Invest in your studies

Unisa first-year journey e-mails: number 4

Do you make notes while you are studying? Or do you think they're a waste of time and that you could rather spend your time reading, memorising or participating in group discussions? We believe that making notes is an investment in your studies. Successful students make notes of what they read. Your notes serve two major purposes:

• Your notes are a permanent record of the time you've spent on a section of work.
• Your notes serve as a first step towards expanding your network of memory strategies.

As your prepare for your assignments, we recommend that you make notes before you answer your assignment questions, as it will help you to make sense of your learning and understand how everything is linked.

Our focus this week is on helping you to learn more effectively.

Activity 1: Learn more about an effective learning strategy

The EFT study method helps you to divide your time between reading your study material, making notes, revising, memorising and testing yourself. Read more about this method.

Activity 2: Try out different note making methods

Read about different ways of making notes. Try out these different methods (examples are provided on the web page) on at least one study unit in one module. See how you can incorporate these ways of making notes with what you are already doing.

Next week

Our focus for next week is on preparing for assignments. To contact the university, click here.

All the best for your studies this week!