FOURTH EDITION
Foreword Starting at the Beginning
Chapter 1: The Need for Organization
Chapter 2: Organize Your Life
Chapter 3: Organize Your Studies
Chapter 4: Organize Your Calendar
Chapter 5: Dealing with Life’s Daily Traumas
Chapter 6: Get Organized for Class
Chapter 7: Organize Your Reading and Writing
Index
This marks another major milestone in the 20-year-long evolution of my How to Study Program—the reissuance of new editions of the key volumes: How to Study itself, now in a seventh edition; sixth editions of Improve Your Memory, Improve Your Reading, Improve Your Writing, and “Ace” Any Test; and a fourth edition of the book you’re currently reading, Get Organized.
I am truly proud, though somewhat amazed, that these books are now moving into their third decade. While all authors want to believe their books will last forever, most wind up in the remainder bin far sooner than we would ever like (or admit).
A number of you are students, not just the high school students I always thought were my readers, but also college students and, much to my delight, even middle school students (which says something quite positive about your ambition and what I anticipate will be your eventual success).
Many of you reading this are adults. Some of you are returning to school. And some of you are long out of school but have figured out that if you can learn now the study skills your teachers never taught you (or you never took the time to learn), you will do better in your careers—especially if you know how to meet pressing deadlines or organize the key points of a presentation.
All too many of you are parents with the same lament: “How do I get Johnny to do better in school? If his life is as organized as his room, I fear for all of us!”
You should be particularly comfortable with both the language and format of this book—its relatively short sentences and paragraphs, occasionally humorous (hopefully) headings and subheadings, a reasonable but certainly not outrageous vocabulary. I wrote it with you in mind!
Learning now how to organize your studying and your life is absolutely key to your future success. You are trying to learn how to study at precisely the right time. Sixth, seventh, and eighth grades—before that sometimes cosmic leap to high school—are without a doubt the period in which these study skills should be mastered. If you’re serious enough about studying to be reading this book, I doubt you’ll have trouble with the concepts or the language.
Having pretty much gone right from high school to college, learning how to organize your life and studies is not just a nice idea—it’s the only thing that will enable you to survive. Trust me. You haven’t even contemplated how busy life can be until you show up at old Klutzburg U. and get your first class schedule…and volunteer schedule… and athletics schedule…and work schedule.
Your child’s school is probably doing little, if anything, to teach him or her how to study. Which means he or she is not learning how to learn. And that means he or she is not learning how to succeed.
Should the schools be accomplishing that? Absolutely. After all, we spend more than $300 billion on elementary and secondary education in this country. We ought to be getting more for that money than a diploma, some football cheers, and a discouraging entry-level job market.
There are probably even more dedicated parents out there than dedicated students, since the first phone call at any of my radio or TV appearances comes from a sincere and worried parent asking, “What can I do to help my kid do better in school?” Okay, here they are, the rules for parents of students of any age:
1. Set up a homework area. Free of distraction, well lit, with all necessary supplies handy.
2. Set up a homework routine. When and where it gets done. Studies have clearly shown that students who establish a regular routine are better organized and, as a result, more successful.
3. Set homework priorities. Actually, just make the point that homework is the priority—before a date, before TV, before going out to play, whatever.
4. Make reading a habit—for them, certainly, but also for yourself. Kids will inevitably do what you do, not what you say (even if you say not to do what you do).
5. Turn off the TV. Or at the very least, severely limit when and how much TV-watching is appropriate. This may be the toughest suggestion to enforce. I know. I was once the parent of a teenager too.
6. Talk to the teachers. Find out what your kids are supposed to be learning. If you don’t know the books they’re supposed to be reading, what’s expected of them in class, and how much homework they should be scheduling, you can’t really give them the help they need.
7. Encourage and motivate, but don’t nag them to do their homework. It doesn’t work. The more you insist, the quicker they will tune you out.
8. Supervise their work, but don’t fall into the trap of doing their homework. Proofreading a paper, for example, is a positive way to help your child in school. But if you simply put in corrections without your child learning from her mistakes, you’re not helping her at all…except in the belief that she is not responsible for her own work.
9. Praise them when they succeed, but don’t overpraise them for mediocre work. Kids know when you’re being insincere and, again, will quickly tune you out.
