably told you from day one that using Wikipedia is strictly not allowed when writing a research paper. However, it’s an extremely useful tool starting out to help you either find a research topic or get a basic understanding of what your topic involves and what exactly you should be looking for in more scholarly sources.

3.  Use quotation marks to search an exact phrase

You might know this already, but if you want to search for a phrase rather than individual words, put your search in quotation marks. For example, if you’re searching for information on monarch butterflies, the search engine will automatically look for the words individually, so you might get some results that are only about monarchs and only about butterflies but not both.

4.  Use online databases for reliable, scholarly information

Your school likely has access to online databases full of research materials. These are excellent places to find the majority of your sources because you can be sure that they are reliable.

5.  Read through abstracts and summaries for article content


It’s difficult to say whether an online article will hold the information you’re looking for based on the title alone, and it might be too long for you to look through in its entirety just to see if you need it, so read the summary or abstract if there is one before diving into the actual text.

6.  Control-F is your friend

If you’re not sure if a source includes information that you need, search for keywords within the text using the command key shortcut Control-F. This will open the “find” window for you to search for words throughout a document. If you want to know if an article on benefits of exercise specifically mentions eating habits, try typing in words like “eating,” “food,” or “diet.”

7.  Use the bibliographies of a reliable source to find more sources

If you find a source that holds reliable, accurate, and crucial information, look to its bibliography to find more sources like it. One great source probably uses other great sources, so doing a little “bibliography mining” will help you find more information about topics that are specifically within the original source.

8.  Use library resources…

On top of databases provided by your school, you might be able to access some free databases at a public library. You should also look for books about your topic to use as sources, as these are also guaranteed to be accurate and reliable. Although it takes more time to read through books, there are ways to quickly figure out if you’ll be able to find what you’re looking for within a book. Start by reading the preface or introduction to get an idea of what the book contains, and then look over the table of contents to see whether there are specific sections that reference your topic. This takes a little more digging, but once you find the information, it’s typically concise enough for you to get a few good quotes and chunks of information.

9.  … including human resources

All libraries have librarians or research aides, so if you’re stumped on how to find the information you’re looking for, talk to someone. Even if you’re just starting your research, it’s a great idea to ask what databases and online resources you can access through the library so that you can cover all of your bases.

10.  Don’t disregard sources that hold the same information as others

Even though you might look at a source and think that it holds almost exactly the same information as another source, that doesn’t mean it isn’t valuable. Information is given quickly and concisely, so there might be one key piece of information that you don’t see anywhere else even though everything else about the source seems familiar. You should also be looking for quotes to use in your paper, so getting as many sources as possible can’t hurt in helping you get more voices and ways to phrase something.

11.  Figure out how you prefer to read sources

Print or digital? Once you know your reading preference, make sure you have a way to take notes and store your sources. You should be taking notes as you read and highlighting quotes so that you don’t forget where any information is or why you want to use it. I prefer printed sources over digital because it’s easy to take notes right on the paper rather than using separate sheets, notecards, or a word document.

12.  Find a way to organize your sources that works for you

As soon as you begin looking for sources, you’re going to need a way to keep track of them whether they’re printed or saved digitally. Organize them in whatever way makes the most sense to you. In the past, I’ve tried a few methods of organizations for printed sources, and I’ve created a mildly-chaotic, though helpful, system. I use different highlighters to color-code sources based on the topics each source covers. This works best if you have an outline for your paper already determined because you already know how many topics/colors you’ll keep track of, and you can see that you have enough information for each point. If you don’t have an outline or an idea of what topics you’ll be covering, this can still be helpful as a way of marking the similarities between sources. You can also highlight specific information within the articles using this system so that you know where in your paper each piece will fit. If I know, for example, that I want a paper on gun control to include pros, cons, statistics, and solutions, I can color code all information I find for each of those sections.

13.  Get both sides of an argument

When you’re writing a research paper, you need to take a stand, but you also can’t entirely write off a point that diverges from your own. You can either agree with part of an opposing argument or disagree with all of it, but whatever you choose, talk about the arguments of the opposing argument. Your paper will be more credible and seem less biased than if you only talked about the evidence to support your own point. If you’re writing that gun control paper, make sure you include the pros and cons so that you can show you’re not just someone with a political right- or left-wing agenda.

Tips for determining a source’s reliability, accuracy, and credibility

1.  Check the publication date and the dates of sources in the bibliography


If a source is from 2000, it’s probably not as accurate as something published in 2012. Information about any given topic changes over the years, so anything that’s more than five years old might not be accurate anymore. Be wary of using anything too old, and be sure that everything seems up-to-date or at least not proven false in later articles. Also make sure that an article doesn’t use old resources for its own information. Even if something was published last year, if it relies on information from 1990, it’s probably not accurate.

2.  Cross-reference information for accuracy

Make sure that you double-check every piece of information you intend to use in your paper. Especially if you’re using sources that don’t come from a database or website hosting scholarly articles, you should keep an eye out for inaccuracies. If something seems questionable, look it up using a different source.

