Hey! So I’ve recently joined the studyblr community, to motivate myself and study harder.
Basic info:
I’m 18
Graduated high school with honours
On a gap year, preparing for uni entrance exams
Tutor at Army academy (@/armyacademics on Twitter!)
Pretty sure coffee runs in my veins!
Subjects:
Physics
Chemistry
Math
Korean (self-study)
Computer Science
Likes:
Reading
K-pop: especially BTS
TV shows ranging from law and order to k-dramas!
Organizing things (just realized how boring it sounds! )
Goals:
Studying smarter and staying productive
Actually sticking to the fancy schedules I make
Acing the entrance exams to get into my dream uni
Making new friends (I’m shy 🥺)
Studyblrs that inspire me -> @emmastudies, @studyign, @studyquill, @the-diary-of-a-failure, @thecosmicstudyblr, @quantumheels, @tbhstudying, @justjasminestudying and so many more! (I low-key stalked so many studyblr..)
my flexibile study schedule. I basically just write by pencil my classes for each day. And I cut the stick parts to my post it bc they are easy to take off. Each color represents a class to study.
when it’s vertical it means that it’s from here to there. When it is horizontal, it’s just for that time. or tbh it changes with my mood lol
Honestly don’t even know how I came up with it but it’s way easier than having to write it out every week. And I’m not always having to print.
quantumheels replied to your post “quantumheels replied to your post “you know what’s hard. grad...”
Oh yesss I am excited! But also anxious because we are having one in the US and one in his home country! Smaller, of course, but still take plenty of planning!
omg that sounds amazing! def a lot of work i’m sure, but it’s going to be so worth it! double the partying :O double the cake! maybe double the dresses??
I was always one of those people who thought some people were naturally good at math and if I wasn’t one of those people then there was nothing I could do about it. I thought I wasn’t “a math person” and would use that description as an excuse. Is math one of my weaker subjects? Sure but that’s mostly because I let years of bad habits get in the way of my current work. This caught up to me in my first semester of calculus (calc I) at university, where calculus was my worst class. Here’s the thing: if you’re not “a math person” make yourself one. In my second semester of calculus (calc II) I improved my mark by an entire letter grade (something I never thought possible). How? Through hard work and by understanding that I would have to work harder than some people because of my past study habits.
Know your pre-calculus well! You will struggle so much if you forget the basics. My prof said not having a good grasp of the basics is the number one reason why students will struggle with calculus. Invest time before/at the beginning of the semester to really review the stuff you learned in high school. (Khan Academy is the best way to review, in my opinion. They have challenge questions you can do for each section. Try a couple of questions for each section. If you can’t answer the question easily, watch the accompanying videos for that section first. Do this for sections you forget or know you struggle with.) Be confident in your basic mental math too, especially under pressure. I wasn’t allowed a calculator on any of my midterms or finals for calc and you don’t want to waste time on easy math that you should know lightning fast anyway.
Attend every lecture, especially if you’re even slightly confused. If you’re behind, try not to get even more behind by skipping class (obviously use your own judgement, but don’t skip unless it’s totally necessary). Don’t sit near the back of the class if you know you won’t pay attention.
Don’t just sit there and copy down notes. Be attentive in class and follow along with examples the best you can. If you get lost at a certain step in a problem put a star beside it. After class, study and attempt the problem on your own. If you still don’t understand, go to a TA or prof for help. They will be able to provide better help if they can see exactly where you got lost.
Keep your notes simple. I would use either blue or black pen for the majority of my notes and use one other colour to emphasize parts of my notes (indicate where I got lost, circle important follows, highlight which section of the textbook the class was at, etc.) Keep your notes neat and leave a gap, if you fall behind during a lecture (just remember to get the notes from someone else later). I also recommend using a grid paper notebook, for when you need to draw graphs.