10. Convince them of reality. (This is for older students.) Okay, I’ll admit it’s almost as much of a stretch as turning off the TV, but learning and believing that the real world will not care about their grades, but will measure them by what they know and what they can do, is a lesson that will save many tears (probably yours). It’s probably never too early to (carefully) let your boy or girl genius get the message that life is not fair.
11. If you can afford it, get your kid(s) a computer and all the software they can handle. There really is no avoiding it: Your kids, what ever their ages, absolutely must be computer-savvy in order to survive in and after school.
12. Turn off the TV already!
13. Get wired. The Internet is the greatest invention of our age and an unbelievable tool for students of any age. It is impossible for a college student to succeed without the ability to surf the Internet, and nearly impossible for younger students as well. They’ve got to be connected.
14. But turn off IM (Instant Messaging) while doing homework. They will attempt to convince you that they can write their paper and do geometry and IM their friends at the same time. Parents who believe this have also been persuaded it’s a fine idea to do homework in front of the TV.
The results of every study done in the last two decades about what affects a child’s success in school clearly demonstrate that only one factor overwhelmingly affects it, every time: parental involvement—not the size of the school, the money spent per pupil, the number of language labs, how many of the students go on to college, how many great (or lousy) teachers there are. None is as significant as the effect you can have.
So please, take the time to read this book and find out what your kids should be learning. You can help them, even if you were not a great student yourself, even if you never learned great study skills. Learn with your child: Not only will it help him in school, it will help you on the job, whatever your field.
If you’re going back to high school, college, or graduate school at age 25, 45, 65, or 85, you probably need the help my books offer more than anyone! Why? Because the longer you’ve been out of school, the more likely you don’t remember what you’ve forgotten. And you’ve probably forgotten what you’re supposed to remember! As much as I emphasize that it’s rarely too early to learn good study habits, I must also emphasize that it’s never too late.
If you’re returning to school and attempting to carry even a partial courseload while simultaneously holding down a job, raising a family, or both, there are some particular problems you probably didn’t have to face the last time you were in school.
Time and money pressures. Let’s face it: When all you had to worry about was going to school, it simply had to be easier than going to school, raising a family, and working for a living simultaneously. (And it was!) Mastering all of the techniques of time management is even more essential if you are to effectively juggle responsibilities to your career, family, clubs, and friends, in addition to your commitment to school. Money management may well be another essential skill, whether figuring out how to pay for child care (something you probably didn’t have to worry about in high school) or how to manage all your responsibilities while cutting your hours at work to make time for school.
Self-imposed fears of inadequacy. You may convince yourself that you’re just “out of practice” with all this school stuff. You don’t even remember what to do with a highlighter! While some of this fear is valid, most is not.
Maybe you’re worried because you didn’t exactly light up the academic world the first time around. Well, neither did Edison or Einstein or a host of other successful people. But then, you’ve changed rather significantly since you were a kid, haven’t you? Concentrate on how much more qualified you are for school now than you were then!
Feeling you’re “out of your element.” This is a slightly different fear, the fear that you just don’t fit in anymore. After all, you’re not 18 again. But then, neither are fully half the college students on campus today. That’s right: Fully 50 percent of all college students are older than 25. The reality is, you’ll probably feel more in your element now than you did the first time around!
You’ll see teachers differently. Probably a plus. It’s doubtful you’ll exhibit the same level of awe you did the first time around. At worst, you’ll consider teachers your equals. At best, you’ll consider them younger and not necessarily as successful or experienced as you are. In either event, you probably won’t be quite as ready to treat your college professors as if they were gods.
There are differences in academic life. It’s slower than the “real” world, and you may well be moving significantly faster than its normal pace. When you were 18, an afternoon without classes meant time to hang out with friends. Now it might mean catching up on a week’s worth of errands, cooking (and freezing) a week’s worth of dinners, or writing four reports due this week. Despite your own hectic schedule, do not expect campus life to accelerate in response. You will have to get used to people and systems with far less interest in speed.
Learning shouldn’t be painful and certainly doesn’t have to be boring, though it’s far too often both. However, it’s not necessarily going to be wonderful and painless, either. Sometimes you actually have to work hard to figure something out or get a project done. That is reality.
