Academic Study Skills: A Reflective Essay on Semester 1 Learning

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Academic Study Skills
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Table of Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................3
Reflection...................................................................................................................................4
Conclusion and future recommendation....................................................................................7
References..................................................................................................................................8
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Introduction
This reflective essay will contain the importance of managing the academic study work. The
academic study work is important for the students to progress in their career. It helps to
improve the learning process of a student. Academic study helps to get higher education to
the students. The higher education contents more scholar study. It helps to build a distinct
thinking process of the students. Academic study work is done by completing different
factors of managing the own lifestyle. The academic study needs different skills of the
students and all the students need to satisfy the study skills to get a successful academic
degree.
In this essay, I will write about the topics that are covered in our first semester and the impact
of topics in my academic skills. The topics that I have learnt in this semester will help me to
get a high progress in my career. I Have learnt different topic such as understanding the
requirement of time management and learning. The importance of motivation in the academic
study. I have learnt how to develop my own strategies for learning and how to become an
effective listener. The semester 1 has taught me how my life can be changed by listening to
the other person. It has taught me that being a listener solves half of the problem. Different
techniques of learning has been learnt by me in this curriculum. I have also learnt how to
work in a team and what is required to work effectively in a team. The semester has taught
me how to manage the group task with the help of team members. It has also introduced us
with referencing technique and integrity of work. I have got to learn about plagiarism and
how much it is unethical in the educational background has been taught to us.
This essay will contain a detailed discussion on the learning of the topic in the semester and
the conclusion and recommendation of how the education system can be improved further.
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Reflection
I have learnt several topic related to academic learning in this semester. The importance of all
the topics will be discussed here. The learning process of mine has been started with
understanding the importance of managing g expectation in the academics and the importance
of time management. Time management is one of the most important factor that has several
impacts in our daily life (Dollar et al., 2018). A proper time management skill can help
complete a task in a more organised way.
The importance of motivation has been taught to us and the impact of motivation in the
academic study skills have also been discussed in the semester. Motivation is a very much
important factor in the students’ life. Motivation from teachers and friends help to complete a
task faster and the task can be completed with more efficiency if a proper motivation is there
(Shapiro et al., 2017). I have learnt that learning is a process that is initiated by oneself but
the learning can be continued by proper motivation from the co-learners and lecturers. The
zeal to learn increases by motivation. Motivation helps the students to some even harder
goals. Motivation is a strong value and it helps the students to become more effective towards
the learning process. I have also noticed that sometimes motivation gives opposite result. If
the motivation is just taken as a word then the performance of the students can be hampered
tremendously (Kelley, 2017). Sometimes over motivation makes the students more confident
this has hampered the intention of working hard towards achieving the goals.
Another thing I have learnt in this semester is being habituated with the time management
skill. The time management skill is very much important for being successful in many places.
Time management helps the students to become more efficient in their own domains. It helps
to achieve more by giving less effort into work (Van Emden and Becker, 2016). The focus
towards the subject gets enhanced more with the time management skill of students. The
decision-making ability also gets increased with the time management skill. I have personally
felt that time management has made my work easier. Starting of the time management is very
tough but after it got into my habit, it has changed my way to complete the work (Salminen et
al., 2018). It has taught me that we can do a lot of things with this limited time of our lives.
The lectures of the classes are important to us. It helps us to progress towards the depth of the
learning process. This semester has taught us how to increase the ability get the most out of
the lectures. One of the most important techniques is taking notes while listening to the
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lecture (Cottrell, 2015). It helps to remember the topic for more time and the understanding
of the topic becomes better. The recording of the lecture while listening to the lecture is
important, it helps to listen to the lecture later when needed and the note can be taken later. It
helps the students to understand the topic better. Asking question is another effective way to
understand the topic in a more effective way. Asking question to the lecturer will help to
understand the topic more clearly (Arnold and Boggs, 2015). It will help to remember the
topic for many more time. The better understanding can be created in this way. I have
personally felt that note taking at the time of listening to the lecture sometimes distract the
students from the lecture and thus I prefer the recording method.
I have learnt from the curriculum, how to work within a team. It has taught to learn work in a
team and to increase the adaptability. Team work has helped me to increase the
communication skills (Contreras and Contreras, 2019). It makes us more comfortable to talk
to each other. The problems get divided within the team and the decision-making becomes
better through working in a team. Team work increases the creativity within all the students.
It helps to complete a work in less time. The learning process becomes more open and
effective. The complementary strengths can be blended and even tough works have been
easier. It has helped me to improve the relationship among each other. It has taught me to
trust my co-partner. Trust provides more safety to the team members. I have faced several
conflicts while working in team, it creates a great problem within a project but team work
also taught us how to resolve conflicts and work with each other.
I have learnt how to be an effective listener. This course has taught me that listening can
solve more than hundred problems. The listening to the other people helps the listener to
understand the point of view of the speaker and this is the point where maximum conflicts get
resolved. I have noticed one thing that majority of people do not listen to understand the
problem, rather they listen to reply to the other party and creates maximum conflicts.
