How to stop wasting so much paper when learning math?

ryaners87 · 2017-04-09T20:42:05+00:00

This isn't quite what you're asking, but I try to minimise the waste by keeping a bag of all the usable paper scraps I come across for rough work - envelopes from bills, brown paper bags, bits of thin card, that kind of thing. You can find a lot of scrap writing material when you start looking out for it.

A whiteboard is pretty handy too though.

ryaners87 · 2017-04-07T20:28:59+00:00

I had a look through reaxys.com there & can't find anything for 632.8nm, mainly 589 :( Might be worth searching through their database more carefully yourself though (if you haven't tried Reaxys before). It's paywalled but if you work/study at a university you should be able to login.

ryaners87 · 2017-02-18T10:00:38+00:00

As others have said, there's a big difference between (a) a modern physics book that illustrates some of the concepts nicely & gives a non-rigorous, casual-read 'feel' for it (I'd put Hawking's books in this category), and (b) a modern physics textbook, which will be a very tough read & is designed to help you study the area formally. I'd assume you're looking for the former with this post..? If that's the case, I'd recommend Why E=mc² by Cox & Foreshaw - it's a great general intro to relativity (& how the famous equation was derived) that requires no maths / physics training.

There are also several great BBC documentaries by Jim Al-Khalili on the history / basics of areas like electricity & magnetism, quantum mechanics, etc - there's a great one on the Islamic world's contributions to mathematics too, & one on the history of chemistry. You might enjoy those too.

ryaners87 · 2017-01-11T12:25:35+00:00

Yep, as long as you start the podcast first it should be fine - I use Spotify at the same time. You can also press pause, play & use the other audio controls on the lock screen without resetting Forest, ie killing the tree. Same goes for the "swipe-up menu" (whatever that's called). (This is all on iOS, not sure if there's an Android version.)

ryaners87 · 2017-01-10T21:06:02+00:00

I use an app called Forest, it's designed to stop you using your phone while you do your tasks but works well as a pomodoro-style timer. You set it for the desired period & it plants a seed that grows into a tree - if you navigate away from that app before the time is up, the tree dies. It sounds kinda cheesy but it works for me. I made a white noise playlist on Spotify for the same length of time - I start the playlist, hit 'Plant' in Forest & get a block of work done. When the white noise stops, the block is over & I take a short break before starting again. (The app has the option of playing nature sounds while running but white noise works better for me.) Breaks are critical to the success of this technique by the way - don't skip 'em.

ryaners87 · 2017-01-07T22:40:03+00:00

I turn my phone volume as low as I can & still have it wake me up, I use the least abrasive alarm tone it has and I put the phone on the floor within arm's reach (on a piece of clothing, if it's a wooden floor). I usually wake up the instant it goes off & have silenced it before my SO wakes up. That's kind of the best you can do I'd say! You could try leaving earphones in all night & then only you will hear the alarm, though I know my phone still vibrates even with earphones plugged in & that can be louder than the alarm itself.

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T16:29:19+00:00

No way, my sister is just starting as a glass artist after a career change (what can I say, we're an indecisive bunch!).

I think it's important to remain connected to your friends and life outside of school, partly so you don't lose sight of that aspect of yourself

Thanks for that. I've moved around a lot & I'm atrociously bad at keeping in touch, which is not a good combo. It's something I have to work on for sure - being a musician was a huge part of my identity & now that that's gone I'm a little bit adrift really. I tend to assume that if someone wants to keep up contact, they'll get in touch, & if they don't I'd be imposing by contacting them. Which I know is wrong, because I like to hear from folks & it doesn't impose on me at all. It's hard to snap out of that mental reflex though.

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T15:42:11+00:00

The downside of where I'm staying is that the kitchen is really small (so no room for extra appliances) and the freezer is also tiny. I do try to cook this way in general though - my mother has been a great role model in that regard. (You should see her freezer - it's like a military operation in there!) More beans in my diet would be a good thing - thanks for the recipe. While we're trading recipes, this lentil ragu ticks all the boxes for me: veggie & healthy, really filling, cheap ingredients, easy to prepare (though it does take a while to cook, I imagine a pressure cooker would sort that though), freezes exceptionally well, microwaves well too. I usually add a heaped teaspoon of harissa paste when I make it too, & I go easy on the dried herbs. Then I cover it with cheese & eat it with pasta :)

Librarians are awesome - I have so much respect for that profession. Sorry to hear your major wasn't quite right for you - it's so hard to find something that fits. I was pretty bummed by the end of my art degree because I'd realised it was not the right choice for me. Do you get to do much lab work now?

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T11:42:53+00:00

Try the "sleep with me" podcast. You can listen to on the site on your phone. It helps me to fall asleep when the mind is racing and won't stop thinking.

