how to get motivation for college?

[bigbangfan]

ok, so after two intense years of study I finally graduated from IB, last november 2010. I really looked forward to starting college and was excited about it, but now, I transformed into a lazy bugger and don´t study at all. This surprises me because I studied a lot for IB and was very organized. Now I feel that I didn´t take advantage of IB study skills or topics in math this first semester of college and I don´t really see that great basis that IB provides for college. I can´t find motivation at all to study and I´m getting bad grades (especially math). I bug all the time and don´t get to manage my time as I did for IB. How can I solve this problem? thanks for your time

[Ezeh]

Set yourself some GOALS!

[Sandwich]

Ironically being able to make yourself study is one of the values the IB is meant to have helped us all with, but I'm going to say I felt much the same as you when I was in my first year at Uni (which was only last year, before I sound ancient!). I think the IB made me think there'd be a syllabus for everything and you could potentially learn it all with the people teaching you intent on making sure you've learned what they're going to ask about, but actually my experience of Uni is that you've half the time only got the general idea of what they might ask you about, but most of it is guesswork!

Basically the only thing I could find to motivate me was fear. When I thought I might fail my first year I freaked out and worked like crazy. Also remember Uni stuff is hard and it's also intense. You're given maybe an hour's lecture to learn something you would have spent a week doing for IB, you have no one:one contact (or very little, unless you're privileged enough to be at Oxbridge), often you have the theory with no examples or just one or two AND you're expected to teach it yourself plus a bit extra just because. So use the fact that you need to have mastered the contents of your lectures AS A MINIMUM as a springboard to freaking out

Go back over all your lectures, see how many weeks that would take you if you did say 3 or 4 lectures-worth of stuff a day. If you can go back and review stuff and start doing it now, you should be okay come exam time. Depends on what course you're doing, but the sheer volume is crushingly more than IB (I think anyway) so you have to start a lot earlier than you ever have before. Basically recall IB revision and preparation but imagine it over a span of several months rather than several weeks.

At Uni nobody coaches you - so you make your own success, but you also create your own failure! Don't let yourself fail! Especially not if you want a top class degree. Remember, unlike IB, the whole thing counts, not just an exam at the end of 2 years. At least on most degree courses I know, if you screw up your first year exams, you're seriously jeopardising your chances of coming out with a first.

[dessskris]

do you like the courses you are studying now in the first place? think of it as studying your dream major or something that you really really like! if you don't like what you are doing, how can you finish it with a good outcome?

motivation is one of the things that is difficult to get.

but for me, my motivations are my dreams and the people whom I am close with. what's your dream? don't you want to graduate and work (and finally get married)? what about your parents? don't you want to make them happy and proud of you? if you don't want to study, how are you going to make them happy? how can they be proud of you? think about the people that you love.

I agree with Ezeh too. set goals! get yourself some sense of competition (this works for some people, including me, not sure if it would work with you)! maybe you know some friends who seem to be good in class? try to beat them and show to your professors that you can do better than them!

I don't have much to say, but remember ora et labora. I wish you the best of luck!