3.  Check for the author’s or publisher’s credibility

If you can’t find an author or publisher anywhere, you’re probably not looking at a credible source. If you can find a name or publisher, search it in Google to see what else may be published by that person or publisher or what people are saying about their work.

4.  Watch out for one-sided or biased arguments

Just like you don’t want to only include your argument in your paper, you don’t want to use sources that focus too heavily on one argument. While there’s no problem with taking a stance, if an article appears biased or completely ignores the opposing side of the issue, it might not be reliable or objective. Instead, look for sources that address the opposing view, as you should be doing in your own paper.

5.  Understand a source’s tone and intended audience


You should know who an article is meant to target so that you can tell that the information is of a high quality. If the information seems to be written for a younger audience, it probably isn’t scientific enough for your purposes. If it’s meant to sway someone in a certain direction, it will probably form its argument accordingly, so watch out for the way an author writes. If he or she seems to be trying to convince you of something with which you disagree, you’re probably not the target audience. If you seem to agree with almost everything, be aware that you could be the target audience, and you might be liable to believe information that isn’t actually reliable but just fits into what you’re used to thinking is correct.

6.  Is there enough evidence to support an argument?

Looking for specific evidence to support a point goes along with searching for biases, tone, and audience. An article needs to be factual rather than opinionated, and if it doesn’t offer enough evidence to back up its argument, then whatever point it’s making might not cover all of the information that’s necessary for it to be deemed reliable. Be sure that each source you choose to use provides sufficient evidence to support its argument, just as your own paper should incorporate sufficient evidence as well.

-Hope Swedeen

How do you organize your research? What are some tricks you use to figure out which sources are reliable and which aren’t?

1 Comment

4 Tips for Keeping up with Homework During School Breaks

12/2/2015

6 Comments

 
When you have a break from school – whether it be a three-day weekend or a full week off – you have the opportunity to do anything that you want during those free days. You can catch up on some TV shows you’ve gotten behind on, spend time with friends, get a little extra sleep, and pretty much anything you find you don’t have time for in your average week. Consider, though, what it would benefit you to be doing in your free time. Yes, everyone needs a break, and I am all for making the most of whatever free time I have. This Thanksgiving break, I hope that everyone spent time with their loved ones and had much less stress to deal with (school-related stress, at least) than usual. At some point during Thanksgiving break, though, I hope that everyone made time to keep up with school work.

I know it’s an unpopular concept – doing work over break – but, whether we like it or not, the work will still be due at the end of break whether we get it done or not. Maybe you didn’t have assignments due the first few days after break, but if you did, and you found yourself struggling to make time to get it done during the holidays, consider using a different approach to finishing schoolwork when your next break rolls around. Following a few suggestions, you just might find that completing your work over break isn’t as much of a drag as you thought.

1.  Make a to-do list

I cannot stay organized without lists, and I have one for every type of “to-do.” I have homework lists; shopping lists; wish lists; books, movies, and songs lists; and pretty much every type of list you can think of. It might seem lame, but lists really do help to keep everything going on in your mind organized. I forget that I have to do entire projects all the time, and if I didn’t have them written down, I’d honestly just not finish them. While your memory might not be as bad as mine, it wouldn’t hurt to make a list of assignments that you need to finish over break so that you have an idea of how much time you’ll need to spend doing work.

2.  Create a homework schedule/plan

After you’ve made a list of assignments, think about when you should try to finish them. If you have something due the day you get back to school, work on that first. If you have a project or paper that you know will take you a few hours or days, start that earlier in your break so that you don’t have to work for hours on end the night before it’s due. You also might find that your family has part of your days off already planned for you, so you’ll need to fit your work schedule to fit their plans as well. That said, homework is always a great excuse if you don’t want to participate in any particular family activities, especially if you’ve already planned out your homework schedule and try to stick to it for the rest of break. This will also ensure that you have some time to spend on your own during your days off.

3.  Do a small amount of work each day

It’s tempting to spend your entire break doing whatever you want and ignoring all homework and responsibility, but don’t give into the temptation. If you’re stuck doing all of your work the night before classes start again, you’ll be burnt out before your break is even over. This makes going back to school that much harder because you’ll already be looking ahead to the next break. Instead, plan a feasible work schedule, and stick to it. Set aside two hours or so each day depending on your work load, and make sure that if you skip a day, you make up for it gradually rather than letting it pile on to your last day. I like to schedule my day before school begins again as a completely free day, if I can, so that I don’t have to worry about doing work on my last day of freedom. Even if I do end up having to finish some work, it shouldn’t be more than I can handle, as it’s only “leftover” work that I didn’t end up fitting into one of my other days.

4.  Stick to your sleep schedule

You might be someone who goes to sleep 4 hours later over break than you would on a school night, but consider cutting down on your night owl tendencies. It’s difficult to wake up at a normal hour when you’re sleeping at irregular times, and by waking up later, you’re cutting out part of your days. Even if you try to get your work done at night, you might not be as productive as you could be in the morning. Consider going to bed and waking up at or around your normal times, and try to get some work out of the way in the morning so that you can enjoy the rest of your day.

