Chapter 1
Attitudes, assets and achievement
I GETTING SORTED
I like work; it fascinates me. I can sit down and look at it for hours.
(Jerome K.Jerome)
Preliminary
What would you say the following had in common:
- Getting up in the morning
- Writing an essay
- Cleaning the car
- Reading War and Peace
- Re-decorating a room
- Mowing the lawn
- Having to practise the piano
- Sending off thank-you letters
- Preparing a meal
- Chatting up someone you fancy
You might answer thatâwith the possible exception of number 10âthey are all a drag but will have to be tackled sooner or later. Another possible answer, though, is that they are difficult to start doing, but that once youâve started theyâre not so bad, even pleasant. Initially, however, there must be a degree of motivation present for you to be willing to start the task.
Like all things, study requires such initial motivation, and that could be paraphrased as your âinterestâ or enjoyment. Indeed, my emphasis throughout is on enjoyment. Few people succeed at anything while finding it dull, and most successful peopleâwhatever their jobâderive an enormous amount of good old-fashioned fun from what they do. So just about the worst thing you can do when starting a new course is to dwell miserably on what hard work itâs going to be. If you expect a course to be difficult, obscure or boring, the chances are that it will be. From the start, therefore, cultivate a sense of enjoyment; believe in the pleasures and satisfactions that await you.
Naturally, it is idle to pretend that any course of study does not involve workâhard work. But the key to that phrase lies in the adjective âhardâ. If you take it to mean âlaboriousâ or âtediousâ, youâre going to lose a lot of will power at once. If, however, you
can latch on to the alternative meaning, of âmuscularâ or âconcentratedâ, you will be setting up a tough and clear-sighted attitude which will sponsor enjoyment. All success requires care and industry: if you have picked up this book hoping for some smartalec way to bypass necessary effort, you may as well put it down again right away. On the other hand, effort is not enough on its own: pleasure and enjoyment are vital ingredients too.
That last remark does not always apply to pre-16 study. If youâre cleverâand in my experience most students are brighter than they thinkâit is perfectly possible to get a GCSE A* in a subject you detest or at least are heartily glad to give up at the end of Year 11. After that, though, the âpleasure principleâ needs to be present. Once youâre 16, you are no longer legally required to attend school or college; presumably you do so because you want to. And since it is just stupid to go on doing something you dislike, I will further presume that you are more or less pleased to be doing the course or courses youâve chosen. If not, this book may still be able to help; however, some kind of motivation is essential, even if itâs only the pleasure of looking forward to when you stop!
To help you work out your own attitude in more detail, here is an extended questionnaire. It is partly meant to amuse, but it also focuses on most of the things crucial to successful study, and many of the items look forward to matters discussed in later chapters. It may be that you will want to tick more than one answer in certain instances; there may be others where nothing listed matches your experience or view. Fine in both cases. The only âruleâ here is that you should be as honest with yourself as possible.
There are nearly three dozen questions. Iâve divided them into six âcategoriesâ; a commentary on the issues raised follows each one.
A Your situation
| 1 | Are you doing your course: | |
| a | Because you love it? | |
| b | Because itâs important in advancement/career terms? | |
| c | Because youâve got nothing else to do? | |
| 2 | Are your study concerns: | |
| a | Primarily academic? | |
| b | Primarily professional? | |
| c | Primarily recreational/non-vocational? | |
All six options are your affair, your privilege, and therefore equally ârightâ. There are, ultimately, as many reasons for being a student as there are students, no two of whom are exactly alike. I hope some of you chose both 1a and 1b: pleasure and success are intimately connected, as I look to demonstrate throughout.
