Absolute

Memorisation Advice

admin — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 09:57:52 +0000

Before you set about reading a book, article or document, try to guess from its title what is written in it (or what you would write in the author’s place). The same “forecasting” applies to the heads of chapters and the first paragraphs of the text. Before reading (listening and glancing through) think of what information you want to derive, and what for. This will stimulate your interest and prepare you for its cognition. Where the author, citing a number of arguments, is going to draw a conclusion, make a deduction yourself first and only then continue to read.
Before reading recall all relevant information known to you. In other words, “brush up” your knowledge. Try to imitate Ancient Roman orators, who learned their speeches pacing up and down and “establishing connections” between the text and the atmosphere of their homes and then would recall the speech by taking “mental strolls”.
If you want to memorise a text in detail don’t learn it piecemeal. Learn the whole text, and learn it in its natural sequence. To avoid forgetting the name of a new acquaintance, strengthen the first impression left by him by repeating his name aloud (”Excuse me, have I heard you right?”), using it in the conversation and when parting. Write down this name, if only with your finger in the air. imagine in whose honour this man may have been named, etc.
Try to evoke the strongest possible emotions connected with the information you memorise. Incidentally, this is exactly what Lenin did. The margins of the books he read bristle with categorical and profoundly emotional notes: “True!”, “What nonsense!”, “Ha-ha!”, and “You’ve hit the nail on the head!”
When preparing for intensive mental efforts consider the state you are in at the moment. Sadness, irritation, uncertainty and fear are enemies of memory. Never write down things without an attempt to grasp and memorise them! To these rules you may add a host of your own, based on the laws of memory. In short, the knowledge of these laws will enable you to memorise much more than before even if you had complaints about your memory.
Taken from : A Guide To Memory Increase By Rocco Oppedisano

Steps identifying goals

admin — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 02:13:00 +0000

1. Clarify your goals and objectives
First, look at the bigger picture and then break things down into
shorter time segments.What do you want to have accomplished by the end of the first six months of graduate study? The first year? Sketch these goals out broadly, as they are likely to change over
time. Now, write down your objectives for the next three months, and then fine tune these for over the next month. Now that you’ve written your goals down, ask yourself two things: are my goals measurable? How will I know when I’ve achieved my goal(s)?
2. Write down a list of actions
Now it’s time to think about all the things you need to do to achieve your goals. What limitations and constraints do you have in terms of time, know-how, equipment, material, etc?Write down as many actions as you can that will help you achieve your goals.
3. Prioritize
Take a good look at your list. Prioritize the actionable points so that you do first what is most efficient and what will most likely assist you in achieving your goals (in other words, if you need to build a piece of equipment before you can run an experiment, you will naturally have to do that step first).
4. Organize your actions into a plan
Actions that are set into a time framework make up a plan.Make sure your plan is workable. Can you do the actions you have set up for yourself in the time frame you’ve allotted? Make sure you’ve ordered your actions into a logical sequence.
5. Monitor and measure your progress
On a regular basis you will have to monitor your plan and make adjustments if necessary. It’s important to remain flexible and re-state your goals from time to time as necessary and as you gain
more experience with your project.

Identifying goals

admin — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 04:08:00 +0000

One question a lot of people ask is how to know if a goal is good or bad. In other words, how do you discriminate between the really important goals and the “nice to have” but not really important ones?
You will know whether or not a goal you have chosen is important by answering these five questions.

Is it really MY goal?
Is it morally right and fair?
Are my short-range goals consistent with my long-term goals?
Can I commit myself emotionally to completing the project?
Can I visualize myself reaching this goal?

If you have answered “No” to even one of these questions, you may want to reconsider this goal. In the short-term it may appear to work for you, but in the long run, you may exposing yourself to a lot of unnecessary conflict and frustration. Be sure to set big goals as well as multiple goals. Big goals force you to reach in and use the potential that is inside of you. Long-range goals help you to overcome short-range failures. They can also help you to change your direction without going back on your decision. Whether or not they ever reach the goals they have set, people who set big, long-range goals have been found to have higher self-confidence, higher self-esteem, and greater personal motivation. The bottom line is that more than half the rewards and benefits achieved from goal-setting come from actually taking your first step in that direction, regardless of the consequences.

