it's time to go back to school
it's ok though because today I've got 5 tips for you to make this the best school year yet or as minimally painful as possible
next year I'm gonna be a senior in highschool so I think I've got some experience on this topic
these are exactly the things that i will be using personally to make this school year go smoothly
and so i wanted to share them with you
so my first tip is to determine your note-taking system and your organizational system at the very beginning of the year
almost every single school year in at least one classes I would completely overhaul my note-taking system in the middle of the year
then you go back, you look at things from the first semester and it's hard to understand, it's hard to match up
with your second semester work and so it's hard to study from. it's ok to make small changes through out the year
but completely re-doing your system will make it hard to review so at the very beginning of the year
as soon as you your teacher gives you your class syllabus, explains the class structure, figure out a note-taking
system and how you're gonna organize all your papers and hand-outs and things and stick to it
some decisions that you'll have to make are things like what color highlighters will you use something that I've started doing is
when i have a question in class I write that question in my notes and I highlight it a certain colour
and then when i get an answer from the teacher I highlight it in another color
another questions are you gonna have a table of contents, are you gonna keep it in the front or the back of your notebook
what kind of notebook are you gonna use, are you gonna use a binder or a folder
how will you format bullet points, how will you format headings,
where will you store homework and notes that you don't need anymore
will you use a system like Cornell notes, for example
i hate Cornell notes, i don't know about your school but at my school they pushed Cornell notes on us so hard
for years and years that everyone just grew to hate it so get that all sort out in the beginning of the year
i don't recommend however doing it before that hum before you've even met your teacher
or gotten a syllabus or anything because you don't know what the class structure will be like
so just wait for the first few days, get acclimated to the class and then decide
my second tip is use a separate planner for school so you've probably seen this planner
in many of my videos but this actually only holds my extra curricular stuff, blog stuff, just other life stuff
this doesn't have anything related to school except I do include things like studying for AP exams
and i include test dates but homework and assignments and things like that that all goes in the
planner that my school provides hum and the reason I recommend doing this is because you have a very
very busy life and school is also very complicated because you get chapters and page numbers and assignments
and multiple step projects and things, so it really just helps to separate your school life and then your
outside of school life you can give the planner that your school gives you if they give you one
or you can get your own if that doesn't work for you but I would recommend not switching in the middle of the year
because it just takes a while to get used to something new and ideally you wanna get the same system going
going through out the year my third tip is one I've already talked about in a lot of blog posts and videos
but it just applied to like everything it is the Pomodoro technique
so to recap the pomodoro technique is where you set a times for 25min, you work for 25min and you
and then you set a times for 5min and you take a break
and i believe you repeat that four times and then you get a 20min break or something all of the numbers can be
adjusted but those are just like the classic pomodoro timers
this is super super important honestly when I started doing it it changed my life
it changed the way that i work it will keep you motivated because you can set little goals like you wanna finish
this worksheet in this pomodoro it just makes big projects feel less intimidating
so if you have a gigantic book report that you need to do you just set a timer for 25min and 25min
sounds a lot more doable than working on something for four hours you seat down for 25min you know you'll
get a break after and it just makes it a lot easier to work my fourth tip is value your class time
it really annoys me when i see people who complain a lot about homework but then those are the people who
talk the most in class and don't use their homework time how long is a school day? like 8h 7 to 8h
or something that's a lot of time and you are definitely not occupied by listening to the teacher that entire time
so you really have to make use of the little chunks of free time that you get to work on homework to
ask questions that you have, now obiously you're at school with your friends so it's fine to talk with your friends but
it's just important to actually balance that out be productive and do what you're supposed to be doing at school
something that really helps me is having a to-do list of the things that I need to do in class
so for example when i need to turn in homework or ask the teacher something I'm very likely to forget that
if i don't write it down so when I get to class I just make a list of things that I want to do
things that i want to work on and through out that 50min class I just work my way through that list
having that plan of action keeps me super productive I don't have to constantly be thinking if I'm forgetting
something because i just have it all down on paper and then that saves me an immense amount of time at home
if you watched my other study tips video I talked about how I was able to stop doing homework Friday to sunday
i wanted to make that a goal because I wanted to like really separate my homework time from my
and then my time for blog and extra curricular things and I couldn't have done that if I couldn't use my time in
school to the max so tip number 5 tip number 5 I kinda related start your assignments as soon as you get them
specially specially specially if you their big projects I know that procrastinating is basically the norm these days but
i would encourage you to just take that first step on a project as soon as you receive the assignment
get a start on these habits as soon as the school year starts when you still have some of that energy
and you're not like dead by the end of the school year as soon as you get an assignment put a little task
on your planner for the first step that you could take whether that's reviewing the rubric , highlighting, adding your notes
getting started on reading a book, brainstorming ideas, anything that you can do will make
the next steps of the project so much less intimidating because it's much easier to sit down and do something
knowing that you've already start it so ya I go back to school in less than 2 weeks and I really feel like
i have to make this school year the best school year yet
because i'm a senior and i don't know what college will be like, I don't know if it will be drastically different
also i'm taking a gap year so I'm going to be away from school for at least a year
so that's why i' really trying to work hard on all of these habits this year
and i just wanted to share them with you in the hopes that hey will help you
let me know if you already know some of these if you're planning on using any of them what are your tips and reccomendations
for students starting this school year make sure to leave this video a like and don't forget to subscribe
and ding the little bell to make sure that you get notifications and let me know if you want more videos in the topic of school
so i'll see you next time, bye!