A very tired and foolishly awake student (Katie)
I’ve spent a lot of time in the last few days thinking ‘I’m going to blog about that’. Then I promptly forget and by the time I’m sitting at my laptop – it is currently 1am on Monday morning – nothing very interesting comes to mind. I will make do, though.
I feel a bit like I’m missing out on Uni. Reading the other blogger’s entries, I see that there are a thousand and one things that UM has to offer – I’m just not doing most of them. Whenever I’m at Uni, I’m thinking about going back to College. I’ve made some great friends here, there is free food and it is (now) the much less scary option when I have free time. I can come ‘home’ and get some sleep or play Frisbee. That sounds like a dodgy American holiday camp movie, I know. With this in mind, I’m going to spend a whole day actually at University tomorrow! Hopefully make some ‘uni’ friends.
I never realised how hard it is to be flippant at 1am on a Monday.
…someone just came to my door, I got distracted, it’s now 2:03am.
The brief summary I was planning seems too long now. I only have one question, reader, what are you all finding works for lecture notes? Writing down every word and point, or just writing down a few key ones? I’m struggling, I don’t know which is best!
College is great, I’m at one and it truly is great, but I would encourage you as much as possible to attend some Uni events and here’s why:
It’s quite common when people leave college that they have no friends outside of Queens/Ormond/what have you, and while the people still at college might miss you, they still have a very large community to look after them, and you don’t.
Hence a lot of people find the transition very difficult and overwhelmingly what past college people have told me is to do uni stuff, make friends outside of college so you have a support network when you eventually leave.
As for actually meeting people can I suggest the free BBQs at Union on 12:00pm Tuesdays? Or the SSS – they’re fantastic and they always make people feel welcome. Be proactive – I invited someone out for coffee the other day and it really helped to cement the friendship.
As for the lecture thing, I write down the key points otherwise I find that you can miss the important stuff and you’re overwhelmed with useless information, plus I think it’s an important part of Uni to be able to wade through what’s important and what’s not, but I’ve heard arguments for taking down every little thing as well.
I suppose note taking, like most things, is a learned art that takes practice. when I began my undergraduate studies I tried to doggedly take down ever word the lecturer said, however after a couple of weeks frustration at missing points and not being able to follow the flow of the lecture because of my furious scribbling trying to capture every word. I decided to take a new tack.
I was at university before things like LMS and my lecturers never use Powerpoint. However they did put up Overhead slides with the outline of their lecture and thus I could write down the headings and slot in the main points of the lecture, which made my life much easier. Now, most lecturers will put their lecture notes on LMS and it is a good idea to print these off and bring them to the lecture and slot in notes and main points beneath their headings.
For more information on note taking got to Transition Undergraduate at the following URL http://www.services.unimelb.edu.au/transition/transition/ug/links.html and follow the links to to the Academic Skills Unit or Airport.
Oh, I forgot to mention the most important point in taking lecture notes is to read and revise them later. It is a good idea to type them up if you have time and then you have solid revision notes when it comes to exam time.
Using my (currently broken) laptop, and getting the important stuff, or stuff that isn’t common sense, or stuff that stands out as an important definition, and punching that into the computer.
You end up with a pretty decent page or two of notes actually.