24.09.2024

☆°~ INTRO TO MY BLOG ☆°~

Beck/Nathan, he/him!

teenager, in high school rn

really into the humanities + arts

not slaying at STEM but hoping to fix that

autistic + probably ADHD and trying to find study/learning methods that work for me

tentatively learning French + Tagalog but I am bad at languages so we try our best here

main blog is @transmasc-wizard, I'll follow and like from there

Hoping to post/reblog:

study tips to try or that work for me

journaling, scheduling, planning, etc content

other miscellaneous school tips

aesthetic content

some assorted things i like:

books: The Great Gatsby, the Secret History, the Grishaverse, the Raven Cycle

music: Hozier, the Crane Wives, MCR, Chappell Roan, Jhariah

hobbies: theatre, DND, reading, writing, drawing

Always looking for friends to exchange this stuff with !!

about me :3 || tagging system

Study tips that i learned through failures!

1. It's so important that you do a first read thru of the text as fast as possible. Stick to annotations and brief summarizing notes/outlines. Our brain is constantly making connections even when we're sleeping, so even if you don't understand something at first, getting stuck on it is a waste of your present time AND sleep time. Some things will click while you're doing chores because your brain is still working in the background! But it can't happen if there is nothing to click. Try to expose yourself to all the material as early as possible. [If you're studying math, skip the derivations and proofs in the first read thru and just do the example problems and focus on the underlying assumptions. Depending on the class/exam objective, you might not even be tested on the proof]

2. The breaks. Even if you know you can study 4 hours straight - don't. I used to do this especially when I was anxious, but it just burned me out. Even as quickly as the next day! If you're doing your first pom of the day and you feel really fresh to the point that you feel like you can skip that first break - dont.. it will pile up!

3. The water and the sugar!! This might sound really obvious, but studying burns up so many resources. On days I don't study, I might be okay with 60-70 oz of water, but on days I do, it's normal for me to hit 100 oz. I also ate way more food in general and ate more sugar too, and I think that's pretty normal.

4. Flashcards and practice problems > annotations > having nice notes. It kills me to say it, but the last exam I took (and passed!), I relied on my very disorganized notes/screenshots on my tablet. I didn't have time to organize and transfer them nicely onto paper in order even though every perfectionist cell in my body wanted to soo badly. Making your own textbook can be helpful but I seriously just didn't have the time. Focus on what will actually get you that pass score!

5. Find the note-taking app you like BEFORE your study period or exam season and practice using it! The last thing you want is to fight the syncing mechanism as you're trying to study. I like to use Flexil because of the split screen feature, the linked screenshots, and the cross-platform sync. If you are studying math, either learn latex over the summer/off period so you can use it in Obsidian/Anki or commit to manually written flashcards and notes the whole way. Dont try to switch halfway through because that will be a waste of your time. I personally think writing out the math is faster than typing it out in Latex, but it's your poison (they're both poison). (And if you study any type of math, I 10000% recommend using a tablet)

6. Unless you are studying for fun, orient everything around the class/exam objectives. Unfortunately, you're not gonna have time to be curious. If you don't think something will be tested, quickly cut it out and move on.

7. Figure out what your exam taking weaknesses are. Out of every 10 missed problems, I realized I'd miss a question solely because i input the wrong number into the calculator. Now I say the numbers in my head as I put it in, do it at a relatively slow pace, and break up large formulas into itsy pieces and make sure the output is close to what I expect it to be. I write out all the steps on paper sometimes to make sure every calculation is as expected. You only get once chance during the real thing, so it's important to come up with a policy to reduce risk and to stick to it every time.

When you're a kid/teenager everyone expects you to base your career around your passions and interests and that works for a lot of people but it's not the full story. I wish they would also teach students to consider the lifestyle that career would require.

Like... if I had to choose a passion and work a career around it, I would probably work at a zoo or aquarium. But those jobs require a lot of schooling with STEM classes (which I hate) and a lot of early mornings (which make me feel ill) and an obligation to work in person with no flexibility to move (which makes me depressed). So even if I'd enjoy caring for animals all day, it's not a good career path for me.

My current job is travel writing, which is not my passion. I like it, but it's not my passion. But I work a flexible schedule, I can live anywhere, I get a travel stipend, and my team is really chill. So it works for me.

Rather than solely focusing on "What topics do you like?" I think we should ask students "Of the careers that suit your preferred lifestyle, which are the most interesting?"

"Don't use Libby because it costs libraries too much, pirate instead" is such a weird, anti-patron, anti-author take that somehow manages to also be anti-library, in my professional librarian-ass opinion.

It's well documented that pirating books negatively affects authors directly* in a way that pirating movies or TV shows doesn't affect actors or writers, so I will likely always be anti-book piracy unless there's absolutely, positively no other option (i.e. the book simply doesn't exist outside of online archives at all, or in a particular language).

Also, yeah, Libby and Hoopla licenses are really expensive, but libraries buy them SO THAT PATRONS CAN USE THEM. If you're gonna be pissed at anybody about this shitty state of affairs, be pissed at publishing companies and continue to use Libby or Hoopla at your library so we can continue to justify having it to our funding bodies.

One of the best ways to support your library having services you like is to USE THOSE SERVICES. Yes, even if they are expensive.

*Yes, this is a blog post, but it's a blog post filled with links to news articles. If you can click one link, you can click another.

once again thinking about composition thinking about lines thinking about the power of diagonal lines in particular. the dynamicity the energy the pathos. the tenderness and tragedy of a continuous diagonal vs the violence of interrupted or intersecting ones

I brought the spinning chair in the living room and stayed there for half an hour or so, now Dragonite is helping me with chemistry.

Studying is so much fun

𝕾𝖆𝖎𝖑𝖔𝖗 𝕸𝖔𝖔𝖓

hand practice