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This school has made earning my college degree convenient and offers many resources. In all of my classes books, appendices, and learning materials are online and easily downloaded to my computer for quick access. Audio files are a useful tool to help me comprehend my reading material. All Of the downloaded materials are also available to download to portable devices so I can take college with me anywhere I go. Another amazing resource is the University Library, which is easily accessible by clicking on the “Library’ tab at the top of the page once I log into my student portal.
In the library are many tools that help me to succeed. Among them is the “Center for Writing Excellence”, or CHEW which supplies “resources to help develop written communication skills” (University of Phoenix, Ixia College, 201 1). In the CHEW can submit a paper for grammar review in ‘Writing’ and submit a paper for plagiarism review in the “Plagiarism Checker”. There are also grammar and writing guides to help me submit a top notch paper with little to no grammatical mistakes.
A downloaded tool available in the CHEW is called Riverfront Writer, which opens a Word document properly roommate according to the required PAP (American Psychological Association) guidelines. Also in the Library is The Center for Mathematics Excellence, as well as, student labs and useful links to aid me in gaining my education. Under the Library tab I can find a search box to research all of the publications that Library has to offer as well as links to other databases to further my research. The tutorials offered in the library allow me to fully understand how to use the available resources.
Next, we will discuss “Academic Honesty”. Ixia College has implemented academic honesty leslies to encourage the student’s intellectual growth, to encourage them to remain honest, and to encourage students to always give credit where credit is due. Ixia College’s Student Code of Academic Integrity states the many different ways to cheat. Among them is Plagiarism which by definition is “the intentional or unintentional representation of another’s words or ideas as one’s own in an academic exercise” (Center for Writing Excellence, 2011 Plagiarism is dishonorable, dishonest and in some cases criminal.
It is stealing and using someone else’s intellectual property as my own. The consequences if caught can be severe. I can be given a zero or failing grade for the assignment, be dropped from the course or even be expelled from the institution. A tip to avoid plagiarism is to always include my resources and use proper citations. The Reference and Citation Generator that is available in the library can help with this. Another helpful tool to avoid plagiarism is to submit my papers to the Plagiarism Checker available in the CHEW. The next step to cover is setting and achieving goals.
My short term goal is to complete each of my classes successfully one week at a time. By focusing on my studies week by week am able to tackle them easily and not be overwhelmed. I intend to keep using this strategy as I have so far been successful. My long term goals are to complete my Associates Degree and to become employed in a hospital or clinical setting. There are always obstacles in any life goal. The trick is to identify them and overcome them. You can identify obstacles by realizing what and who supports your endeavors and what and who don’t and rectify the situation.
A strong support group will help you overcome anything that gets in your way. My Ixia degree will be pivotal in me accomplishing my goals. This degree will change my life for the better and I can’t wait. Now we will talk about managing time wisely, something that I need to get better at doing. The goal is to balance time between my courses and to focus enough time and energy to both Of them. I have learned to set schedules for myself and set aside time that will only be for schoolwork. Throughout the day I have work, school, and family responsibilities.
Setting schedules for your day really does help you accomplish everything you need to. When get up immediately head to the computer and log into my classes, there I check in for attendance and see what I need to accomplish for the day. I go to work, and when home tend to my family and then back to the computer to complete assignments or participate in discussions. I found that I wasted time in front of the TV and was able to find more time for studies when I eliminated frivolities. The best thing to do is prioritize my time and activities and I will be successful. Now let’s move onto developing reading comprehension and retention.
A valuable process I learned was how to use the USSR (Survey, Question, Read, Recite, and Review). When applying this process to my studies I found that retained information better. Surveying is your pre-reading or scanning for the basics of information that you will need. Questioning is compiling questions related to the topics you just surveyed. You are then ready to Read. The Recite step is repeating information written or out loud to let the information sink in. Next is to Review your notes or highlights (Carter, Bishop, & Gravitas, 2007). This process can be beneficial to anyone for reading comprehension and I highly recommend it.
The final step is applying personality and learning styles to my studies. Through assignments I discovered that my strongest learning style and intelligence is “Verbal-Linguistic”, which according to the text is the “ability to communicate through language (listening, reading, writing, speaking)” (Carter, Bishop, & Gravitas, 2007). Feel this learning style is perfect for distance learning environments because can process what I read and write easily and successfully. My weakest intelligence was “Naturalistic” and decided to study he environment and nature more in order to develop this.