Guidelines for Success in Mathematics

Take good notes and review them often. A habit that has proven to be helpful for many people is to recopy your notes into another notebook after class. This serves the purpose of you reviewing your notes and ensures you have a legible and organized copy to review later on in the course.

Make sure to plan and utilize enough time to study and do homework. The rule of thumb is to plan for five hours of homework a week, and some people need more time. Homework is the only way that you will really understand mathematics.

When doing homework, don’t conserve paper! Many students try to get as many problems as possible onto one page. This style of homework make sit hard to find mistakes, causes mistakes, reduces the chances for a tutor to find your troubles with a problem, and makes your homework almost useless as a study source.

When seeing a tutor:

Have your problems ready and be as specific as possible. Their job is not to teach you the whole lessen, but rather to assist you with difficulties and how to make the mental connections needed to solve problems.

Don't marathon study. Long sessions usually cause problems like frustration, low retention of the material, and ideas tend to blur together. You will find the best results occur when you study an hour or two every day.

Study in a surrounding that is as free from distractions as possible. Study with a friend or in groups. The process of sharing information with another person gives you a higher retention of the material.

Get help when you need it. Procrastination is the worst thing to do when studying mathematics. While the problem is fresh in your mind is the best time to get help. Also, getting the help early keeps you from getting into wrong processes for solving problems. Most of mathematics is getting into good habits and proper procedures.

Keep up with the class. Getting behind will confuse you and makes it harder to understand the new material. Instructors try to show you the best way to learn the information. Don't be shy in the classroom; ask questions. Instructors cannot read minds; you have to let them know what questions you have.

When you ask a question, don't be vague. Instead of asking "I don't understand the problem," you should ask, "I don't understand the third step." This allows the instructor to be more precise with their explanation, and you will not get bored with the steps you already know.

Finally, math instructors tend to make mathematics look easy. They did their homework when they were in school. Long hours of homework was how they formed their skills. Everyone starts with basics and works their way up since no one is born knowing mathematics. After you have done enough math work, you too will make it look easy when showing it to someone else. Like everything that is important to know, math takes time and practice.