How to deal with a large amount of College reading?

Student Lounge College Life
1

I am in community college in Northern California near SF and I am aiming at transferring to primarily UCLA(others include Davis, Irvine, Berkeley, maybe Santa Barbara) the challenging thing that I am having to deal with is a vast amount of reading.

I am taking 3 semester courses in the summer (10semester units) and for every class I am being told to read on average 60-100 pages of reading in each course. This is my only struggle that I have in higher education.

Anyone have tip, strategies, input on how to read?
I just feel it’s very time consuming because I want to finish quick but life gets in the way such as children that need my attention, work, commuting, volunteering, just life in general.

Thanks

2

60-100 pages a day or week?

3

Roughly around five days

4

For a summer course that it’s that much. That’s about 25-40 pages per day.

Do you work full time?

5

Yes, also the speed is quick because the courses that are normally18 weeks in a semester are squeezed into 6 weeks.

6

I really don’t know what to tell you. That isn’t a lot of reading at all. How old are you and how many kids do you have? I assume you are an older student?

7

I am 25 years old; I would be under the non traditional student route. I have 2 children.

8

See if you have drop one class if it is too much for you. There really are no shortcuts.

9

You need to be careful with the amount of courses you take in the summer. Summer classes put out a lot of work, and you can’t really handle the coursework unless it’s just a few classes. I suggest you cut down on the credits for now.

10

Summer courses can be like that, they have a lot to stuff into a shorter time period. Is it too late to drop one of the classes? But here is the bottom line. If you have kids and are going to school, there isn’t going to be a lot of time for other stuff. If you have to work some to make ends meet, that is going to stretch you really thin. Volunteering, socializing, etc – that is going to have to be back burner if you want to finish your degree. You are going to have to adjust your priorities. 100 pages/week for a class doesn’t seem that far out of line – my college courses often required this.

I got one of my degrees at night while working full time (you don’t say how much you are working). I had time for 2 classes per semester, and that was super stressful. I could barely keep up, and I didn’t have kids yet.

11

To be successful in college, you must do your reading. I have learned this the hard way, there is usually no way around it. Professors assign it for a reason. I wish there was a way around it.

If the W date has not passed, take the W. Taking one summer class is often a challenge, let alone 3. As long as you’re not receiving Federal Student Aid, there really is no need to rush through.

12

Drop one class and tie the W.
(Note that generally speaking it’s better to take 2 classes max per summer session).

13

The reason why I don’t want to drop is because I want to transfer as fast as I can. So far I have a 4.0 and I feel that this fast speed and loads of information thrown at me can prepare me for the quarter system at UCLA.

14

There is no way around the reading, and in comparison to what I had as an undergrad and grad student that seems really light. Find a way to lighten the load elsewhere (work, childcare etc,) so you have the time for the reading and studying or drop one of the classes. You aren’t doing yourself any favors by looking for any other ways around it in my opinion.

15

How to read a book: https://pne.people.si.umich.edu/PDF/howtoread.pdf

I recommend that for everyone from freshmen to grad students.

You need to learn how to academic read- which is not the same as pleasure reading.

16

40 pages a day. 24 hours a day minus 8 hours of sleep a day = 16 wakeful hours. Average reading speed is ~ 2 minutes per page so you need 80 minutes of time dispersed over 16 hours (960 minutes). So you must figure out how to spend 8-10% of your time reading. Of course, that is simplistic. The reference above is very good although it illustrates that you need even more time. If you don’t have the time, then you are biting off more than you can chew.

17

Change your mindset somewhat.

You are probably taking 15 credits which means 15 academic hours of class per week. But for each hour in class, you are assumed (by the government who creates guidelines) to have 2-3 hours of homework/reading/studying. So that means you have 45-60 hours/worrk per week…more than a full time job. So treat it like a full time job.

I would highly recommend the book by Cal Newport: “How To Become a Straight-A Student:
The Unconventional Strategies Real College Students Use to Score High While Studying Less”
It will help you with time management and how to be more efficient.

So for reading, start by knowing hwo much you need to read. Break it up by day so you know how much you need to read per day. "100 pages by Wed, so 50 on Monday and Tue.

Also learn how to take notes on your reading…find out what the professor is looking for. First look at your assignment. Why are you reading this book? You might want note themes, interesting passages, new terminology , etc.