Personal
The First Day of School
Yesterday was my first day in a new school. I was moving from a secondary school to a sixth form college and there were many differences. It went well and but I found some of the differences a bit difficuilt to come to terms with. To get them off my chest I’ve decided to share my thought on the matter with you.
I haven’t been in school with girls for five years and coming back to a mixed-sex was a bit of a culture shock. It’s amazing how much people (boys especially) relax when around the opposite sex. In a single sex school you get over that quite quickly and since there’s nobody to impress you tend to just get on with work and mess about much less. Another surprising thing to me is how easily male teachers can give in to good-looking girls. They seem to be able to avoid tellings-off all the time; shame the female teachers aren’t as easily manipulated.
‘Sixth-form is a step towards adulthood’ reads my sixth-form prospectus. I had read this many times and been told that I would be treated very differently by the teachers but I never expected it to be like this. If truth be told it is a little too relaxing for me. Firstly the teachers are much more relaxed about small things like talking quietly when they’re talking and being 5 minutes late. This sounds great but it’s quite a shock and really tempts you to relax a bit and do the same.
It doesn’t help that there is no uniform either. I apologise to readers from cultures where non-uniform is the
No more of this to be seen.
norm but in the UK it has always been compulsory and to see it go is actually quite sad. I have been to seeing the same sea of navy blue jumpers for the last 10 years of my life; everyone has always looked the same. But now to see everybody dressed up in the latest fashion is strange. It causes you to feel much freer which is good but it will take a while to sink in.
Finally and most importantly is the attitude of the teachers which freaked me out the most. Usually at the end of a class the teacher would repeat the homework instructions a number of times, making sure everyone had noted it down and was capable of completing it. Not any more. This time there was a sentance or two of verbal instruction before the teacher left the room in a hurry. Teachers really aren’t there for you any more. They are, but you have to seek them out yourself, otherwise you’ll start to lose out. My parents always said to me that you are much more independant in college but it has taken me aback for sure.
You're on your own now, son.
How and Why to keep that ‘Back to School enthusiasm’
Well, it’s about 2 weeks until I go back to school after the long summer break and so I thought I’d share my thoughts and ideas on this brand new, exciting and very often terrifying time.
I always looked forward to the start of a new school year as a younger kid. I’m not sure exactly what it is but there is something oh-so-irresistible about the blank canvas before you. It’s a chance to re-invent yourself to a certain extent and to make a positive impression on your teachers and peers. Inevitably, it all starts a week or so prior to the start of term when you go out and buy the best stationary, coat, shoes and lunchbox possible in an effort to make the best impression you can (dare I say it, on the opposite sex).
The new-found enthusiasm contiues when you get into class. You write as neatly as possible (with your new pencil, I might add), lay out tables with all the care and attention of a master craftsman, and colour in diagrams like a young van Goch.
Everything would go so well for about a fortnight and then you’d have a late night, feel a bit tired in the morning and standards would begin to drop; it was inevitable.
via flickr
A lot of things have changed since those days of primary school but for whatever reason I still haven’t been able to shake this terrible habit of mine.
To make sure I don’t fall back into the old ways I have devised the following routine to keep me in tip-top form for class.
- Get into bed by 9:30 on most school nights. A very difficult decision for me as I have always been an evening person (writing this post at 8:45p.m.), but I think it’s possible to reverse this and I’m sure I will reap the rewards in the long term. This is doubly difficuilt as it may mean compromising my social interactions a little, which is why I am aiming only for most and not all nights.
- Shower in the morning. This is another new thing to me as I have always showered in the evenings. Although it means getting up a bit earlier it will help to wake me up further (plus I think my hair looks better after a shower, which is a bonus).
- Keep well nourished. A mistake I’ve been making for pretty much the past 5 years is not eating during the day. I did have lunch. But through the whole morning I was working on a near-empty stomach which distracted me and caused me to lack energy in classes. Breakfast is equally important and though I never skipped it, I normally only had time for a small bowl of cereal. With my new found love of strawberry jam and toast though I hope to get the day off to a much better and nutritious start.
