Learning Strategies Resources for Students

Find below more information on time management, test taking tips and notetaking strategies.

Time Management/ Procrastination:

  • Fall Semester Schedule  
  • Breaking down assignments into chunks table  
  • Combating procrastination, including strategies to manage social media during study 
  • Pomodoro Method and Body Doubling Handout and Links  

Test Taking:

  • Multiple Choice Tipsheets   

Notetaking Strategies:

  • Tips and Cornell Notetaking Strategy and How-To Video  

Time Management/ Procrastination

Fall 2024 Schedule

Download Fall 2024 schedule table in word format, so you can fill it with your courses for your convenience:

Fall 2024 Schedule

Breaking Down Assignments into Manageable Chunks            

Here is a tool to break down large tasks into smaller ones to hep to organize your time and stay on track of your work. First, list what you must get done and add in the start and end dates. Next, fill out the Word table vertically by adding in all the tasks you need to complete.  After that fill in the How Long portion and add in approximately 30 minutes to each task in case things take you longer to complete.  Next, add in when you will complete these tasks. Finally, transfer all the tasks, amounts of time and dates you will get the work done to your calendar.  You can also add in comments to measure your progress.

Download Breaking Down Assignments Table

Combating Procrastination

Common Procrastination Triggers: Fear of failure, perfectionism, lack of motivation.

1. Fear of Failure:
  • Perfectionism: Fear of not meeting high standards can lead to avoidance. Perfectionists often procrastinate because they’re afraid of not doing the task perfectly, leading to not completing the task.
  • Self-Doubt: Concerns about your ability to succeed can create a fear of failure, causing delay.
2. Lack of Motivation:
  • Relevance: When a task doesn’t seem meaningful or aligned with personal goals, motivation to complete it can be low. This can happen with school assignments or readings that you are not interested in.
  • Overwhelm: Large or complex tasks can feel overwhelming, making it hard to get started. Breaking tasks into smaller, manageable parts can help.
  • Reward Structure: If a task doesn’t offer immediate rewards, it’s harder to find the motivation to start. Creating small, short-term rewards can help maintain momentum.
3. Distractions and Temptations:
  • Environmental Triggers: External factors like social media, entertainment, or a cluttered workspace can serve as distractions that trigger procrastination.
  • Immediate Gratification: The temptation to engage in more enjoyable activities instead of completing a less appealing task can lead to procrastination.
4. Lack of Clear Goals or Planning:
  • Ambiguity: Unclear or vague tasks can make it difficult to know where to start, leading to procrastination.
  • Poor Planning: Without a clear plan or deadline, tasks can be easily put off for later.

Solutions for Procrastination:

1. Fear of Failure:
  • Reframe Failure: Shift your mindset to view failure as a learning opportunity rather than a negative outcome. Understand that mistakes are a natural part of growth and improvement.
  • Set Realistic Goals: Break tasks into smaller, manageable steps with achievable milestones. Celebrate small successes along the way to build confidence and reduce the fear of failure.
  • Focus on the Process: Not the Outcome: Concentrate on the effort and progress you’re making rather than the end result. This reduces pressure and makes it easier to get started.
2. Perfectionism:
  • Adopt a “Good Enough” Approach: Recognize that perfection is often unattainable and that doing something is better than doing nothing. Aim for completion rather than perfection.
  • Set Time Limits: Allocate a specific amount of time for each task and commit to stopping when the time is up. This can help prevent overthinking and endless tweaking.
  • Practice Self-Compassion: Be kind to yourself and acknowledge that it’s okay to make mistakes. Remind yourself that everyone has flaws and that imperfection is normal.
  • Check In: On assignments, set up a meeting to check in with your instructor and/or with peers to see if you are on the right track with assignment.
3. Lack of Motivation:
  • Connect Tasks to Personal Goals: Identify how each task aligns with your long-term goals or values. Understanding the bigger picture can boost motivation and make the task feel more meaningful.
  • Break Tasks into Smaller Steps: Divide large or overwhelming tasks into smaller, more manageable pieces. Completing small steps can create a sense of progress and build momentum.
  • Use Rewards and Incentives: Create a reward system for yourself. For example, promise yourself a treat or a break after completing a task. Short-term rewards can help maintain motivation for long-term goals.
4. Distractions and Temptations:
  • Create a Focused Environment: Eliminate or reduce distractions by turning off notifications, using website blockers, and keeping your workspace tidy. A focused environment can minimize temptations to procrastinate.
  • Schedule Distraction-Free Time: Designate specific times of the day for focused work where distractions are minimized. Let others know that you’re unavailable during these times.
  • Practice Mindfulness: Mindfulness techniques can help you stay present and focused on the task at hand. This can reduce the urge to procrastinate due to distractions or temptations.
5. Lack of Clear Goals or Planning:
  • Set SMART Goals: Ensure your goals are Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound. Clear goals provide direction and make it easier to stay on track.
  • Create a Detailed Plan: Outline the steps needed to achieve your goal and set deadlines for each step. A clear plan reduces ambiguity and helps you stay organized.
  • Prioritize Tasks: Use prioritization techniques like the Eisenhower Matrix to identify and focus on high-priority tasks. Tackling important tasks first can prevent procrastination.