Understanding the other person does not make us lose but it helps us to understand the topic
and the conflict can be avoided by listening to the topic properly. I have experienced that at
the time I started to listen to other properly many conflicts have been dissolved in my life.
Sometimes due to listening to others for long time the other party has thought that I have
nothing to say and do not possess any view point. It is one cons of the listening to their but it
can be easily mitigated by answering strongly to the viewpoints of the other party.
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The academic study of this curriculum has taught me how to give an effective presentation. I
have learnt that to present anything the basic thing is to research about the topic. Researching
of the topic properly gives the initial confidence to the presenter. Effective communication is
needed to present a topic promptly in front of all the students. The presentation of any topic
should portray the passion of the students towards the topic. To connect the audiences
towards the presentation, the topic should be started with an interesting incident to connect
the audiences towards the presentation. The presentation should include several data but not
many statistical data. Presentation with a lot of statistical data makes the presentation boring.
The content of the presentation should be more interesting and simple. In my last
presentation, I had started the presentation with a small interesting story and it has helped to
connect the audiences and the attraction of the audiences have been created by this. In my last
presentation, I have maintained the eye contact with the audiences and a smile was there in
my face according to my learning. It helped me to attract the attention of audiences.
In my course of semester I have been introduced with the idea of referencing and the integrity
of the academic study. Writing thesis and other academic article is a part of the academic
study. The academic study needs 100% integrity and to maintain the integrity the article
should not be copied from any other article. The article should be original. Plagiarism is a
serious offense in the world of academic study. It is another name of stealing in this field.
Another important thing in the academic writing is the referencing. There are different styles
of referencing available and the referencing is used make the article standard.
The above content holds the details of the learning program of mine in this semester and the
impact of the learning on my daily life and the education.
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Conclusion and future recommendation
From the above portion, it can be seen that in first semester I have learnt many things. All the
things I have learnt has their own positive and negative aspects in my life. The learning list of
mine holds various topics such as time management, team work, providing effective
presentation, ways to become an effective listener. The curriculum has also introduced me
with the concept of plagiarism and referencing. It has helped to learn the writing style of the
writing an article. The article has covered a lot of things but like every other thing, it also has
some limitation and the limitation should be overcome. It has all the topic but not in detail.
The topic should be discussed in details. Each topic should be given more time to make the
students habituated towards the topic of the course. Using of sources have been learnt
through this courses but there are different styles available of referencing an academic article.
All the styles should be taught in detail from the next time.
The time management skills have been taught in detail but the time management skill is more
dependent in the application. The time management is more about application and practice. In
the next course more practice session is expected on time management. I have learnt different
term of interpersonal skills and the importance of interpersonal skills have been taught but it
is also more about applying. The application of interpersonal skill is very much important and
many more session on improving the interpersonal skills are expected in the next session. The
different techniques of developing the writing quality should be discussed in more detail and
the writing also needs to be practiced more to achieve the high efficiency in the subject. I
have started working in a team after learning the importance of team work but the resolving
of conflicts within the team should be taught more effectively and the teachers should be
more sensitive towards the raising conflicts in the teams.
I have become a more effective listener but how to increase the patience level to become an
effective listener should have been explained in mire detailed way. The communication part
should be increased in the course. The scope of asking questions to the teachers is very less
and it makes more confusion regarding the topic of the discussion. The content of the course
has included the definition of plagiarism but the ways to avoid plagiarism in the content of
the writing is still a confusion. The concept of plagiarism and the ways to make a plagiarism
free work should be discussed in a more detailed way.
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References
Arnold, E.C. and Boggs, K.U., 2015. Interpersonal Relationships-E-Book: Professional
Communication Skills for Nurses. Elsevier Health Sciences.
Contreras, E.C. and Contreras, I.I., 2019. Development of Communication Skills through
Auditory Training Software in Special Education. In Advanced Methodologies and
Technologies in Modern Education Delivery (pp. 263-275). IGI Global.
Cottrell, S., 2015. Skills for success: Personal development and employability. Macmillan
International Higher Education.
Dollar, J.M., Perry, N.B., Calkins, S.D., Keane, S.P. and Shanahan, L., 2018. Temperamental
anger and positive reactivity and the development of social skills: implications for academic
competence during preadolescence. Early education and development, 29(5), pp.747-761.
Kelley, C.B., 2017. Time management strategies: purposeful rounding and clustering
care. MedSurg Nursing, 26(1), pp.S1-S1.
Salminen, J., Pakarinen, E., Poikkeus, A.M. and Lerkkanen, M.K., 2018. Development of
pre-academic skills and motivation in kindergarten: a subgroup analysis between classroom
quality profiles. Research Papers in Education, 33(4), pp.515-543.
Shapiro, E.S., Gebhardt, S., Flatley, K., Guard, K.B., Fu, Q., Leichman, E.S., Calhoon, M.B.
and Hojnoski, R., 2017. Development and validity of the Rating Scales of Academic Skills
for Reading Comprehension. School Psychology Quarterly, 32(4), p.509.
Van Emden, J. and Becker, L., 2016. Presentation skills for students. Macmillan International
Higher Education.
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