Get a mini notebook! I bought a tiny notebook for cheap and filled it with a (very) condensed version of my notes, throughout the semester. I wrote down common derivatives and integrals, shapes of common graphs, important theorems and formulas, etc. This is especially helpful for calc II, because you’ll have all the necessities from calc I handy.
Advice for using Maple for math labs (if this applies to you): Pay attention to tutorials and ask questions. Complete as many assignment questions as you can in the lab/when a TA is present. If you have any other assignment questions to finish up make sure you work on them at least a few days before they’re due, so you have time to ask for help if you need it. Also, Maple can be a stupid program. You could be missing just one number, letter, or symbol and it won’t work. Or you could have it exactly right and it still won’t work (retyping your input in a new worksheet usually helps). To remedy these issues, I would work on assignments with friends and compare what our worksheets looked like. Oh and TAs love if you give your variables funny names or change the colours of your graph, because they’re all nerds (and so are you, so embrace it).
Do as many practice problems as you can. Calculus is a class where you learn by doing. Do questions till you understand the concept. If problems are recommended, treat them as if they’re actually due (otherwise you’ll just tell yourself you didn’t have enough time to do any practice problems). My number one mistake was not doing enough practice problems and just assuming I knew how to answer the problem (if you can’t answer the entire question from start to finish, then you don’t actually understand the concept).
Please don’t fall behind. Stay on top of things and prioritize what needs to be done (i.e. treat practice problems from the chapter you just learned on equal footing with the lab report you have due -- if you treat it as a priority, you will get it done). But, if you do fall really behind, don’t wait until it’s too late to ask for help. Just remember, there’s always something you can do (even if you feel like you don’t know anything and there’s not enough time for any practice problems before your midterm). Identify what you need to learn before you can do anything else (i.e. work on understanding basic integration before you try to do something more complicated like trigonometric substitution) and fit in as many practice questions as you can.
Don’t give up! If you don’t understand a concept right away you just have to keep trying! For practice problems, try to find an answer without looking at your notes. If you can’t figure it out from there, look in your lecture notes and textbook for any relevant formulas, examples, or similar questions. Try to answer the problem again. If you get it, be sure to fully complete another practice problem without any outside references. If you can’t figure out an answer then you should seek help from another person!
Don’t forget everything you learned at the beginning of the semester -- review, review, review! Check out this explanation on the curve of forgetting. If you continually review what you learned, for only short periods of time, you will remember so much more and save yourself time in the end!
Utilize the resources available to you. I have a list of online resources at the end of this post, but don’t overlook what’s right in front of you. Go to your prof’s office hours, ask a TA for help, and take advantage of any tutoring or study groups. My uni has a math and science centre where upper year students are always available to help other students with practice problems. If you join a course union, they sometimes offer free tutoring.
Study in a productive environment. This varies by person but personally I need a quiet environment, with ideally no noise or only instrumental music, bright/natural lighting, and nothing to distract me (I hide my phone and only have one pen or pencil out). If you like to listen to music when you study, math is one of those subjects where you can listen to music with words.
Improve your test-taking skills. (1) On an exam, understanding a concept is no use if it takes you forever answer the question. Do lots of practice problems till you immediately know how to answer any kind of question. Speed can be key on exams. (2) My strategy is to flip through the exam booklet as I get it. I answer the questions I can do easily, first, and leave the really difficult ones till the end. (3) Show all of your work! Don’t lose marks because you didn’t show all of your work. (4) Expect your exams to be challenging and prepare accordingly. Overlearn the material. Prepare specifically for the exam by completing past exams/practice exams in an environment that mimics the test-taking environment.
Get every mark you can, because the little marks make a big difference. If you don’t know how to answer a question on an exam, write down any formula or theorem that could relevant. If you try to figure out a solution and know that it’s most likely incorrect, but don’t have enough time/knowledge to find the correct answer, just leave your work there (don’t erase it). There’s always a chance you could be on the right track or nice markers will give you a point or two for trying. Something is always better than nothing.