Strategies to Reduce Social Media Distraction:

  • Placing your phone in a small bag/pencil case and treating it as a “lockbox”, that you put away in your bag or in the back of the room (when studying from home), that you do not open until you are done with your study session.
  • Deleting social media/distracting apps off your phone and only accessing them through the browser.
  • Not saving your passwords for these sites.
  • Changing your password for these accounts to one that is long and complicated makes it more difficult to remember.

The Pomodoro Method:

Read Pomodoro Technique image transcript

Saint Mary's University Student Success Centre and Learning Skills and Strategies.

The Pomodoro Technique developed by Francesco Cirillo.

The Pomodoro Technique is a time management tool to help you work productively by setting goals for a work period, working and taking breaks for set intervals, and keeping track of your progress.

  1. Plan Your Tasks.
    • What do you want to accomplish? Write down your specific goals.
    • How much time do you expect it will take?
  2. Set a timer and work for 25 minutes.
    • Consider using an app blocker or a Pomodoro-based game like Flora to reduce distractions.
  3. Record your progress.
  4. Set a timer to take a break for 5 minutes.
  5. Repeat steps 2-4.
    • Complete three to five rounds of study/work cycles.
  6. Take a longer break.
    • Assess your progress. How much have you completed? How does that align with your expectations? Take a break for at least 30 minutes. Then move on to another task or keep at it, starting from the top!


Pomodoro Method and Body Doubling online links:

Test Taking

The Robert Gillespie Academic Skills Centre: Five Tips to Ace Your Multiple-Choice Exams

Which of the following is the most effective strategy for multiple choice tests used by students?

  1. When in doubt, the answer is C
  2. The longest answer is the correct answer
  3. Eeny, meeny, miny, moe
  4. Always pick “All of the above”
  5. None of the above

Those strategies may have worked on some of your high school tests, but they won’t be effective in university. Studying, practicing problems, and going to class are some of the best ways to make sure you do well on tests, but did you know there are also in-test strategies? Use these five tips to help you ace the multiple choice questions on your tests and exams.

Read the questions carefully

  • Make sure you understand what the question is asking. As you read, underline words like “not” and “always” since they change the meaning of the question.

Answer the question without looking at the options

  • Coming up with the answer yourself will help you identify what the correct option should say. Compare your answer to the options. Look for the same ideas and key terms.

Eliminate the incorrect options

  • Read each of the options and eliminate the ones that are wrong. They may not be related to the question or may be completely off. If you still have remaining options, read the question again, think of the answer you made up, and try eliminating again. It’s okay to restart the question if you think you do not have the correct answer.

Answer all the questions

  • Don’t waste your time on a question if you don’t know what the answer is. Skip the question and come back to it later. Give your brain more time to think about that question as you tackle other problems.
  • Even if you don’t know an answer, make an educated guess. There is a chance you might get the marks. If you don’t try, you are guaranteed to get zero.

Manage your time

  • Budget your time to answer each question, review your answers, and transfer them to your answer sheet. Before you start writing the test, look at the test to see how many questions there are and divide your time accordingly. For example, if you have 50 questions in a one-hour test, you could budget 50 minutes for answering them and 10 minutes for checking your work.

Notetaking Strategies

Lectures, Listening & Notetaking - Academic Skills - Trent University

Lectures, Listening & Notetaking:

The Challenge of Lectures

In lecture, professors sift through reams of work on a particular topic and present you with the most significant and interesting aspects of it. In any given lecture, a professor may draw on ideas he or she has gleaned from many different scholarly works and years of experience in the field. In short, lectures are a primary means by which your professors will communicate information to you, information that they will expect you to know and apply during seminars and on exams.

Clearly, learning how to listen actively to and take notes during a lecture will be crucial to your success as a student. However, many students have trouble getting the most out of lectures, especially at first. There seem to be two main problems that can cause this difficulty:

  1. Information goes by once, usually very quickly. If you miss something (say, you are writing instead of listening), it’s gone.
  2. It’s difficult to separate what is important, the main points that you need to note, from secondary points.

Understanding the Lecture Experience

One of the best ways to meet the challenge of understanding and taking good notes during lectures is to think of the lecture as more than a one-shot, fifty-minute experience. Instead, think of it as a three-part experience, and realize that you will need to participate actively in each part in order to get the most out of lectures.