I especially hope this book will benefit anyone who chose 1c, which might appear to have been offered as a sardonic joke. It was not, and is not. Nowadays, the pressure on young people to continue their studies as extensively as possible is enormous, and as a result the alternatives are both fewer in number and less attractive than used to be the case. If youâre a student because nothing else seems available, or because youâre used to school/ college life and donât yet feel sufficiently confident to venture into something unknown, or simply because your parents have more or less insisted that you stay a student, you deserveâand haveâmy considerable sympathy. All Iâll add is that youâll need to look on that âsole optionâ in an affirmative way if you can: if thatâs all there is, then donât just get on with itâenjoy! And that friendly command applies whatever your needs and whatever âtypeâ you are.
B Your attitudes I: Inward
| 1 | Do you: | |
| a | Look forward to study/work? | |
| b | Work sensibly but only when necessary? | |
| c | Resent having to work? | |
| 2 | Are you: | |
| a | Confident? | |
| b | Diffident? | |
| c | Arrogant? | |
| 3 | As a learner, are you: | |
| a | Humble? | |
| b | Modest? | |
| c | Fearful? | |
| 4 | Is your memory: | |
| a | Good? | |
| b | Average? | |
| c | Poor? | |
| 5 | Do you: | |
| a | Think youâre a fast reader? | |
| b | Think your reading speed is average/okay? | |
| c | Think youâre a slow reader? | |
| 6 | Do you take to criticism: | |
| a | Willingly? | |
| b | Reluctantly? | |
| c | Resentfully? | |
| 7 | Do you prefer to be: | |
| a | Enthusiastic? | |
| b | Critical? | |
| c | Witheringly dismissive? | |
| 8 | As a student do you: | |
| a | Expect to be taught? | |
| b | Expect to learn on your own? | |
| c | See things as essentially a partnership? | |
| 9 | If you answered (c) to 8, is that partnership: | |
| a | With teachers? | |
| b | With texts? | |
| c | With fellow students? | |
All these issues are covered in detail later on, so I will not take up much of your time on them now.
It should be obvious enough that if most of your answers to Questions 1â7 were c, youâre in trouble! In most cases, you can do something about those negative waves: slow reading, poor memory, excessive confidence or excessive worry can quickly be put right. I should perhaps add that option 2c is unfair and sneaky of me, since Iâve met only a handful of truly âarrogantâ students in thirty years.
Four other quick things:
- If you chose 1c Iâm surprised youâre reading this book, unless you picked it up hoping to find some smart-alec cure. If you did, forget itâand if you really resent time spent working, then you can also forget any idea of becoming a successful student.
- Criticism: nobody likes it, nobody. The best any of us can do is realise that it is usuallyâI would like to think invariablyâoffered in order to help us learn, develop and improve.
- A word about destructive criticism. There is (contrary to widespread attitudes) a great deal to be said for it. Indeed, it is one of lifeâs pleasures to perform the perfect demolition job on something that thoroughly deserves it. But it would be unwise for a student to look forward to that too much or too often! Unless youâre singularly unfortunate in the course youâve chosen and the people who administer and teach it, such occasions will be rare, and you should keep the âwitheringly dismissiveâ part of your armoury under wraps.
- Concerning questions 8 and 9: ideally, you should have ticked all six boxes. There is no end to the ways in which you can learn, and no limit to the people and things you can learn from. However, Iâd say 9c is particularly important. In the end, students learn as much from each other as from the more evident âauthoritiesâ they encounter.
C Your attitudes II: Outward
| 1 | You believe teachers are: | |
| a | Always right | |
| b | Usually right | |
| c | Sad types who canât get a proper job | |
| 2 | You believe: | |
| a | A good memory is a gift | |
| b | A good memory is a skill | |
| c | Sorry, what was the question? | |
| 3 | The printed word is: | |
| a | Gospel | |
| b | Suspect | |
| c | Depends | |
| 4 | Study aids are: | |
| a | Essential | |
| b | Rubbish | |
| c | Depends | |
| 5 | How do you evaluate classes versus private work?: | |
| a | Classes are more important | |
| b | Private work is more important | |
| c | They are equally important | |
In questions 1 and 2, only option b will do. 1c and 2c are jokes; if you didnât realise that, one or other of us needs to do ...
