Lecture 2

Gain an Adequate Conception of the Work Involved in Succeeding

Richard Light, in his book Making the Most of College, points out that a key factor in student success is time. According to Light, successful students understand three things about time:

• Time is not an unlimited resource

• Time should be organized around priorities

• Time must be monitored.

Time is Not an Unlimited Resource

Let’s consider the first point: time is not an unlimited resource. No matter how much you might wish otherwise, there are only 24 hours in the day, 168 hours in the week. Compounding that problem is the fact that not all of those hours are yours to command.

Note:  Idle leisure, social time, resting/sleeping, etc. are important priorities.  One difficulty that students face is setting priorities for “leisure” time.  It may be useful to read the following essay by Mortimer Adler as you attempt to identify your priorities: The Use of Free Time.

"Gathering" vs. "Applying" Information

A major difficulty that students encounter in time management, particularly as it applies to allocation of study time, is the belief that “study time” equals “homework.” “I don’t need to spend “X” hours studying because it doesn’t take me that long to do my homework.” Homework, in turn, is understood to be anything that is related to a grade: essays, problem sets that are collected and evaluated, the test (which requires occasional extra study time for cramming). This misconception is partly based on the notion that one comes to college to “get an education.” This idea implies that an education is something one receives as a gift. The difficulty that underlies this notion is that gifts are freely given and, most often, do not have to be earned.

The "Banking Concept" of Education

The Brazilian educator Paolo Freire attacks this belief when he criticizes what he calls the “banking” concept of education which implies that students merely file, store, and withdraw information as called upon. According to Freire, “In the banking concept of education, knowledge is a gift bestowed by those who consider themselves knowledgeable upon those whom they consider to know nothing.” The product of such an approach is “lack of creativity, transformation, and knowledge.” Freire believes that education in the true sense, is and must be active. Those who are “knowledgeable” approach the world critically. If we accept Freire’s ideas, then the student who focuses on “doing the homework” and fails to engage the material, is imitative, stagnant, and full of trivia. Essentially, students who spend all their efforts on “gathering information” which they can give back on a test are little better than robots.

Studying vs. Learning

When approaching the material for a course, the student needs to understand the difference between “studying” and “learning.” According to the dictionary the verb “study” means “to read in detail, especially with the intention of learning.” Learning, according to cognitive psychology, is to absorb new information into preexisting patterns of thought. To learn new material, you must work with it; you must give it structure. Thomas Mann has said that “Organization and simplification are the keys to mastery.” The best and most efficient learners are active learners. Active learners ask questions, test themselves, learn the material when they first encounter it, and spread out review to support the original learning.