I need a little advice. I have all four of my classes on one day, Monday and Wednesday, and then only three on Friday. All of my classes are in the same building and three of them are only an hour long with the fourth one being an hour and a half long. I’ll have two in the morning then a two hour break and then the other two. Am I crazy? Since they are only an hour long I don’t think it will be much of a problem. Also, any advice on how to organize my notes? I don’t want to be lugging around four binders/notebooks/textbooks all day.
I had similar schedule in my spring quarter. Honestly, it’s not too bad, but it can be annoying to not have a break. It look like you have a nice two hour break in between, so make sure you use that break to eat (I didn’t really have time to go eat in between classes, so hunger was a constant problem).
Do you have e-books? Most of the time, you really don’t need to bring the textbooks with you to class. Also, if you have separate notebooks for notes, get rid of that- just buy a multiple subject notebook to save space.
I used to purposely schedule all of my classes back-to-back because it was easier for me to have free days when I could schedule other things. The only downside is if you get tired from sitting and listening for so long (but you really only have two classes in a row and then a break so it’s not that bad) and/or if you have exams all on the same day. Make sure you check your syllabus at the beginning of the semester to make note of any important dates. If you do have exams on the same day, make sure you plan accordingly.
For most classes, you don’t need to bring a textbook to class (I’ve never brought a textbook to class, but everyone’s different, I suppose). I usually only had one notebook per quarter, not even per class, and I would use it for all of my subjects. Though, if slides were posted online, I would write on those instead of notebook. Eventually I started doing all my notes electronically, so I only brought my iPad with me.
But if you want to be more organized than me, you could bring one multi-subject notebook to take notes in. Or you could bring one binder with dividers and just take notes on binder paper. The might be nice if you’re the type of person that wants to print out slides and such to take notes on or study. That way you can keep them in the binder with everything else. If you start running out of room, you could just leave the old binder at home and bring a new one. And just use the old binder when you need to study. Or you could just bring paper to take notes on in class and keep a binder for each class at home. Then you could just put your notes in each binder when you get home. There are a million ways you could not have to bring four notebooks/binders everyday. You’ll find something that works for you.
It’s not horrible or anything; I wouldn’t really recommend stacking more than three classes on any given day but it’s not like your schedule is a recipe for disaster. With your 2 hour break you can go get lunch, meet up with friends, study, do homework, take a nap, hit the gym, etc – so it won’t feel as overwhelming as having 4 classes back to back.
As for organization, you can just bring a single folder with loose leaf inside and take your notes on that and when you get home you can put them in your binder or rewrite them into a notebook (I’m a big fan of rewriting notes - it helps a ton with committing information to memory and solidifying important concepts that might’ve been murky during lecture). Last semester I began using e-books for my texts (including article readings) – I kept them stored on my iPad Mini and just carried it in my backpack with my charger.
The semester before I used hardcopy textbooks but I never brought them to class - very rarely will a professor require that. (The only exception I could think of was a Religion class I had taken and sometimes the professor asked us to bring in our Bibles – but that’s a very unique situation, you probably will not have the New Testament as an assigned text, LOL.) Most students don’t bring in textbooks ever. Just the supplies they need to write down notes with.
Will you be a college freshman? What are the 4 classes? How come you have 7 classes (apparently: $ on M-W, 3 on T TH)?
@MYOS1634 The way I figured it, (s)he has an 1:30hr lecture class on Monday and Wednesday, and 3 1hr lecture classes on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
It will be a busy day but definitely not impossible or crazy, especially with the break. If the last professor is boring it might get hard to stay awake for the full hour and a half though. I use a different notebook for each class since I like having them separate, and I like to handwrite my notes.
I’ve had similar schedules, and it’s not really that bad. Get a 5-subject notebook that has folders built into it. Five-Star has one that I really like. I can’t even remember the last time I used a binder. Most classes don’t really require you to have the textbook in class in my experience.
My school supplies for a typical semester basically include two 5-subject notebooks, some pencil lead and erasers, some ink refills for my pens, and some spare batteries for my calculator. That’s pretty much it. That made having 5 classes in one day a breeze.
I would say the real challenge with this schedule is choosing to be productive even when A) you don’t have class the next day and B) you don’t have class all day. If you can manage that, you’ll be fine. We all went to school for 7 hours a day for years.
If you’re going to be a freshman I strongly recommend against it. learning how to build a schedule is am essential skill. you need a variety of classes - one with a lot of reading, one with computing, one class with lab and no more, one language class… with 2classes T Th and3MWF or if this is not possible, the reverse.
I did a 4 class a day for 2 days schedule my second semester with absolutely no problem. 9:15 - 11:45 and then 1:30 to 4:30. In return I only had labs on T/F and 3 classes on Thursday’s. As @Pancaked said, if you have good time management, this is an ideal schedule.
I had four classes on Wednesdays and Fridays first semester last year and it was fine. Like you, I had a break in the middle of the day (mine was long enough to go to work though), which made it a lot more bearable. I had two classes in the morning (9 to 10 and 10 to 11) then two afternoon classes (2 to 3 and 4 to 5). I would go to the library and read during the hour-long afternoon break and have a snack. You probably won’t need your textbooks every day (or ever) but if you can get digital versions you can maximize your downtime 