It strikes me that so many people I've spoken to don't know about the feature, but you can have a block of text that's dictated by Siri and then made into an MP3.
To do this put the text you want dictated into a word processor, I used textEdit, then highlight the whole text and scroll down to services, then click on Add to Music as a Spoken Track. Then there will be a small dialogue box where you select what voice you want and what to name it.
Then hopefully you should have an MP3. I use it for required reading, so I can listen to the chapters whilst doing other things, but you can really do it for any block of text. It is a computer voice, still, so if that's something you don't like, then maybe give this one a miss.
I don't know how to do this same thing on PC, so if anyone else knows, then please add on to this post.
Writing this because @md-drawz asked but I’m doing it in a post format hoping that someone else might also find it useful. Disclaimer, it’s been three years since I graduated university and have only been writing “essays” in the form of blorbo metas since, but during those three years where I had coursework I’d like to think I found a good rhythm that helped tackle papers. A lot of you are uni/college aged or are gonna be soon so this is for all of you, hope you find it helpful.
This whole post mainly boils down to note organizing tips and helping you create a structure, a skeleton you can then build on and write your essay. There are many different kinds of papers you could be expected to write in a tertiary education setting and I’m coming at this from a media/cultural studies perspective, but the core of it applies to all writing.
Organize notes
Okay but how. Depending on what you’re writing and how much reading and research goes into it, you can end up with notes that are longer than the actual essay you need to write. What I usually did, certainly in my last year, is break the notes down into parts but, crucially, do it in different documents. Say, you have your initial notes in a Word document or any other text file. Copy that document and start deleting and reorganizing - your original copy will always be there as backup if you need something deleted after all. Make several copies with several steps if you’d like. By the end it wasn’t unusual for me to have three notes docs, many more for my dissertation.
Basically:
The first document is everything, full quotes and all you could ever possibly need and refer to. Write out the full titles of books and articles so you can do your bibliography properly at the end but from now on just use the referencing you’ll actually need when writing. So in later versions of the notes I’ll just write Tuiyla, 2022 (if you do it Harvard style) instead of the full title of my source.
Streamline in the second doc: identify themes within a source, themes you already wanted to build your essay one. For example, I’m writing about women in noir and Tuiyla, 2022 has useful ideas and quotes about the very basics like definition of the genre and its history, as well as some more advanced stuff useful for my later arguments. I note those main areas down. Then, when I went through all my sources I group them together.
This can be done in the second doc but I like to have it in a third one. So now that I have the main themes in sources, I sort by themes and ideas rather than individual sources. It helps if you went into the research bit with a vision of what main points you want to touch on and you can use that as a structure and assign sources and their ideas to it. Within a main idea I include bullet point of what I’m gonna say and what sources talk about/support that claim.
Here’s an example of a third-year paper, first my research doc:
second, a structure doc that’s more organized and has several main sections, in order (a better more advanced version would streamline further and focus on themes first and sources second):
Have an arc
Now that you hopefully have your main building blocks of topics you want to touch on and sources to back all that up, you organize them so the paper has an arc. Forget about intro and conclusion for a second, focus on the main body of your paper. Start with the building block that best explains the basics and then try to find the best segues into other sections. This is more of a me thing, but I think a good essay flows seamlessly between paragraphs because you find a way for the topics to naturally progress into one another. Point A brings us to point B, point C presents and interesting counterargument, etc.
If there’s a topic that a source brings up but you can’t quite fit it anywhere, it might be time to say goodbye to that idea. Depending on how hardcore you are with your research and what your word count is, there’s gonna be a ton of stuff that just can’t fit. Again, all about streamlining until you get an actual skeleton you can follow when sitting down to write.
Ideally, you start with a thesis even before your research and that evolves as you start reading up on the subject so now that you have your building blocks and arc it’s a good idea to refine that thesis statement and write a few words of introduction/conclusion. It literally only has to be a few words, maybe a full sentence, just to see if you’re actually gonna say something with your paper. It’s a very initial draft that you’re gonna rewrite once you have your text’s body anyway.