Goals

admin — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 08:10:00 +0000

Long term - to provide you with a vision of what you want to do in your lifetime. Short term - to provide you with gratification, to keep you going on a day-to-day basis. Realistic, achievable and challenging - to balance the need to provide yourself with challenges as well as the need for success.
Flexible - so you can revise goals as your life changes, as priorities change and as new opportunities arise. Precise and measurable - so you know exactly what you need to do, with deadlines. Your goals - no one else’s. They must reflect your learning style and the way you to operate. In writing - to make them real. Goals aren’t real goals until they’re written down - don’t be afraid to put your dreams in writing. There are two kinds of goals: outcome goals and performance goals which involve actual tasks. Outcome goal for my computer course: I’m going to get a 3.75 in my computer course this semester. Performance goal: I’m going to utilize all available lab time, ask my instructor about specific concepts I don’t understand and review regularly, not just before quizzes or exams.
Outcome goal for English: I’m going to get at least a B+ on my next paper. Performance goal: I’m going to improve my English grades by improving my essay writing techniques. I’m going to learn to organize my information clearly before I start writing. I’m going to proofread my work, finding common mistakes. Outcome goal for Math: I’m going to earn an A in my math course. Performance goal: I’m going to improve my grade by studying and working on math problems at least an hour and a half every day. I’m going to do all chapter problems, not just the assigned ones. I’ll work with tutors
in the Tutoring Center whenever needed. If you achieve the tasks in your performance goals, you will achieve your outcome goals.
Taken from David McNally - Goals Settings

Self Motivation

admin — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 10:08:00 +0000

First, our motivation can only come from inside ourselves. Why? Because motivation is an internal force that drives individuals to act in order to achieve a specific goal. Two people might read the same book, or listen to the same inspirational speaker but respond differently. One person might feel motivated to act, the other might not. Second, you must have a big enough ‘reason why’ in order to feel motivated. Your reason why must provide a ‘meaningful motive’. It can be useful to look for a reason that’s bigger than yourself. For example, you may want to earn enough money to take care of your family - not just yourself. So David McNally’s advice is to dig deep into the truth of what you want. This is why it’s so important to choose goals to which you feel 100% committed. Third, you need to believe that your goal is attainable. Either that or your fear must be so great that you will try anyway. Without this fear or belief self motivation is difficult to maintain. Given that you probably don’t want to live with feelings of dread, let’s take a look at belief. You can start by looking for evidence within yourself that you can achieve your goal. You can then back this up by seeking support, mentors and role models, either directly or indirectly through books and audios.
Fourth, your environment is an influence on motivation. That’s a key reason why you need to choose
your friends and colleagues carefully. This doesn’t have to mean saying goodbye to the people you know now.
But consider whether it would be helpful to make new contacts. Again, books and audios can be very
supportive when you are looking to new ways of thinking. Finally, there is a difference between motivation and inspiration. Inspiration is getting in touch with our human spirit, whereas motivation is the driving force to move towards our goal. Inspiration can certainly help self motivation - and we can look outside ourselves for help with inspiration. So speakers like David McNally might help us feel inspired. It is then up to us whether to decide to be motivated to take action to achieve our
goals.
Taken from David McNally - Goal Settings

Content

admin — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 17:09:49 +0000

Why give a paper anyway? It is a remarkably inefficient method of disseminating scientific information. A speaker can reach only a handful of potentially interested colleagues, and the time constraints at most meetings rarely permit an extensive exploration of a subject. A talk is an ephemeral event, of which the only lasting elements lie in a brief abstract and the fading memories of the relatively few who attended the session. Yet oral presentations are a time-honored means of transmitting the fruit of scientific research and scientists will no doubt be speaking at professional meetings for a long time to come. It is a way to reveal quickly our most recent thoughts and discoveries to our colleagues – a way of informing the world that we are into a specific aspect of research (staking out a bit of scientific territory, if you will). It is too often a prerequisite for obtaining funds to attend these meetings, but we won’t go into that. A scientific talk unquestionably is highly effective for developing fruitful discussion with others interested in the subject. So we will continue to give talks; the question is how do we insure that we give good talks. Consider an audience – part of it is there specifically to hear your paper, the rest because they have nothing better to do. It will in most cases be composed of a few people as knowledgeable (or nearly so)
as you on your subject, a majority who know at least something about it and many who are totally unfamiliar, or nearly so, with it. A successful talk provides something of value 9 although not necessarily the same thing) to all these groups.
How does one leave most of an audience with a feeling that they have profited from the talk regardless of
the level of knowledge with which they approached the subject? All the memorable talks I have heard, regardless of my familiarity with the subject, shares one common trait; simplicity. The speaker convincingly presented a few conclusions, which I retained for a long time. It is more important to get across a few points that will be remembered than to tell everything you know about a subject. Better to save the detailed account for the printed text. Too often speakers waste this precious time at the podium presenting unessential data. Few listeners care for, or will remember numbers, lists, etc. Of far more interest are significant trends, relationships, or differences – in other words, the interpretation of the data.
Taken from How to Keep an Audience Attentive, Alert, and Around for the Conclusions at a Scientific Meeting by H. Edward Clifton