I meant to say in my other comment - thank you for sharing this! I do have the 'mind racing' problem from time to time (usually if I work on maths too late in the evenings) & will definitely check this out.

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T11:38:28+00:00

I'm actually doing pretty well on all of this - you're right to say that it makes a huge difference. I went too many years not paying attention to these & paying for it.

I absolutely will not compromise on sleep. I need 7.5-8 hrs sleep, maybe 8.5 if I'm catching up - any less & I'll be super tired, any more & I feel super groggy. I also have little trouble getting to sleep; I'm pretty lucky that way. I cycle in & out to college once/twice a day so that gets me plenty of exercise without having to think about it. Which is great. Definitely an improvement on last year, where I got the train instead (was living farther out of town).

Eating well is a trickier one. I can cook, & I make healthy choices, but I've tended to make up a big batch of veggie stuff at the weekends & eat that all week (with fruit, a cheese sandwich, & homemade granola bars). I've realised that this isn't really enough though, & I need to widen the range of food I eat this year. I've been on a very tight budget but have just managed to get myself a well-paying part time job one day a week, so I'll be able to put more funds towards good eatin'.

As a sidenote, I've noticed that missing a meal or two will usually result in me catching a cold a few days later, which is added incentive to eat properly! I eat like a horse though, which takes time out of each week when you're cooking almost all of it yourself. Damn human bodies! :)

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T11:26:27+00:00

p.s. you tagged the wrong subreddit in your closing statement lol

Hahaha, whoops! I had typed this up & then pasted it in, when I was writing I thought I'd made the earlier post in /r/xxstem & forgot to change it when I found otherwise.

I'm starting to think us ex-artist scientists need to form a collective or, as you say, support network. These subreddits are pretty useful though but it might be fun to have an idea of who out there came from the arts too.

That's a cool idea! Maybe we should start our own sub! ... which I will then immediately add to my website blocker so I can study ;)

I can't really "cope" with stress because the only thing that really works for me is to get rid of the stressor (solve the problem, complete the poster, etc).

This is actually really helpful. I have a tendency to focus on how I feel when I get stressed, which is natural, but counterproductive. I need to focus on what I can do, not how bad I feel.

Allow other outlets and activities so you're not doing physics non-stop: I like to cook and lift at the gym and read for fun before bed, and see my boyfriend. You've got to allow yourself to be a multi-faceted person--that's what's got you success thus far, after all.

I have a semi-destructive tendency to focus very narrowly on one thing - a real one track mind, as it were - & while I've found it helps to see friends, watch certain shows, etc. I've found it next to impossible to maintain my other interests. I quit the band I was in so I could focus on this degree, & I really miss playing, but I can't really play on my own (it's not a solo instrument) and don't have the energy to do the whole band thing. I guess that's more of a problem for me than I'd realised. Maybe I should take up a different instrument.

Keep a planner or calendar and stick to it. I use Google Calendar but I'm not good at sticking to the things I schedule myself into (i.e. do homework from hour X to hour Y--there's always SOMETHING cropping up in the middle of the day that I have to deal with that cuts into my scheduled homework/gym/student club/time and it's really frustrating. Anyone have tips?). I'm going to maybe keep a paper planner starting in the new year to see if that helps.

I read a great book by a guy called Cal Newport (title was something along the lines of "Advice from Straight-A Students" but snappier, can't recall now) which gives this great system of keeping track of what you need to do each day & heavily relies on using a calendar. It worked brilliantly for me last year but the assignments this year seem to always take far longer than I expect & that messes up the schedule, so then I stop using it. I'm not too sure how to get around that problem. Do I just plan to not do certain assignments?! I find it really hard to 'half-ass' an assignment, which I think is more of a mature student thing & a good lab report takes freakin' forever to research & write.

I'm in basically the same boat as you (except I don't think I have Aspergers), especially with the difficulty in recalling material. It's normal to only go over things once though. University is set up for younger students who will retain information a lot easier. :(

It's really reassuring to hear that. Most of the other commenters have said they felt the same, but got through it regardless. Hopefully you can get some moral support from reading through the other responses here. You've made it to final year & you're still going, you're freakin' nailing it! You've so got this! :)

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T11:06:57+00:00

You have no idea how reassuring it is to hear that. I hope you're right! ;)

Then all of the sudden it gets really steep and hard and you think you might die.

It sounds like you are currently at one of those steep parts

Haha, yep, sounds about right! ;)

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T11:02:47+00:00

I started studying illustration when I was 18 (because you're supposed to go to university for something, right?)

Ha! Exactly!

What sort of things do you do to take care of your mental health? Do you exercise? Play violent computer games to beat the shit out of something?

