Study

The Wonder of the Weekend

Why would you want to treat the weekend as the weekend? Saturday and Sunday are boons for productivity.

photo by mcleod

The week is a great time for fun at uni and things often slow down at the weekend. It’s not always the case, but you’re likely to find precious little happening over large chunks of that time, so it’s perfect to get on with your work and catch up on the stuff you don’t want to think about when everything else is vying for your attention during the week.

Look at Saturday and Sunday as a two-day week. Let Monday to Friday be the weekend instead! Okay, so there are lectures and it won’t be work-free. But how often do you manage an entire day where it was exclusively fun, laughter, decadence and delight from start to finish? Exactly!

Normally, the weekend is an excuse to chill, or a time to go back to the family home, or catch up on sleep and washing (if you parents have stopped letting you bring your dirty stuff home…). However, you have the prospect of achieving a whole lot more if you’re proactive on campus. While others go home and Saturdays are naturally quieter, you can focus on more important matters. And for those who stay on campus at the weekend, you can get up early on a Sunday while everyone else stays in bed catching up on lost sleep or nursing hangovers.

I recently saw this quotation from ‘How to be Idle‘, by Tom Hodgkinson:

“To be truly idle, you also have to be efficient.”

The weekend is the perfect time to do most of the work you’d expect others to do in the week. Then, when the normally busy weekdays come along, you can spend a lot more time idling and a lot less time worrying about your workload. Good times, here we come!

Even if you have sporting events at the weekend, meet up for a weekend activity, or go to church on a Sunday morning, there should be no trouble incorporating it into a packed routine. There should still be plenty of weekend ‘dead time’ to be proactive in.

I’m not the only one who made the most of this valuable time. Cal Newport has long been an advocate of a ‘Sunday Ritual’. It’s great to get up as early as possible on a Sunday (even if it had been an eventful Saturday night…) and enjoy the peace. For me, early mornings were spent walking around the quiet campus, catching up on reading, getting a few boring chores out of the way, writing drafts of essays, going to a practically empty library and making the most of the facilities, and all sorts of other things.

photo by patkisha

While everyone else slept, I worked with ease and without distraction. Once friends started to emerge from their beds, I’d been up and about for hours. It was bliss. Seriously.

Some people thought my workload was nothing compared to my friends. It looked like I was doing much less than anyone else. And at that precise moment in time, it was probably true. But if they’d noticed how much I’d achieved while they weren’t looking, all would make sense and it would be clear how much effort I’d really put in. I only made it look easy. Doesn’t mean it was a breeze. A relaxed effort, yes. A half-hearted effort, no.

What does the weekend mean for you? And how much is that time worth?

Back Away From Pointless Plagiarism

Plagiarism doesn’t always have to be intentional. It’s unlikely, but certainly possible if you’re not careful.

Seeing double? (photo by bananabren)

Get your wits about you and give credit where it’s due. Here are a few ways you can stay on the right side of things:

Don’t take another person’s unique idea and use it unless you reference that person’s work.
Cite the source of facts, statistics, and quotations.
Don’t copy from elsewhere without properly referencing and attributing, no matter how obscure it is.
If it’s a close call and you feel a reference may be needed to cover all ground, do put the reference. Don’t second guess yourself and decide against putting a footnote. Citing it means that you’ve done your research and it means you won’t get into unnecessary trouble later down the line.
Quote and reference in advance. When you copy quotations, photocopy pages, or do anything with another person’s work, make sure to note down the reference, so you can add it easily to an essay later. A major time-waster for many students can be the bibliography and references at the end. Even if you don’t use half the information you’ve gathered, you’ll still save time having noted the proper referencing notes in the first place, rather than working it out at the time. I found this out pretty quickly…A quotation without a reference can be hell!
Don’t blindly rely on what classmates have to say on a subject. If you take down someone’s opinion on an essay topic, how do you know it’s an original thought? You may find that the idea is a very specific one that’s held by an important academic in the field. From taking a friend’s idea and thinking you’re onto a good thing, you may find difficulty when you’re being asked how you came across this information. Stick to your own ideas and back them up.

