Chemistry Note: Before & After the lecture
Left side of the note are the two possible exam questions, and
the right page indicates how I solved the two questions.
Biology definitions & concepts, followed by 2 possible exam questions
Before I went off for Spring Break to NYC, I applied TART strategy to two of my courses: Biology and Chemistry. Before Biology and Chemistry, I have 1 hour break for myself to catch up on materials. During this break, I skimmed through the materials that I was going to learn in lecture beforehand, and wrote all the definitions and concepts down on my notes. I organized the notes so that it can be easily followed during lecture and left bit of space for each concept to write down additional information that the professor was going to explain in more details.
In biology, we covered study of tissues: nervous, muscle, epithelial, and connective. During this lecture, I wrote down detailed information based on professor's knowledge, and had a handful information on epithelial and its branch information of squamous cells. I have actually attended and participated and took action. In chemistry, we were learning information on ICE tables and it was something that I learned in high school. Apparently, I had a slight memory of the material, so I took it for granted and went to the lecture with attitude of reviewing and learning the material again. I had to find the equillibrium molarity based on initial molarity given in the question, and had to use the ICE table to solve for it. Two pictures attached above will help you readers to understand what I am talking about.
After the lecture, I went back to my room to review the materials that were covered on that day and made up some questions for myself. I looked at previous exams to see the kinds of questions that professor usually asks on exam and used the same format to create my own questions. Even though I made up the question by myself, solving and coming up with the answer was actually hard for chemistry as it involved calculations and solving using ICE tables which sometimes get really confusing. Then I thought to myself. If I accumulate more and more questions, I will have many possible exam questions before the actual exam takes place. Therefore, this strategy really works as it forces me to review the materials beforehand and create possible exam questions which allow me to test my knowledge based on the material covered on that day.
I agree on the fact that this strategy forces you to review the materials beforehand and create possible exam questions. I think it is a really great way to prepare for the exam. For me, making up test questions were easy for both of my courses, Astronomy and Art History, were more about facts. However, I can see how it was tough for you to make up your questions for Chemistry. Still I think you managed to do it and did it very well! So far, I've seen 4 blog posts, including me, and all of us seem to be well adapted to using TART as our reading strategy.
ReplyDeleteTART strategy is best suited for reading and lecture based courses. Since most of my courses are based on reading and lecture, I feel very confident for those courses by using and adapting this strategy to my current readin habit. I used to love reading but reading in college is really different from my other reading material. Creating test questions afterward is also very good idea to prepare for an exam.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Chan on tart strategy being the best for reading and lecutre based courses. Reading is without a doubt painful process, but you need to do it. So let's do our best with using a good strategy and make the painful reading actually worth that much of pain.
ReplyDeleteThe test questions part of the TART is always helpful in that it not only forces us to read the materials, but also lets us prepare for the exams as well. I hope the two of your challenging courses went well by using TART, because that is what I used as well for the classes with tons of readings to do. I guess that going to lectures prepared in more important than anything. It helps you learn the actual materials.
ReplyDeleteWhoa... Science... I personally do not really like science, especially when it is about the human body and stuff like that. Now, enough with the personal talking. I strongly agree with your last statement; the TART strategy also really helped me review the materials by reading it over again and testing myself. Lucky for you, you have learned part of the materials in high school, and that should have benefited you. Keep up the good work.
ReplyDelete