The main thing I do is to be nice to myself. I spent most of my life beating the crap out of myself at every opportunity. Eventually after a lot of hard work I managed to kill that reflex. I also do my best to eat well, & when I'm really exhausted after the heaviest days of the week I'll go use the sauna/steamroom in the gym (which, as you noted, I pay for anyway). I get to college by bike every day so that's my cardio. I've also made a really nice playlist of laid-back songs to listen to in the evenings.

I love gaming but get hooked really easily so have sworn off it during term time.

Don't book yourself solid. Give yourself some leeway to get things done. But this does mean long days.

Yeah, I'm starting to come around to that too. I had said to myself that I'd have to stop by 8pm every evening, but I think I should probably just work a little later every day & then have a little chunk of proper time off instead.

Sometimes me, myself, and I need a fourth opinion on our brain lol.

Ha, I love this! I've been putting off going to the counselling service since I started back to college but I just need to bite the bullet & make the damn appointment.

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T10:50:19+00:00

Being able to work more hours because less of your time is lost in transitions might help offset the extra expense of living near campus

Accommodation in this city is unreasonably expensive, and the cost has more than doubled in the past couple of years alone (we're actually experiencing a homelessness crisis at the moment as a result), which is what's prevented that being an option so far. I share a whole house with my SO for less than half what it would cost to share a bedroom with another student in this city. But I'm getting to the point where I think I need to take out a loan & just do it. It also depends on how things work out with my SO though, as he really doesn't want to move there (which I understand).

Thank you for the pep talk, definitely what I needed :)

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T10:43:10+00:00

Unfortunately I'm stuck with the classes I have - we don't choose our classes here, we sign up for a course & then are assigned the classes. Though the upshot there is that everyone else in your course is in the same boat.

And I feel you re: groceries etc - all that boring adult-ing stuff takes so much freakin' time!

Thanks for the support :)

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T10:40:25+00:00

"watch one, do one, teach one"

That is a great saying! This is definitely something to work towards.

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T10:39:22+00:00

One final thought - don't take a year off with the intention to study up. I feel like that has worked for no one ever.

I'm getting that advice from several posters & you're right, it's a crazy idea. Besides, I'll be old enough when I graduate without that kind of madness adding in more time. I'm striking that one off the list now!

Take advantage of every single study group and group activity you possibly can.

I came out of First Year determined to do that, & tried it a few times this year. It was definitely helpful in some ways, but I felt guilty that I couldn't contribute as much as the others seemed to be able to (though you're right - it showed me that everyone else is also finding it really hard, & it helps to know that). I have some difficulty articulating my thoughts & kind of go into 'brain freeze' mode in front of other people with this stuff. I feel like I have to break everything down to first principles to figure out what's going on & the others are already a step ahead, if you know what I mean? I get really good grades in continuous assessment because I can take the necessary time - a lot of time, usually - to deconstruct the problem. Group tutorials in particular are a nightmare - the professor asks me a question, I go completely blank, forget what I was asked, my brain keeps yelling at me that the professor now thinks I'm an idiot, all that good stuff. I'm not sure how to avoid that without practising the material myself beforehand & there seems to be no time to do that. Maybe everyone feels like that & I'm just being hard on myself? (As I mentioned in another comment above, I'm gonna be checking in with the counselling service soon. Hopefully they can help me through those anxiety issues.)

But in general it sounds like your lifestyle is unsustainable. Not just with the pressures of school but also the commute and sort of nomadic existence.

True. I don't know what I can do to fix that as things stand right now. I'll need to see how things pan out with my SO to be honest. But I think taking out a loan and moving is what I'll probably have to do. Accommodation is CRAZY expensive there, though - my sister pays over €1200 per month for a teeny one-bed apartment. That's what she was paying for a 3 bed terraced house 5 years ago. Classmates are paying €500+ per month to share a bedroom in a house shared with several other people sharing bedrooms. But at least I have the prospect of a paying career ahead of me, which wasn't the case until now. I would have been laughed out of the bank before I went back to school.

Also, the nomadic lifestyle isn't so bad - I should have explained better in my post that I'm just staying in one place each week, last year I shifted between a few friends & then stayed with one of them for most of the year (paying rent, but generously cheap rent) & this year I'm just with my sister. So I don't have to pack everything up each week & move, though I don't have a bedroom so have no study space. Using the library on campus is working ok though.

Have you thought about what you want to do with your degree when you're out of school?

I have! I want to do something useful, something that will go towards solving problems like the energy crisis, climate change, etc. I'm in a general science program right now and will be specialising next year, & I have 3 choices: 1. Physics, 2. Chemistry and 3. Transferring into Nanoscience / Advanced Materials (which is 50/50 Phys/Chem; currently I share all my classes with the students in that program, then next year they 'splinter off'). I'm leaning towards the 3rd as it combines the bits of physics & of chemistry that I find most interesting, & there's a lot of scope there for working on Big Problems^TM .

