Learning actively means taking action. It's about taking responsibility for your own learning and making the most out of the learning opportunities that come with studying at university. Active learning is important during your formal, taught sessions, and during your informal self-directed learning. A large amount of your learning will take place outside of formal sessions, and you might find it helpful to think about your goals, plan your time and organise your study space.
Whether you are attending lectures in person, attending lectures online, or engaging with any other kind of formal taught session, it is important to think about the information being presented to you and how you are going to use it. For example, if you are taking notes, rather than attempting to write down everything that is being said, try to work out the key points being communicated and note down only those. You can also include your own thoughts and opinions in the notes you make, along with any links that you spot to other things that you have learnt.
Asking questions is a key part of active learning. Your lecturer may offer an opportunity to ask questions during the lecture, or you may note down points that you want to follow up later during your own reading and research.
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You can practice active learning by engaging with information on any topic that you find interesting. Why not try watching a television programme, listening to a podcast or reading a newspaper article. As you do so, ask yourself the following questions:
Actively identifying your goals can be really helpful with staying motivated and keeping on track. Goals can be short or long term, and don't need to be ambitious in order to be effective (although they can be!) A goal that feels achievable will often be more effective than one that feels out of reach.
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Think about what you want to achieve through your University study. You might want to think about your goals for the whole time that you are studying, your first modules, or even your first day! Make a note of your goal, or goals, and store it somewhere that you can refer back to it when you feel like you are losing motivation or struggling with what to prioritise.
If you haven't yet enrolled on your course, it might feel like there's not a lot you can do to plan your time when you are studying. Whilst you might not know what your study commitments will be, you can still practice how you will plan your time. Planning your time can be divided into three steps:
1. Identify your fixed appointments and add them into your plan. These are things that you need to do, that happen at a fixed point and can't be changed. When you are studying this might include lectures, webinars, and meetings with academics. Outside of study this might include paid or unpaid work commitments and leisure activities or events that happen at a certain time.
2. Identify the other things you need to do over the time that you are planning for, and think about their priority. High priority should be given to things that are both important and urgent. Lower priority should be given to things that are not important and not urgent. Add these things into your plan. If there's not enough time to do everything that you need to, include the high priority tasks before the low priority tasks.
3. Look at the balance of your plan. Are you spending enough time on each aspect of your life? The balance of time that you spend on study, leisure activities, and paid and unpaid work, will be unique for each individual, and only you can decide if the balance is correct. Make any adjustments to your plan that you think are needed.
The format of your plan can be adapted to suit your needs. Consider whether you want to make a plan on a physical calendar, a paper diary, a mobile app, a digital document, or any other format that works well for you.
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Make a plan for the week ahead, following the steps above. If you have access to your timetable and/or course requirements then you can include these, but this is not essential to develop the skill. At the end of the week, reflect on the experience by asking the following questions:
Many people find that the space that they use to study in can have a big impact on their learning. Some people can only concentrate in a clear environment; others work well with everything that they need within reach. There is no right or wrong way to organise your space and like so many aspects of preparing for university study, it is worth experimenting with what works for you and what doesn't.
When you are organising your space, think about what you find useful and what you find distracting. Then, think about how you can make the things that are useful visible and easy to use, and the things that you find distracting invisible and difficult to use. For example, a mobile phone can be really useful for study. You might use it to access the internet, make notes and ask questions of others. If this is the case for you, then make sure your phone is visible and within reach. However, you might find that your mobile phone is distracting. You might use it to browse social media, play games, or communicate with others about things not relevant to your study. If this is the case, then put your phone somewhere that is out of reach and invisible. Of course, you may find that your mobile phone is both useful and distracting, both at the same time! If this is the case, then it might be worth investigating ways that you can make the distracting elements hard to access, whilst still being able to use the useful ones. This might be as simple as turning off notifications for the potential distractions, or you might want to investigate an app that allows you to control what you can easily open on your phone.
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Think about what space you have available to you when you are studying. What can you change to make the useful things visible and easy to use, and the distractions invisible and difficult to use?
You might also find it helpful to investigate other options for study location. Why not try reading a book in a cafe or a park, and seeing if you find the environment helpful or unhelpful? Enrolled students at the University have access to study spaces in libraries and learning spaces across the campuses and sites.