Write summaries of sections
You have your sources, know where to bring up what, have an arc you can go on and you know what you’ll ultimately want to say. It’s still hard to get started on writing the damn thing and that’s perfectly okay. Going through all you have so many times is designed to help you focus but you also need to take a step back sometimes. So if you’re having difficulty starting, know that a) starting is the hardest thing to do for any writer anywhere and that b) you’re already doing so well when you have a structure and building blocks. Without those, it’s hard to stay on topic and within word counts and so organizing your talking points should also help with the flow of the writing itself. The thing is, as much as it can be a pain to do all this organizing and do it on as many levels as I recommend, it does help. It gives you constraints but within those you can get started.
The best tip I have for getting those first words out is yet another reworking of your structure, but this time around try to have as many complete sentences as possible. Write short summaries for each of the main arguments/paragraphs and have your sources and points ready in a bulleted list. After a while it really just becomes a matter of connecting those dots with a few extra words and it might even help you keep things concise.
Trust your notes
The most important lesson I can leave you with is that yes, writing an academic paper of any kind can be a pain because it’s strict in its structure and doesn’t allow you to sway too far from your point. But, use that limitation to your advantage and work through your notes as many times as you need to to get closer and closer to a proper first draft, after which every version gets easier. The good news is, if you go through the trouble of really getting your notes together you’ve basically started already without noticing. So trust those notes and trust the different stages you put them through to get a final product of a shiny and new paper.
As a final tip, it’s true in academia as much as with everything else: reading makes you a better writer. So your research is already half of your success when getting ready to write an academic paper because you’re already familiarising yourself with the terminology, style, structure, and types of ideas that you’ll also have to recreate.
I hope some or even all of this was helpful, feel free to ask me for more or even examples. And remember, writing is hard for everyone and no one gets it 100% right on first drafts.
hey everyone! if you’re just stumbling upon this post and are new here, i’m going into my 3rd year of undergrad in bio for health sci a.k.a pre-med sorta deal! i did this post last year and u guys loved it, i also think its a great ways for us #studyblrs to share more . this is just an update into what courses i’ll be taking this year, life updates, tips i learnt from last year + more!
PICKING COURSES
my courses:
I'm a health sci bio major with a double minor in chem + business! so here is what my full-time year of studies looks like (5 courses per semester)
physiology of neurons & muscles
human development
structural biochem
metabolism & bioenergetics
neurosci
statistics
lab in cell & molecular bio
molecular bio
fundamentals of marketing
managing projects & business plans
for freshman, your courses are pretty set and you likely won't have much choice around what you actually want to take, so unless you're an upper-year, you likely won't see more interesting course titles like what i have above. not much for an update in this section, i planned most of my courses last year, but the most frustrating thing that happened was 9/10 courses i wanted to take were in my fall semester originally, so i have to do A LOT of rearranging, anywho.....
scheduling:
i'll link last years post here as i went into pretty deep detail of how i schedule my courses and how you can too!
other tips + updates:
it’s always okay to change your programs!! (ie. major, minor, specialist) don’t let the standard of “a 4-year degree” fool you into thinking you can’t take longer. its always a good idea to look ahead and try to plan, but this age of our lives is when we're changing the most and really finding who we are and what we want to do with the rest of our lives. it's definitely not something to rush.
if you have to do summer courses, or retake courses, or take an extra semester, don't beat yourself up. it happens to 99% of people!
take me for example!! i went into school thinking 100% i wanted to go down the med path, now here i am starting my 3rd year and I'm not so sure. I'm more so looking at doing my masters in physical therapy. you change, life changes, and you find what works BEST for you and the path you want for your life.