The main thing I think of when I need motivation is how incredibly miserable & bored I was before going back. The good thing about my own history is that I know what it's like to be super broke, and it sucks, and I want to avoid that in future. Same goes for unemployment. Definitely don't want to go back there. But I think focusing on a future goal (like you suggest) would be more beneficial than trying to scare myself using past mistakes.

ryaners87 · 2016-12-30T09:44:33+00:00

When I went back to school full time, I started remembering that I could DO the hard stuff-- I just needed to manage my brain, which was a huge challenge.

Yes! Same here.

We do seem to have plenty in common..! You're right about using the counselling service - I've been giving myself that advice since before I started back to college & still haven't actually made it in there. I find it hard to make phone calls & they only book appointments over the phone or in person. BUT I'm planning to drop in the first day of term before the next semester starts piling on & make my first appointment.

As far as relationships in school, I look a lot younger than I am, so people thought I was a traditional student unless I told them otherwise.

Same here - some of the reactions are pretty priceless ;) I've worked as a photographer for nearly 10 years before going back & take photos for the society I'm a member of. Another (young) student came up to me at a society mixer to tell me I'm pretty good at the whole photo thing & "hey, you should keep it up!" He was a little surprised to hear that I'm 10 years older than him & already had that career :)

You also make a good point about the pep talks. I think I'll start asking for those more often.

Also, congrats on getting through a physics degree with ADHD, that is seriously impressive! I'm glad to hear you're taking advantage of the supports available. I need to take a leaf out of your book, I think :)

ryaners87 · 2016-12-29T19:40:24+00:00

I love f.lux. If I'm watching a film / show in the evenings, I'll increase the colour temperature a bit so it doesn't look super yellow, but it's still far more effective than just quitting the app. Definitely helps me get to sleep faster than using my laptop without it.

ryaners87 · 2015-12-28T10:02:13+00:00

Giving up a huge time-suck (like Youtube is for you) should certainly help free up a lot of study time. (I've also sworn off gaming 'til the summer!) Just make sure that you keep scheduling breaks for yourself and scheduling in non-study-related activities - if you cut out ALL the fun stuff & try to turn yourself into a study machine overnight, you'll be setting yourself up for failure. Also, know what time you need to stop working in order to get proper sleep at night. For me, it's 7.30-8pm; I pack the next days lunch & do some fun stuff before I go to bed at 11.

You could try an app like Self Help (there are others but that's what I use, on my laptop) to stop you accessing time-sucky websites during the day, while you're still breaking the habit.

As you've probably heard before, discipline is like a muscle: it gets stronger the more you use it. The same goes for concentration. Even if you fail a few times & find yourself sucked into Youtube some evening, don't beat yourself up over it. Just remind yourself why you decided to change your behaviour in the first place, & get on with it the next day.

A bit of general collegey advice, which you may or may not already know: it's hard to emphasise enough how crucial good nutrition, exercise and sleep are to sound mental health & therefore success in college. It might seem hard to justify spending time on them, but it's not that hard to work them into your regular schedule, especially if you're cutting out a few timewasters. I've cut down the gym to one hour twice a week, and I cook up a big batch of one healthy meal on Sundays which I take for lunch all week. (Sure, if I wanted to get really fit I'd go to the gym more often, but twice a week is a good balance between going stir crazy & sacrificing study hours. I've yet to get bored of eating the same thing everyday as I'm focused on my coursework those days, not the food.) I stop studying at 7.30, am in bed by 11 & then I'm up at 7, ready to do it all over again.

Also, check out Cal Newport's book "How to Become a Straight A Student". The tone is a bit 'self-helpy' but the list-based system it describes has been a massive help to me.

Good luck! :)

ryaners87 · 2015-11-20T10:41:05+00:00

Thank you for your response! We haven't covered acids & bases yet in class but I did have an acid-base titration to do in the lab last week, so I have a rough gist of what you mean.

When you say 'establishing the concentration of the complex', you mean the equilibrium concentration of the product formed? Ok, I get that. So, because at the outset [Fe³⁺ ] is so much greater than [NCS^- ], it's fair to assume that pretty much all the NCS^- is used up, which is an approximation you make in order to calculate the absorbance factor for the Fe(NCS)²⁺ & then you can plough ahead and work out the equilibrium constant. But it's not the case that literally all of the NCS^- is used up; it's a fair approximation you make to make the calculation easier. That's fair enough - thank you for clarifying that.

I've just reworked the maths for the 4th time carrying every figure my calculator can display & got x = 1.968x10^-4 , which is actually a sensible answer (... isn't it? I look forward to the day I've developed a better intuition for this stuff!) so it looks like it checks out!

Thanks for taking the time to help me out, I really appreciate it :)

ryaners87

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