Focus on the applications of calculus (it’ll make the semester a whole lot more interesting)! A physics major won’t necessarily use calculus the same way a bio or chem major might, but that doesn’t mean some calculus isn’t useful for all of those majors to know. I’ve always planned to major in biology and looking ahead at classes I will need calculus for biostatistics and genetics classes. Never tell yourself something isn’t useful because then you’ll never treat it like it’s useful. Also, my prof taught a whole lecture about how calculus could be used to account for all the variables that could affect population if a zombie apocalypse ever happened, so obviously calculus has at least one really important use :)
Resources
A bit of advice: These are called resources for a reason. It’s okay once in a while to use some of the resources to find a full solution for a practice problem, but don’t abuse it. It is so so easy to just look up the answer but you’re only hurting yourself in the end.
Desmos (Online graphing calculator - I’ve made it through so far without actually buying a graphing calculator)
Khan Academy (Step by step videos and practice questions! You can go your own speed with the videos! My top recommendation!!!)
Paul’s Online Math Notes (If your prof doesn’t provide you with decent lecture notes, these ones are great!)
Symbolab (They have a calculator for derivatives, integrals, series, etc. and I like the way they split up the steps to solve.)
Slader (find your textbook on here and they’ll give you all the solutions to questions!)
Textbooks: I used the Single Variable Calculus: Early Transcendentals (8th edition, by James Stewart) and it was awesome. The way it was set up and all the examples really helped me (I just wish I had used it more)
This post by @quantumheels is seriously fantastic (and she has lots of good advice for other topics too, one of my favourite blogs)
My Other Posts:
AP lit tips, high school biology, how to ace intro psych, organization tips, physics doesn’t have to suck: how to enjoy and do well in your required physics classes, recommended reads, reminders for myself, using your time wisely on public transport, what i learned from university (first year), what i learned from high school
Hi everyone! I am Julie and have followed studyblrs on my main blog for a long time. My likes over there were starting to get cluttered with study posts and I’ve been wanting to start posting my own stuff like notes, bujo spreads, tips and book stuff so I decided to start this blog.
About Me:
♡ I’m 20 years old.
♡ I am a junior in college and am studying to become a software engineer
♡ I am from Argentina but am going to college in the US
Interests:
♡ My favorite bands are The Doors, The Smashing Pumpkins, Hole and Nine Inch Nails
♡ My favorite tv shows are Twin Peaks and Rupaul’s Drag Race
♡ I love studying stuff on my own. My favorite topics are true crime, physics and religion
♡ I love reading! My favorite books are The Brothers Karamazov and Wuthering Heights
♡ I love to write stories, usually surrealist (aka the weird stuff) about crimes, religion, mental illness, etc.
My Goals:
♡ To graduate on time
♡To get a summer internship
♡ To read more in my spare time
♡ To minimize how much I procrastinate and make studying more effective and enjoyable
My Classes:
♡ Art History Survey I
♡ Net-Centric Computing
♡ Survey of Database Systems
♡ Structured Computer Organization
Some Studyblr’s That Have Inspired Me to Make This Account:
That's... An NMR? *is from a small school with shit science funding so our NMR is teeny*
It’s a 900 MHz NMR that’s designed for protein work (i think this one does both solution state and solid state samples in up to 4 dimensions I think) so it’s like a pretty souped up NMR
like the NMR instruments most people use for like, small molecule stuff are 400 MHz (so much smaller) and you really only use them for 1D proton solution spectra (and like very occasionally natural abundance carbon or something weird like phosphorous)
Just got my planner from @quantumheels!!! Can’t wait to put this baby to use next week as I start my summer class. I already know it’s going to be so helpful in keeping me organized, which is my biggest problem. I’m nervous about doing well in chemistry and biology this year but my pencil reminds me that passion never fails. I am so excited for this school year!
physics doesn’t have to suck: how to enjoy and do well in your required physics classes
As someone who doesn’t intend to take a physics class ever again, I was relieved when I walked out of my second semester physics final. That said, physics doesn’t have to suck or drag your average down.