ALSO your path doesn't have to be linear, or the typical; if you want to go to med/law/other post grad school, but your grades or extra curricular didn't necessarily cut it, that's okay! maybe you'll work somewhere for a year or two and go back to school and get in. basically what I'm trying to say is if there is a career path that you love, don't give up, and don't think you have to get there the same way as someone else did.
currently, my fall courses are all completely online (minus 1 in-person tutorial) i hope most of you will be in-person, unlike me. but i'll continue to post both online and in-person study tips as the year progresses.!
LIFE BESIDES SCHOOL
this summer i was lucky enough to work as an online PT, and this will probably continue part time into the school year. besides my other social accounts kinda blowing up, working on Syrse Dawn, I've been crazy busy with everything. I'm a little worried about balancing everything come the school szn, but as usual, i always prioritize my school work
we love academic validation haha....no but seriously, i love learning and school, and doing well has always been important to me, so while my work is important, mental health and school come first.
right now some passion projects and summer bucket list things I've been working on are finishing a current novel I'm writing (haven't finished writing one since 2015), reading 1 more book, filling a sketchbook, going for a sunrise swim and honestly just spending as much time with my friends as fam as possible!
• • • • • •
like last year, i’d love to create a chain of studyblrs doing an update like this, sharing their courses for the year, how they organize them, updates + more! so if you get tagged, add to this chain + tag 5 more studyblr accounts!!
hey guys, I’m starting university 3 weeks late. Any tips on how to catch up? My uni told me that im academically responsible for all what I’ve missed and honestly I’ve never been more anxious. :(
im in my last year of school and im planning to take up phy in college too! do you have any thing for me that i should keep in mind while studying for exams+first year experiences?
First year of college is an adjusting period. You’re not used to things happening the way they happen in college, classes and exams and what not. So, most importantly don’t be too hard on yourself in your first year. By the end of the first semester you’ll sort of have an idea on how to go about things and by the end of the year you’ll know how to handle things. It might be overwhelming and scary and stressful, but you’re not alone everyone goes through that.
Just show up for classes, it can be really hard to be disciplined enough to go for every class because you can miss your class and no one will give a fuck, but it WILL affect your understanding, of course it’s not possible to never skip so when you do make sure you go through the slides or the reading material or some one else’s notes from that class before you attend the next one. Make sure you do your assignments on your own and ask your doubts, if you don’t wanna ask in class or even office hours, ask a friend. But slowly you’ll have to have good relations with your professors if you want to get into research and carry on with physics. By the end of your degree you should have at least two professors who can write you a good LOR. Do your research on your professors, ask to work on a project under them, if they don’t have one going on which involves students, come up with your project idea or talk to the Head of the Department. You should have at least one project that you’ve done in your bachelors because there’s a lot of competition out there. And this will give you and edge.
As for exams, if you mean university exams, it depends on your prof. If they give more theoretical question papers or problem sets or a mix of both. But in general; physics is a subject where you can follow multiple approaches and get the same answer. So you have to specify what you’re doing. For eg for a particular question you can resolve forces and solve for velocity or you can use conservation of energy, it’s almost always entirely upto you, so you have to specify “acc to WE theorem...” because the prof doesn’t know what’s going on in your head so make sure you tell them what is going on, it might seem obvious to you but you’ll always benefit from writing whatever you’re thinking. Like “taking reduced mass because the masses are comparable and then taking center of mass” to solve a problem, that may seem obvious but doesn’t hurt to mention.
One tip to understand the subject better, just understand what the laws and the equations mean. You need to know what the formula is telling you and what it’s not. Try to find or make your own graphical representation of a formula, it is helpful in visualising what is actually happening. Oh and whenever you get stuck, try to derive your own formula based on your existing knowledge and keep it the last resort to find the solution from a book or whatever. That will help you improve your mathematical intuition and make you better at the subject because if you were wrong, you’ll know why you can’t use that concept there which is extremely helpful.