  1. Before. Prepare for lectures before they begin and try to anticipate what they will cover.
  2. During: Listen actively and find a notetaking system that works for you.
  3. After: Review and respond to your notes.

What to Do Before the Lecture

  1. Read the syllabus to see what the unit is about and what the title of the lecture is. Think about where the lecture fits into the course.
  2. Consider what you already know about the topic and try to anticipate what might be covered.
  3. Review your notes from previous lectures to further re-establish the context of the course in your own mind.
  4. Do assigned readings. Anticipate how they might relate to the lecture ahead.
  5. If they are posted ahead of time, download and copy any outlines or list of key terms for the lecture ahead.  If PowerPoint slides are posted, print them in handout form so you can make additional notes, identify key information and indicate connections.
  6. Make a list of questions you would like to have answered by the lecture.

What to Do During the Lecture

Listen Actively

It is not necessary to record the lecturer’s every word or idea. Not only is this physically impossible, but excessive writing can become a barrier to listening. What good is writing down things that you don’t understand, anyway?

  1. Listen for important points.
  2. Listen for relationships between ideas in texts, class discussions, and the lectures.
  3. Listen for cue words; they help you cluster and prioritize information.

Cue Words

Types of Cue Words

Examples

Words that Signal Emphasis or Importance

Essential

Crucial

Significantly

Words that Signal the Order or Scope of a Topic

First, second, third

Initially, Finally

For instance, For Example

Words that Indicate the Lecture is Moving in a New Direction

However

Nonetheless

Whereas

In contrast

Words that Signal that parts of the lecture are NOT central and DO NOT need to be written down       

Incidentally

As a digression

By the way

Know What to Write Down

  1. New or unfamiliar facts and ideas.
  2. Things that come in lists: if the lecturer has created a list to categorize facts, reasons, themes, etc., it’s a good indication that the information is important.
  3. The lecturer’s reasons for questioning or favouring a particular approach or theory.
  4. Points which the lecturer pauses over or repeats: people lecture with certain goals in mind, and usually when they convey a point which is crucial to their thesis they repeat it.
  5. Don’t write down what is on the PowerPoint slide if you have access to it later. There is no need to repeat information.

Develop a Notetaking System

  1. Develop your own short-hand of abbreviations and symbols.
  2. Write in point form.
  3. Leave lots of white space to fill in later when you complete your comments on the lecture or fill in gaps.
  4. For laptop notetaking, make sure to save often.
  5. For audio recording: ask for the instructor’s permission, sit near the front of the class, and take notes as well if possible. There are many new tools, such as smart pens, that can help you with recording and notetaking during lectures.

The Cornell Method

The Cornell Method is one of the most common and popular notetaking systems.  In this method of note-taking, you begin by drawing a line down the length of your paper about one-third of the way through the page. On the left side of the page, write only key terms or ideas. Leave most of the space blank. On the right side of the page, take notes on the lecture in point form. Later, the space on the left side can be used to add in or expand on information, highlight key points, or raise key questions. This picture shows how you can organize your notes using the Cornell Method.

Image demonstrating the Cornell Method. Lined paper with two columns separated by a line down the length of the paper. Numbered key terms in left column and point-form notes on the right column.

What to Do After the Lecture

Just as the lecture experience begins before the professor begins speaking, it continues well after he or she is done. Many students leave the lecture hall and file their notes away until exams. Unfortunately, research shows that in doing so, they lose a significant amount of what they just learned. Instead, review your notes soon after the lecture ends.

  1. Read through your notes as soon as you can after the lecture ends. Highlight or underline main points. Put stars next to key information. Try to fill in any gaps in your notes.
  2. Respond to and reflect on your notes in the margins of the paper. You can use one margin to make a list of terms that corresponds to the information in the body of your notes. You can use the other side of the margin to write a short summary of a key idea or make a connection between the point made in lecture and ideas from readings or seminars.
  3. Discuss your notes with a friend or study group. This can help you to process information, fill in gaps in your notes, and deepen your understanding of the main points.
  4. Make flashcards or lists of key terms. You don’t need to wait for the end of the term to start preparing for exams. Take a few minutes to put key vocabulary terms or concepts on index cards or a list of terms with a brief definition.
  5. Keep your notes organized so you can find them. Indicate course code, lecture title, and date of the lecture. File your notes together by course and organize them chronologically for easy access; this strategy works for handwritten or typed notes.

Effective Lecture Notes

Cornell Notes Video: Cornell Notes Method of Taking Notes - YouTube

Land Acknowledgement

Land Acknowledgement

George Brown Polytechnic is located on the traditional territory of the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation and other Indigenous peoples who have lived here over time. We are grateful to share this land as treaty people who learn, work and live in the community with each other.

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