(1) How to enjoy physics: Adjust your attitude. Physics is so cool if you actually think about it. Your attitude will dictate your experience. (2) But physics is so hard: Change the way you study and don’t give up. I did better in university physics than in high school. The content was way more difficult but it was my studying methods that made the difference.
This post is split into 3 parts: Introductory physics (very basic physics, that unit of physics you had to do in a lower level science class), high school physics (physics from an algebra-based perspective), and university physics (calculus-based physics and labs). (Obviously these overlap a lot but I needed to organize this somehow)
INFO IS UNDER THE CUT B/C THIS POST IS RIDICULOUSLY LONG
1. INTRODUCTORY PHYSICS
Skills you should master that will greatly help you now and in the future
Converting between units
What all those symbols actually mean
Interpreting what graphs mean
Scientific notation
Know how to do algebra fairly well (esp. rearranging equations)
Khan Academy is a great resource for introductory and high school physics.
Start every question by stating all of your known and unknown variables. Write down which variables you have and which ones you need. Then, you can easily figure out which formula you need.
Make sure you’re actually understanding the concepts behind everything; plugging numbers into equations will only get you so far.
Rearrange formulas to equal the variable you need before you substitute your known values into the equation.
Use your knowledge of physics from your own experiences. Don’t overthink. Just try to picture what would happen if, say, a ball and a feather were dropped from the same height.
2. HIGH SCHOOL PHYSICS (ALGEBRA-BASED)
(Everything from part 1 applies, esp Khan Academy)
Pay attention to in class demos.
Draw free body diagrams whenever you can -- they can be annoying but quickly being able to visualize all of the forces acting is an important skill
Ask your teacher for help or clarification if you need it! You won’t always have the opportunity for one-on-one help, plus your teacher may mark you a bit easier if they see you’re really trying.
Know trigonometry well! In fact, if any of your algebra skills are weak, be sure to review. Don’t let basic math hold you back -- you can do this!
Your first step for any problem should be to write down any known variables or numbers and then the variables you need to find.
Work with a study group (just make sure everyone else is as committed as you are, otherwise studying with others won’t help). People think in different ways and you’re bound to find a solution eventually -- and less likely to give up if you can’t do it.
Get all the part marks. Write down your variables, a formula that could be applicable -- anything that might earn even half a mark (teachers are a lot more forgiving than you think)
Double check your final answer. Ensure you have the right units and ask yourself if your final answer makes sense.
Don’t give up! A big mistake I made in high school was giving up the first time I couldn’t figure out a question because physics was hard and I would never understand it. No excuses! Ignoring a question won’t help you answer it when it comes up on a test. Figure it out on your own or get help.
3. UNIVERSITY PHYSICS (CALCULUS-BASED + LABS)
(Note: Some university physics classes are algebra-based. My university is dumb and forced me to take difficult, calculus-based classes.)
(Again, most things from part 1 and part 2 apply here as well.)
A) Lectures, studying, finals, etc.
Pay attention in class and write good notes
My physics lectures were boring but trying to catch up by reading my textbook later was so much worse
Your lecture notes may not make much sense at first but later on you’ll be able to tell which concepts were stressed by your prof
Draw any diagrams your prof shows you (or take a picture with your phone if you’re lazy). Be sure that the diagram is complete and don’t forget about labels. Don’t worry too much about neatness as long as you know what the diagram is supposed to show you.
Keep all your notes in one notebook: Use one colour for writing regular notes, another colour for circling formulas or starring things you don’t understand, and be sure to write the date down for each lecture and leave space if you fall behind during the lecture (you can always copy someone else’s notes later)
Get a good textbook!
Talk to older students and see if the textbook was helpful for the class. If it’s useful then actually use it! If it’s not, find a good textbook to use!