Best of luck anon!! I hope you enjoy university and physics and that it’s good to you!!!
PS. I’m strictly speaking from a private Indian university’s POV, idk how the projects and stuff work in govt. unis but really don’t know how the other countries’ education system is.
Probably gonna get lost in the tags or whatever, but I need help for a thing:
Studyblr ppl, fellow uni/college students, or anyone who may know a solution. I usually take notes on laptop, but during online classes i find it easy to get distracted while doing everything on my pc (in class, the environment helped me focus). My solution was to go back to taking notes with pen and paper, since I have to focus on writing, but I'm also an artist and my arm is very prone to tendonitis, plus my uni course (new media art i think would be the English name) requires lots of using a computer so there's a lot of added strain. After just a week of doing that I already injured my arm, so clearly this isn't something that i can continue doing.
Does anyone have some tips? Is there a middle-ground solution? Im kinda desperate
But does anyone have any tips for going/moving into uni? Like for my flat but also for what I should bring/buy ? I understand textbooks are probs a good idea but after that I low-key have no clue what I actually need. And I move in 9 days. Uh. I need to make a list, so ANY help is wanted and begged for. Homeware, school stuff or personal stuff? I have no clue what I need lmao
Starting my 8th semester in uni, I think I have now come up with a way to plan the semester and all the projects so that everything gets done on time, and without me actually perishing in the process, and so, here it is:
How to plan your semester in uni (and not die)
(disclaimer: I am studying a MAhons in Archaeology at a university in Scotland, so your semester/workload might be different from mine, but you can still take these principles and use them however works for you)
1. Start planning the semester as early as you can (preferably BEFORE the actual semester starts) - I usually make a new notebook in OneNote for this, with 4 or more main tabs for each subject (index, lectures, seminars, and whatever projects we will be doing for the assessment). My index is the most important part, with 3 main pages and 1 optional (timetable, assessment, reading, and goals as the optional page):
Timetable: in which I take timetable from the handbook/moodle/wherever they put it, including day, time, and location of the lectures/seminars, as well as the topic (if available beforehand). This is what you will refer back to every week.
Assessment: In the assessment I include all the given information on what I will be graded on during the course, from what type of projects to how much they are worth in my final grade, as well as their description/guidance (if applicable).
Reading: The reading page is where I put any and all reading that is required for the course - seminars, lectures, and overall, which will be very useful when studying for the exam.
Goals/optional pages: I also sometimes include a page on my goals with the course - what I want to learn from the course, and how I want to feel at the end of the course. Here you can also add more pages that suit you, for example emails to the lecturers, their office hours, and anything else that will be useful for you to have in the same place and not have to look around for in the future.
2. When you have done this for all your courses, you should also know all of your due dates during the semester (unless you have shitty lecturers, in which case - I’m sorry and this might not be super helpful, but you can also update this as you go). Sort these in order of due date, and make a table of them in this order (see my example from last semester), and now assign them priority/time to work on them (I usually set around 2 weeks/project, but this also depends on the word count and my familiarity with the topic. My categories are:
Low Priority, will take less time: here a scrapbook and a presentation, as well as the chapter of my dissertation because I could spread that out over the semester
Important but not a Due Date: something that happens that might disrupt/affect the work I am able to do that week, but not something due, here a short trip and a field trip with a course
High Priority, will take more time: essays and projects that are larger or more complicated, here most of my assignments for the semester
blue highlighting the current week so that I know where I am in the semester and what I should be working on
purple for when I should be putting much effort into a project
beige for when I should prep or can work a little bit on a project
3. Use the notes to describe what you will be working on a specific week, but keep this very general and somewhat flexible. Also specify which day of the week something is due, this will help.
4. Then use this when you are planning your week or your month or your day, to always keep track of what you should be doing, whether you plan on paper or digitally.
Good Luck, and I hope this helps! You can find the entire text, with the images here. Also check out my post on planning your week, which will be out soon!