Time Awareness and Time Tracking

admin — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 12:25:00 +0000

It will help you manage your time well if you know where your time actually gets spent. One very helpful way of determining your actual usage of time is to track your time. The process here is like making a schedule, but it works in reverse. Instead of writing things in that you are planning to do, time logging is a process of writing down the things that you have already done. Doing this is sort of a get-to-know-yourself exercise because this procedure will highlight many of your habits that you might selectively ignore currently.
For instance, some people find that every time they plan to do math homework they end up watching television. Other people just can’t seem to follow their schedule until the week before finals. Whatever your time habits, time tracking will help you adjust and fine-tune your time management practices. Having accurate information about your time usage patterns can serve as another important point of reference for self- monitoring. A few ways to track your time follow:
Strategy #1: Time Tracking is fairly straightforward. At the end of every hour jot yourself a quick note about how you actually spent your time for that hour. The note needn’t be long; one sentence or less should suffice. If how you spent your time doesn’t match an already planned activity, simply enter a comment as to what you really did during that time. This way you will be able to review patterns that emerge in your use of time and make adjustments to improve your productivity.
Strategy #2: Some people find it helpful to modify the planning page to facilitate tracking time. The modifications are easy enough: make two columns on your paper for each day of the week. In one column, write down the plan you are trying to follow; in the second column, make notes on what you actually did with your time. The side-by-side comparison is very telling and an excellent way to figure our where you’re not using time in the way you intend.
Strategy #3: Another effective way to make changes and get results from your time management strategies is to summarize your time use by time category such as: sleep, study, work, travel and so on. Before doing the summary, estimate the amount of time that you think you spend on the various activities listed on the form below and enter these in the “expected” row of the summary sheet. Feel free to add any additional categories that might be helpful. Then log your time for one week on an hour by hour basis. When the week is over summarize your time by category for each day, add up the values for all seven days of the week, and write the totals in the “actual” row of the summary sheet.
Taken from : Time Management for Students, Brian Pose

Sub-dividing Goals into manageable pieces

admin — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 12:25:00 +0000

Once you have a set of goals, it is useful to decompose the goals into manageable steps or sub- goals. Decomposing your goals makes it possible to tackle the m one small step at a time and to reduce procrastination. Consider for instance the goal of obtaining your degree. This goal can be broken down into four sub-goals. Each sub- goal is the successful completion of one year of your program. These sub- goals can be further broken down into individual courses within each year. The courses can be broken down into tests, exams, term papers and such within the course, or into the 13 weeks of classes in each term. Each week can be further subdivided into days, and each day can be thought of in terms of the hours and minutes you’ll spend in your classes and doing homework for
today. While it may seem challenging to take in the whole scope of that convergent goal, thinking of your goals in this way helps to reinforce the idea that there is a connected path linking what actions you take today and the successful completion of your goals. Seeing these connections can help you monitor your own progress and detect whether you are on track or not. Take some time now to think through the goals you’ve set and to break them down into their smaller constituent parts.

Goal setting

admin — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 12:36:48 +0000

What are your goals? Really, what are your goals? It might help to divide your goals into time frames (immediate goals, short-mid-term goals, long-range goals) but you don’t absolutely have to do so for the exercise to be useful. And, you don’t have to have firm answers to those gripping questions about what you want to be or do when you’re done at university to make this work; your goals are likely to shift and change over time anyway.
All you need to do right now is think of a handful of goals to get started. Write down a list of goals now before reading further. Take a look at your list of goals. How many of the tasks you intend to do today contribute to accomplishing the goals you have set for yourself? Are you actively working on these goals? Are you putting any of them off for a later time? What would you have to change in your life to make it possible to work on these goals?
Taken from : Time Management for Students, Brian Pose

Internet marketing campaign

admin — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 14:35:47 +0000

Now, with anonymous marketing anonymous marketing strategies developed by companies yet we haven’t found the best one that could automatically draw customer to choose their products instead of competitor’s. Today on digital and virtual world when customer and producer not only can meet on the conventional market, an internet marketing strategy could be one way to grab those niche market. This strategy, when used on the right way could be a turn around point for your company.
A huge list of marketing tools and strategies can be used and implemented to get your sales grow as your company’s targets and goals. One of the oldest of these techniques is email marketing, this technique is used by sending your product’s offer right to your potential end users. This is a cheap marketing techniques, you could get in touch with those potential customer personally. Yet, it has weakness, if you do it wrong, you’ll probably will get caught to be a spammer and you’ll get banned from sending those promotion to your potential customer.
But don’t have to worry further, you should see an email marketing software which will help you to eliminate those problems with email marketing strategy. With this software you could self managed how your promotion email will be sent to your potential customer without worrying about spamming issues. So, I suggest you to get email marketing software for your marketing program as soon as possible so you could start it right away.
Some software are not only send promotion but could also draw feedback from customers providing you with data on how you can afford a product’s improvement. With these feedback you could create an improvement program for your products accommodating market needs. An online survey tool will help you with a customer feedback improvement program. Just as email marketing software, this kind of software will help you with your marketing campaign.