Improvement in chem!

[cjsmith]

I now believe I know how to study for chemistry exams with this teacher.

1) When in doubt, memorize. How many joules in a calorie? How many joules in a liter-atmosphere? What's the gas constant in your instructor's favorite units? What's Planck's constant? What's the density of mercury (for water barometer problems)? What's the constant in Balmer's equation for hydrogen lines? Know them all.

2) The day before exam time, do one homework problem of each major type. Molarity, gas stoichiometry, redox titration, heats of formation, pressure-volume work -- anything that was covered in the appropriate chapters needs to run through the brain once at this point.

3) During the exam, show every last possible detail of work that can possibly be imagined. Explicitly multiply by "1000 mL / 1 L" when needed, and do not skip a single step of algebra. FILL the page. Use the back.

I got a 98. Now if only I can do it again the Monday after Thanksgiving, and then one last time on the final.

Comments

[platypus]

It's good to figure out an instructor's system, so as to get the best grade possible from him/her, but I never really understood the point of mass memorization of reference information that can be looked up in the real world.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Neither do I. And this instructor will claim she doesn't either, which threw me for a while.

[mapache]

Yeah. At least one of the professors I had in college let you prepare a "cheat sheet" for exams. One page front & back for the mid-semester exams and four pages front & back for the final. That way, you could put down anything you might need to memorize or look up and focus on actually understanding how to apply said facts.

(Fun fact: You can fit the entire Haskell standard prelude on a single sheet of paper if you use 4-point font, and it's surprisingly legible, as well as a pretty complete reference on everything you need to know about functional programming.)

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Ooo, that prof let you print it? The one prof I've ever had who allowed a cheat sheet required it to be hand-written.

I wonder if older students would be able to bring a reading magnifier. This, of course, leads me to wonder if extremely ambitious students could bring a microscope.

[mapache]

I don't think anyone in CS remembers how to write by hand any more. :D Same professor also had handouts of his class notes for the day for everyone, as he though people copying down what he was showing was a waste of time when you could be paying attention to what he's saying instead.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

One of my profs does the class lecture notes handout approach as well. I really appreciate it. In our case, the PDF is posted online and the students print it, but that's a budgetary thing. :-)