Do lots of practice questions
My profs tended to go over more conceptual ideas in class and didn’t do many examples.
Try to do a variety of questions! This will tell you if you actually understand the content or if you’ve just memorized how to do certain questions.
Work with other people on assignments (and join/start a group chat for your class)
I had online assignments due every Friday at midnight. My friend and I would meet up on Wednesday or Thursday to work through most of the assignment together. If there was a question we didn’t get, there would always be someone in our class group chat wondering the same thing and there was always some smart physics student that would be a bro and explain how to approach the problem (on another note: don’t leave assignments till the last minute)
Group chats are also great if you miss class or can’t remember when the cutoff for the midterm is
If you don’t understand something get help before it’s too late.
Be prepared with specific questions. It’s hard for someone to help you if all you can say is that you don’t know anything. Go to your prof, TA, tutor, etc.
I found my profs to be super nice about everything. They just want people to be excited about the subject they teach!
If you’re just stuck on one thing there are tons of resources online! Just be specific in what you’re googling and check out resources that other profs have posted online.
Understand the math before you start doing questions
Know the basics of derivatives and integrals
It’s super important to be able to draw a rough graph of the first, second, etc. derivative when all you are given is a graph of the original function (i.e. drawing the graphs for velocity and acceleration when given a graph of displacement)
But don’t ignore the conceptual stuff
This is why a good textbook is important!
Plus you can get part marks for some questions by stating whether one value should be higher/lower than another value, even if you can’t figure out the calculations -- and you can check your answers this way.
For example, it’s pretty important to know what magnetic flux density is before you can calculate it’s value
When studying for tests, don’t just assume you know how to do a question.
Looking over the solution for a problem and actually completing the problem are two very different things. This is the biggest mistake I’ve made when studying physics.
Understanding the solution is only one step in actually being able to answer the question. Looking over solutions is lazy studying if you’re not even trying to do the work. Start the question. Glance at the first part of the solution if you’re stuck. Keep going from there.
For first year physics classes, you really shouldn’t skip over any parts of problem. Yeah, rearranging that formula might look easy but can you actually do it? Practice makes perfect.
If you have a midterm coming up that tests material from a few weeks ago, be sure to do questions from the older units. The content might look familiar but just because you could do a question 2 weeks ago doesn’t mean you can do it now.
Don’t leave your studying till the last minute.
Get a planner and carve out enough time to do practice questions every few days. Trying to catch up on four chapter’s worth of problems is not fun and won’t work very well. Plus, you don’t just have to know how to answer questions. You have to be able to answer questions efficiently.
B) Labs
My labs were very different each semester.
First semester content included kinematics, relativity, forces, momentum, work, etc. The labs were super boring but super easy. For most labs we used motion detectors and a program called logger pro to collect and graph data. Lots of carts.
Second semester content included light, energy, radiation, magnetism, circuits, etc. The labs mostly involved bread boards and wires.
Regardless of content, some general comments on labs are...
Labs won’t always follow lecture content. Apparently that’s too difficult to organize.
That said, get your prelabs done. Properly, if you can. If you don’t fully understand a prelab question, ask your TA once you’ve handed it in. This will save you so much time.
Find a good lab partner. Not sure if there’s a trick to this but just try your best. And be a good lab partner too!
Make note of how strict your TA is with sig figs and error calculations. There’s no sense in losing a few marks when you could stay an extra 15 minutes and do the work properly.
Eat some food and hydrate before your lab -- you never know when your lab will take you 3+ hours to finish.
If you’re not sure if your experiment is working ask your TA. Trying to complete the lab with incorrect data is difficult and your TA will probably make you repeat the experiment anyways.
I hope this post was helpful! I struggled with physics in high school (my worst class) but it ended up being one of my best classes in university (A’s both semesters). The content was way more difficult but my studying habits and test-taking methods were what made the difference!!