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-Hope Swedeen

How do you keep yourself from getting behind on school work during the holidays?
6 Comments

11 Tips for Writing an Effective Personal Essay

11/17/2015

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If you’re a high school student, there’s a good chance that if you haven’t already had to write a personal essay at least once, you’re going to be asked to write one soon. These essays are typically written for applications for membership in organizations, scholarships or awards, and colleges. Whether you’re applying for any of these now or not, you just might find yourself writing a personal essay one day and wondering just how to begin. What should you include? How do you write an essay that will show who you really are? As someone who has filled out several college, scholarship, and membership applications in the past few years, I can tell you that, like most things, it’s much easier to write a personal essay after you’ve done it once. It’s difficult to say what specifically you’ll need to say in your essay to achieve whatever you’re pursuing, but I can suggest some general tips that should help you no matter your topic.

1.     Follow directions and stay focused – Before you can even begin writing, you need to know the topic and word count for the essay. All personal essays are not the same, and while one might ask a general question about a significant experience, another might ask about how an experience provided a specific type of insight. A popular topic, for example, is how an experience has shown you the importance of diversity.

2.     Use the first person – This essay is all about who you are, what you’ve done, and what makes you “you.” The only way to write about yourself is to use “I,” “me,” and “my,” so disregard what your teachers have said about formal, objective essay-writing. This isn’t a research paper; it’s more of a story than anything.

3.     Open and end strong – Whoever is reading your essay will likely only spend a few seconds on it if they’re not immediately caught, and your conclusion will be what sticks with them once they’ve finished reading.

4.     Use an anecdote – Your essay will likely revolve around an anecdote, and this is generally the best technique. Using an anecdote, especially at the beginning of your essay, captures your reader quickly and has a better chance of showing your personality and history than just talking about your accomplishments.

5.     Don’t be afraid to get personal – It’s a personal essay; by definition, it has to be at least a little personal, and the more anecdotal it becomes, the more personal it will feel. If you’re not comfortable talking about the more private details of an experience, you can still stress its significance and how it has changed you without sharing everything.

6.     Choose an experience that matters to you – If you’re writing about something that is only slightly significant to you, whoever is reading your essay will be able to tell. Get creative, and stop trying to outdo everyone. Just be you. Don’t try to use an experience that affected you briefly and slightly like a week-long volunteer position or a summer job – these are obvious choices that everyone assumes can impress, but it’s what you gain from even the smallest experience that sets you apart, not the experience itself. That said, you don’t have to have saved someone’s life or had a traumatic experience to be a worthy applicant. As long as it’s important to you, the most ordinary experience can be the most significant.

7.     Balance humility with confidence – Whoever is reading your essay wants to know that you’re competent and have the qualities that they’re looking for, but that doesn’t mean that you should use your essay for bragging rights. Highlight your uniqueness and qualifications, but don’t try to assert your superiority over other applicants. In the same way, though, don’t undervalue your experiences and minimize the importance of what you’re saying. If you don’t appear to value your own experiences, why should someone else?

8.     Research your audience – Although your essay prompt might be specific enough to explain what people who read your essay will be looking for in your essay, it doesn’t hurt to do a little research to find out what specific qualities are important to them and their institution or organization. You should know what type of person will be reading your essay to know which aspects of yourself you should choose to highlight. For example, if an organization’s website lists a mission statement that values determination, teamwork, and hard work, then try to highlight those qualities.

9.     Show, don’t tell – Although you want to be clear about what you can offer your reader by explaining your qualifications in your essay, don’t outright tell them “I’m hard working and determined.” Show them examples of times when you possessed these qualities, and they can figure out how these examples apply to them on their own. This applies especially to when you’re working your research into your essay, as previously mentioned. Using anecdotes will help immensely with this, as stories natural “show” rather than “tell.”

10.  Start early – If you leave your essay for the last minute, you’ll find that it’s much more difficult to come up with anecdotes and draw out the most meaning possible from your experiences. Starting early will give you time to think about what you’ve written for a few days, go back and revise, and feel comfortable that you’ve said all that you want to say. You’ll also have ample time to fix any mistakes you might have made, which brings me to my final point.

11.  Check for errors! And then check again. And again – You get the idea. Make sure that your essay is as error-free as possible. Check punctuation, capitalization, spelling, and sentence structure over and over to be sure you catch any mistakes. If you’re not someone who excels at editing, or even just to get a fresh pair of eyes on your essay, ask you parent, teacher, or friend to read it for you. Having them read it out loud is even better, as you’ll be able to hear how someone other than you interprets what you’ve written, and you might change your mind about how you phrase something. At the end of the day, if you still have a few small mistakes in your essay, it’s not the end of the world. Putting in the extra effort just shows that you used your time wisely, and the big mistakes will have been discovered, so hopefully you’ll just have a few commas out of place, which isn’t at all unusual.

-Hope Swedeen

In what instances have you needed to write a personal essay? What are some tips you’d suggest for writing them? 

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