Department of Mathematics

▪ Sturcture Studying (adapted from Dr. John Kerbs’ Structure Study Guide)

▪ It is important to work on calculus daily (or at least almost daily). One hour every day will lead to much better performance in math than 7 hours every Monday, even though the total time is the same. Study smarter not harder!

▪ Use the calendar on our course site to see where you should be and what you should be working on. Keep up!

▪ Plan your time to get a little practice in every day, but try to average at least an hour a day. Attached is a Structured Study Guide that will help you organize your time. This will help you in ALL your classes!

▪ Here are a few more tips that will help you improve your math scores...

▸ Before you begin each day's work, write down your personal "hw cheat sheet" of formulas you will need. Try to do so by memory, but for new formulas you will need to look at the notes. Hopefully tomorrow you will write them down by memory. If there are formulas that give you trouble after a few days put more effort into memorizing them. If there is a formula from algebra you are running into while working problems that is giving you problems, add that to your hw cheat sheet.

▸ Work the problems listed in the Practice, getting to the Homework as you get through the problems. The problems in the text are typically ordered from easier to harder, so you start easy and work your way to harder.

▸ When you start each new type of problem you will probably need to refer to the notes or the text or the WebAssign tutorials. But after a few problems you need to stop looking at the tutorials or hints -- there won't be any on the tests.

▸ WebAssign is a good learning tool; be sure you use it to learn the math and not just to earn a grade. Pay careful attention to the words in the problems - they tell you what you are expected to do, and will be important to recognize when asked to work similar problems on a quiz or test where you do not have allowed multiple submissions. WebAssign does not require you to simplify most expressions to be marked correct, but you will be instructed to simplify some problems on exams. Practice simplifying too.

▸ When you run into a concept/problem in which you are not progressing even after reviewing notes or checking for tutorials/videos on WebAssign and e-book, get help from your instructors in office hours or a tutoring center (see below for URLs of tutoring centers).

▸ ACE has a variety of general workshops geared toward improving study habits. For registration and more information go to http://ace.fsu.edu/Workshops.

▸ For free peer tutoring go to ACE in WJB, http://ace.fsu.edu/Tutoring or The Learning District in Strozier http://lib.fsu.edu/tutoring/math.

▸ We have heard students say that it is impossible to do well in calculus if you have not already had it before, but some of my best students never had calculus. The key is that those students were not afraid of hard work and getting help when they needed it.