Why bother with all this? If you’re feeling tired you can just catch up after the lesson.
This point of view is a common and foolish one. There’s always someone in class who is falling asleep or just doesn’t want to concentrate; they don’t think they need to because they have a textbook at home. This is such a waste of everybody time and resources. Firstly the student themself, who is wasting their own time, secondly the teacher, whose knowledge and expertise is being squandered, and thirdly the time and attention of participating students which is being wasted by unnecessary interruptions and breaks in teaching.
This goes to show, if just one student is not on form the entire lesson can be less productive for everyone concerned.
Imagine you failed to concentrate in one lesson every day for an hour. That’s five hours a week and more than 100 hours a year. Wouldn’t you like that time back before an exam?
So, I’ll give that a try and report back soon. What do you think, will it work?
Is your routine harming you?
We all have a routine. Even the greatest ‘free spirit’ has a certain point during the day when he’ll regularly be doing something, and us students are no different.
A routine provides comfort and certainty in our day-to-day lives and enables us to focus ourselves on particular tasks at certain times of the day, but can sticking to your routine too closely hinder you in your studying.
via flickr
In short, yes it can. You see by committing yourself to a routine in such a strict way you lose the flexibility to start tasks early and finish them later and often you spend less time on these tasks, leaving their quality to suffer. But it doesn’t have to be like this…
In order to complete tasks to the absolute best of your ability you need to dedicate time to them and you’d be surprised how much time you actually have.
Let’s say for example that you tend to do your tasks in the evening. During that day you may have missed an hour of two’s worth of opportunity to get started, at lunch time for example. And don’t think you need a quiet room with a deskto get started, just twenty minutes on the bus home or relaxing in the library is enough to get you thinking ahead and mentally preparing your work. Just getting some ideas flowing around your head can really focus you when you get down to the business of actually doing the thing.
This is something I have recently realised that I actually do a lot, I think I always have done. I’ve always been pretty focused in school (ever since starting) and thank goodness because without this ability to concentrate I would have done a lot worse at school. I sense that school has always been lurking at the back of my mind (it does kind of take over your life as a kid) and even when I was playing football after school I could let my mind wander and ponder my work.
This may not suit you that as well as it suits me, I am sort of a workaholic and I can cope with an overlap in my work and home lives.
If you have been at all confused by the message of this post, here it is: Don’t be afraid to loosen your routine if it allows you to commit more fully to an assignment. Good luck!
Do you need to sort your life out?
This is a question I find myself asking (myself) from time to time, usually about once or twice a year. This happens when I get myself into a right pickle and need to take a step backwards, a deep breath and tackle all the problems that are bugging me at the moment.
‘Sort out your life’ seems like a bit of an over-reaction right? Of course it is, but by applying such a dramatic title it really boosts you into action.
So here’s where I am at the moment: (my to-do list)
- Tidy my room
- Sort out my wardrobe
- Throw out all my old junk
3 simple tasks, but 3 time consuming
So…here’s how it’s done:
Take the day off: plan to do nothing. This is such a depressing thing to do and I do feel so stupid writing it down but this really has to be done. By giving yourself a free day you know that nothing can give you an excuse not to do whatever it is you need to do. When the day comes: have a lie-in. Don’t get up until about 10 and pretty much just lounge about the house all morning. Then have lunch. Fill yourself right up so that you have a lot of energy to keep you going all afternoon.
OK, that’s the preparation out the way, now to get stuck in! However you approach the task make sure that you don’t rush yourself. In fact you should take your time if you’re going to be spending a good couple of hours over this. Put on some music and then get to work.
I always tend to sort my life out on a Sunday when there are less distractions. I turn off my phone, though there tends to be less socialising on Sundays anyway, put on some music or even the radio if I want to listen to the Grand Prix. I work right through the afternoon from about 2 until 6 or 7 in the evening. Then I watch a bit of TV and get to bed early to recharge my batteries so that I can start my newly-organised life with a bang.
Anyway, off to sort out my life now, speak to you soon.
[Do you have a similar routine to mine, does it work? does mine? Leave a comment below.