[nabs-l] studying, skimming and reference material

[bookwormahb at earthlink.net]

Hi all,

College texts are full of words and examples.  Frustrating when you cannot skim through especially when you need the highlights for a test.
I take notes when reading.  But my notes don’t always amount to what the professor tells us to study for the test, if they tell us.

So what do you do when the professor has a study guide?  
Some students take it and jot down the coresponding pages to the study topics and study those pages.
How do you use it?
Sometimes professors give a list of terms/concepts to study or a list of questions to guide your preparation.  My communication professor outlined on the board what concepts we needed to know for our final.
But here’s the thing.  I cannot skim the text or look up words.  My notes may or may not have them.  Even if they do, its still looking for a needle in a haystack when reviewing for finals!  So I’ve usually had to ask a reader; they act as my eyes and look in the index for the key words or skim for the key words or headings in the chapter.

For me, I usually use audio whenever possible. But even with e-texts, I cannot skim because I don’t know the exact phrase and without that the computer does Not know what to look for; also
it is divided in to chapters and I cannot search across chapters.
Another thing, how do you work with open book exams?
Do you have a reader there and they look up any info from the book? That is what I’ve done.
Again, openbook  tests let you use it as a reference tool, but that is hard for us.

So any tips for studying or “skimming” would be good.  How can you direct a reader to actually skim?  Usually they will read too much to me rather than just the main paragraph of the topic; generally under the main headings I find the introduction to the concept and smaller headings tell you details/examples.


Ashley