It isn’t always as simple as copying someone else’s writing or idea word for word. There are many different ways to get caught in the trap. Here are some more helpful links to help you understand what plagiarism can be:

Photo by mollyjolly

Research via Google alone: Are you crazy or just lazy?

Recent research has suggested that an overwhelming number of people think they can get all the information they need on the basis of a Google search. The majority believe there is no need to probe further. Now imagine, if 98% of people got by on a web search for their data, think how much better you could achieve if you worked in the other 2%, looking further than Google.

Even if you did one extra thing to boost your research, you’d be well on the way to producing a work with a more rounded research base and a quality bibliography. You don’t even need to step away from the computer if you don’t want. Many academic libraries subscribe to hundreds (if not thousands) of specialised journals and you should be just a couple of clicks away. Your library website and departmental webpages should help you find the treasure. If not, ask a librarian. It’s what they’re there for!

Maybe a lot of students think the web search really will provide all the details they need to get on with their work. Or maybe they think it’s enough to get by and believe any extra work would take too long and wouldn’t produce enough extra credit. Either way, a lot of you are missing out. And it doesn’t take a lot of extra time to get a much greater return.

It’s more about walking a couple more yards than it is going the extra mile. There’s no excuse to scrimp on effort, because it doesn’t take a lot to bring everything into play. Unfortunately, when you start with the bare minimum of work, you’re likely to build a false belief that any extra work will bog you down completely. It only takes a couple of goes at sourcing more information to find that the reward for a few minutes extra work can be worth a bomb. So get to it!

If you want more help on how to take your research further with ease, I have 16 ways to help you with your research in the archives.

And if you’re really interested ( or need help sleeping… 😉 ), you can read more of my thoughts on Google versus libraries if you want.

A Journal Journey – 10 Benefits of an Academic Journal

Keeping some sort of diary or journal isn’t restricted to your personal thoughts on how a hot date was, what you think of the stupid trick played on you by your so-called mates, and how amazing that low-key gig was last night. Just look at the range of output you get from all the blogs out there.

One powerful way to whip yourself into great study shape is to start writing an academic journal. The process can be as quick as you like and the benefits far outweigh the time you need to spend on it.

photo by lusi

An academic journal doesn’t need to follow any particular structure, but you should take it seriously. It only requires a few bullet points each day to show how you’re solving a problem, how you intend to find your voice, or what you’re doing to shape your future. Feel free to write in whatever way you feel comfortable with. It may take a few days to find a style or setup you’re happy with, but once you work through that, you’ll gain access to the bigger picture and take hold of a new perspective on your working:

You can learn about yourself on a more engaging level;
You can learn from your mistakes;
You’re more likely to pick up on the ideas that work best for you;
Your focus will remain pin-sharp;
What was just a nugget of an idea, merely throwaway at the time, can expand into an elaborate vision when you revisit that thought;
You can plan ahead with greater ease and pick up on flaws and overlaps;
It helps you with the creative and written process;
It helps you analyse at a deeper level;
Your journal is a document of past moments that may be valuable to a great future;
You should gain greater confidence through a journal, compared with just your thoughts.

I didn’t keep a journal while at university. But I now see the value in making the effort. I still don’t write a regular daily journal, but who needs to sit down with a ‘Dear Diary’ nowadays anyway? All I do is fire open a journal on the computer and get down ideas for the day, respond to what’s on my mind and allow the creative juices to flow. Often, it helps me ignore any Internal Editor sneaking around my head too. It means my ‘journal’ is often subject to change. But as it’s a personal document, it makes absolutely no difference.

In time, you’ll end up enjoying the process and realise how beneficial it’s become. And it shouldn’t take up much of your time at all. Bonus!

photo by dinny

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