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Counseling/ Guidance » Strategies for Success

Strategies for Success

Strategies for Success
 
Follow the steps below on your path toward academic success.
 
Time Management
Using the Binder Reminder
 
Write Everything Down in your binder reminder. Your binder reminder is useful for keeping track of homework, assignments, deadlines, quizzes, and tests.
 
What you write down is what you’ll remember!
Do these things each day:
  1. Think about what is important right now.
  2. Record/write down your assignments with their due dates, when research should be done, when the first draft should be completed, and all other assignment components, etc.
  3. Review your planner each afternoon/evening to see what needs to be completed.
  4. Act by planning your priorities (follow your daily schedule)
  5. Check-off the assignments when you complete them.
  6. Preview your planner each morning to see what is due.
  7. Check to make sure you have the work due that day in your notebook.
Setting a Daily Routine
Set a routine. Allocate a set amount of time for each subject each day (Monday-Thursday). I'd recommend 20-30 minutes per academic subject a night.  So one can expect to spend 2 hours per night on homework, reviewing, reading, writing, and studying!! 
You need to set a timer and follow your set schedule.
 
Making and setting the daily schedule:
  • Begin with the most difficult subject then move to the second easiest.
  • Take a break (30 minutes).
  • Resume studying with the second most difficult subject and eventually finishing with the least difficult subject. Now, when I say difficult, I mean difficulty in understanding/comprehending not most amount of work.
Some days there may be no assigned work, but students do best if they develop a routine of studying/reviewing/reading/etc. each day.
 
 
How to Study
 
Test & Quiz Preparation…What to do during your Daily Routine
  • Review class notes every day (make it part of your Daily Routine).
  • Reread handouts and textbook. When reading the textbook, review the unit preview, read the chapter objectives and main ideas. Define the terms, bold-faced words/concepts. Be able to answer the California Standards being addressed.
  • Rewrite/type your notes for further understanding and neatness.
  • Write questions you think and/or know will be on the test. Make sure to include an answer to these questions.
  • Create Note Cards: place your defined terms on cards, prepare questions and answers from class notes and assignments. Punch a hole in each note card and put on a leaf ring or like attachment device.
 
T3 = Ten minute Teaching Time

This follows the idea that one learns more when one teaches others.

One way to improve grades is to have students teach parents/guardians something they have learned in school that day, and the key is the time allotted to teaching this concept, 10 minutes {Ten minute Teaching Time T-Cubed). Now the idea is not to tell one what one did throughout the day, but rather to teach how/why something is the way it is (example, explain the concept of figuring out the speed of something, the reason why the Romans built aqueducts, etc.).

This teaching can be done in a number of manners. Have the student explain 5 things at 2 minutes each, or he/she can take 10 minutes and teach one thing, concept, method, etc. Beyond communicating with a parent/guardian, the focus of this method is three fold:
  1. The student is to think of the main concept/point/topic/method taught that day, and not get caught up in all the small stuff.
  2. The student is able to get his/her mind thinking of what was important from that day.
  3. This process enables the student to remember what assignments and things he needs to study for the day.
 
Organization
 
How to keep yourself and your work organized
Doing homework is only the first step. Sometimes students can be overwhelmed by managing all of the papers that come with more advanced work. Gather everything into one three-ring binder for each subject so you’ll have a better chance of getting everything home, finding it, and then getting it back to school.

Three-Ring Binder Organization
  1. Color-code the binders by associating a color with each subject - green for science (nature)
  2. Have a title page: include subject, period, your name
  3. Use dividers/tabs color coded – use different colors for notes, class work, homework, tests/quizzes
  4. Have a clear pocket for work needed to be completed and/or to be turned in to the teacher.

Three-Ring Binder Usage
  1. After homework is finished, put it into your binder.
  2. Put the binder immediately into your backpack.
  3. Next, put the backpack next to the door, so no time will be lost in the morning searching for it.
  4. During class, turn in the homework as directed by the teacher. Some teachers have students put it in a box at the start; others ask for it at the end of class. If the teacher forgets to ask for homework, offer it to the teacher.
  5. Do this everyday so it will become as automatic as brushing your teeth.
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