/sci/ - Science & Math

>>14860446
excerpt from pic related

A related problem is faced by students who get behind in a course. Being behind presents you with a choice: do you try to catch up by going back to where you last understood it and working forwards, or by trying to understand the new material as it appears, and going back to fill in the gaps according to what is currently needed? I would favor the latter option, for the following reasons.

First, the working-forwards option is emotionally unpleasant because you will probably always be behind. It is also practically wasteful because it means that you'll spend a lot of time sitting in lectures you don't understand. Second, the start-from-here-and-go-back-to-fill-gap option fits in better with the strategies for learning from lecture notes discussed in Chapter 7. Making it work requires a bit of thought, though, and I suggest the following. If the course has lecture notes that are given out in advance, look at what's coming up in the next lecture. If it doesn't, look at the notes from the most recent lecture instead. Either way, identify any key concepts or theorems that are used, and go back to study those: look up the relevant definitions, examples, and proofs, study them using the strategies from Part i, and try any associated problems.