It’s also reality that everything isn’t readily apparent or easily understandable. Confusion reigns. Tell yourself that’s okay and learn how to get past it. Heck, if you actually think you understand everything you’ve read the first time through, you’re kidding yourself. Learning something slowly doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with you. It may be a subject that virtually everybody learns slowly. Or a textbook that is simply incomprehensible.
A good student doesn’t panic when he just doesn’t “get” something immediately. He takes his time, follows whatever steps apply, and remains confident that the lightbulb of understanding will eventually glow.
Parents often ask me, “How can I motivate my teenager?” My initial response is usually to smile and say, “If I knew the answer to that question, I would have retired very wealthy quite some time ago.” However, I think there is an answer, but it’s not something parents can do—it’s something the student has to decide: Are you going to spend the school day interested and alert or bored and resentful?
It’s really that simple. Since you have to go to school anyway, why not develop the attitude that you might as well be active and learn as much as possible instead of being miserable? The difference between a C and an A or B for many students is, I firmly believe, merely a matter of wanting to do better. As I constantly stress in radio and TV interviews, inevitably you will leave school. And very quickly, you’ll discover that suddenly all anyone cares about is what you know and what you can do. Grades won’t count anymore; neither will tests. So you can learn it all now or regret it later.
How many times have you asked yourself, “Why am I even trying to learn this calculus (algebra, geometry, physics, chemistry, history, whatever)? I’ll never use it again!” Well, you really have no clue what you’re going to need to know tomorrow or next week, let alone next year or next decade.
I’ve been amazed in my own life how things I did with no specific purpose in mind (except probably to earn money or meet a girl) turned out years later to be not just invaluable to my life or career, but essential. How was I to know when I took German as my language elective in high school that the most important international trade show in book publishing was in Frankfurt, Germany? Or that the basic skills I learned one year working for an accountant (while I was writing my first book) would become essential when I later started four companies? Or how important basic math skills would be in selling and negotiating over the years? (Okay, I’ll admit it: I haven’t used a differential equation in 30 years, but, hey, you never know!)
So learn it all. And don’t be surprised if the subject you’d vote “Least likely to ever be useful” winds up being the key to your fame and fortune.
Though I immodestly maintain that my How to Study Program is the most helpful to the most people, there are certainly plenty of other purported study books out there. Inevitably, these other books promote the authors’ “system,” which usually means what they did to get through school. This “system,” whether basic and traditional or wildly quirky, may or may not work for you. So what do you do if “their” way of taking notes makes no sense to you? Or you master their highfalutin’ “Super Student Study Symbols” and still get Cs?
There are very few “rights” and “wrongs” out there in the study world. There’s certainly no single “right” way to attack a multiple choice test or take notes. So don’t get fooled into thinking there is, especially if what you’re doing seems to be working for you.
Don’t change what “ain’t broke” just because some self-proclaimed study guru claims what you’re doing is all wet. Maybe he’s all wet. After all, if his system works for you, all it really means is you have the same likes, dislikes, talents, or skills as the author.
Needless to say, don’t read my books looking for that single, inestimable system of “rules” that works for everyone. You won’t find it, ’cause there’s no such bird.
You will find a plethora of techniques, tips, tricks, gimmicks, and what-have-you, some or all of which may work for you, some of which won’t. Pick and choose, change and adapt, figure out what works for you. Because you are the one responsible for creating your study system, not me.
I’ve used the phrase “Study smarter, not harder” in promotion and publicity for the How to Study Program for more than 20 years. Does that mean I guarantee you’ll spend less time studying? Or that the least amount of time you can study is best? Or that studying isn’t ever supposed to be hard?
Hardly. It does mean that studying inefficiently is wasting time that could be spent doing other (okay, probably more fun) things and that getting your studying done as quickly and efficiently as possible is a realistic, worthy, and attainable goal. I’m no stranger to hard work, but I’m not a monastic dropout who thrives on self-flagellation. I try not to work harder than I have to!
In 1988, when I wrote the first edition of How to Study, I composed it, formatted it, and printed it on (gasp) a personal computer. Most people did not have a computer, let alone a neighborhood network and DSL, or surf the Internet (whatever that was,) or chat online, or Instant Message their friends, or…you get the point.