Textbook Study Tips

Hi everyone! Recently I have been studying like crazy and it has been hard to post all the time.  With all that studying came the inspiration for this post. Today I am going to share how I use my textbooks to study. Keep in mind that I do buy all of my books oppose to renting them. If you are renting your textbooks some of these tips may not work for you!

The first thing I use when reading my textbook are highlighters. While reading I use different color highlighters to mark vocabulary terms, definitions, examples of the vocabulary or key words, and any other information I think is important. This makes it easy to spot any important information.  The colors I use are; pink for the section titles, blue for vocabulary/key words, orange for examples of vocabulary/key words, and yellow for any other important information.

The next thing that I use is bookmarks. I like to place a bookmark in every chapter that I read. I do this until I have a test. This helps with studying because I can see what chapters will be on the test. Placing bookmarks in each chapter also help so that I can get to each chapter faster and not have to flip through all of the different pages. I highly recommend using bookmarks because it will make your life so much easier! To see what bookmarks I am currently using take a look at my last post where I talk about my favorite bookmarks.

The last thing that I use is post it notes. I use the post it notes to write thoughts and questions down and stick them on the different pages. Sometimes I will just use a pen and write in the margins but post it notes are also great to use!

These are just a few of the ways that I study. I want to know what you do to study. Let me know in the comments below!

-A

Nanny Diary- Burned Out

Hi everyone! Today I wanted to share with you the chaotic and busy week I had, and  by the title I am sure you can tell it ended in me being burned out and not feeling to great.

This past week I took on extra hours at work so I was working full time. I also told another family I would do daycare drop off and pick up/bedtime routine. It was very exhausting and I was rushing between the daycare and my job. Even after getting home I did not get to relax like I had hoped. I would begin to do homework and post my blog post for that day. It was not until this morning I realized I was burned out and really needed a break!

Even though I had a crazy week it was also very eye opening and helped me to realize I could make some changes so that I do not get overwhelmed in the coming month when I have to balance a full time job and going to school full time. The biggest thing I realized I could do is do one assignment a day and not all of them on one day. This would not only help me have a less stressful week but I also would do better in school because I am giving my attention to one lesson instead of three. The second thing that I learned is that I am able to schedule my posts to post to my blog by itself. This will make it so that I am not rushing to type and format posts.

At the moment I am working on homework and rushing to type this post. However, I do look forward to trying these new ideas this week and hopefully will be able to relax a little bit! What do you do to ease your work load? Let me know in the comments below!

-A

Smart Strategies to Better Time Management

Hello my name is Annmarie and I am terrible at time management!  I am sure a few of you can relate to that statement. With classes starting again tomorrow I thought now would be a great time to talk about different techniques I am going to be using to better my time management skills and with that hopefully help you too!

The first thing that I have found that really helps me is using a planner! I put everything in my planner, from babysitting jobs to my school schedule and assignments. I have used many different planners, but this year I am using a Mead planner from Target. When writing out everything I assign a certain color to each topic. I even use different colors for each class. So one class may be purple and another will be brown. Being able to see the different things I need to do in different colors really helps and keeps my attention.

The next thing that helps with managing time is to set a time limit for each activity. I totally understand that this might not work for everything, but with most it should. I know that managing school, work and other activities can be difficult. However, on days that I have to work, go to school, and do other activities I can set this time out. An example of what I might do for Mondays is; Work 7:30-12:30, School 2-4:30, Chiropractor 5:30-6. With those three main things it does not leave a whole lot of time to do much else. So I could set an hour and a half for studying for each class. I also have gotten in the habit of working out every day so on my busy days I can find a few five minute workouts and do those! I have yet to try this technique, but I definitely plan to do so tomorrow!

The last thing I am going to talk about is planning out your weeks and making sure you have everything ready ahead of time. This will cut down on time during the individual days. I have done this and it definitely works! With that being said I do not do it every week, which I plan on changing.  For me this might be planning out my blog posts and having them typed and saved on my computer. By doing that I do not have to stress about my lack of time to type up a post and sometimes even come up with a topic! If I have everything typed and planned I can just copy it to the blog page and publish it in a few minutes, which will end up saving me 5 hours a week at least!

I am in no way a professional at time management, but by doing these different techniques weekly and even daily I hope to make things so much easier on myself! Using my planner has been the best technique for me, but may not be the best for you. Let me know what you do to better manage your time in the comments below!

-A

24 Facts about Me

Hey everyone! For today’s post I thought I would take a couple minutes to share with you 24 facts about me.

1. I am a college student, and am majoring in Speech and Hearing Sciences.
2. I work as a nanny to 3 girls
3. I am the oldest of three. I have two younger brothers!
4. I love to watch television shows and movies. I have so many shows that I love to watch weekly and often binge Netflix shows.
5. I have a ton of mugs and water bottles that I hardly ever use. However, I continue to buy more!
6. I love ABBA! I have a station on my Pandora account dedicated to ABBA and know basically every song.
7. I teach primary at my church and have done so on and off for 7 years. I started at 18 and stopped at 22 then picked up again this year!
8. I really enjoy doing crafts! Pinterest is my kryptonite.
9. I love superhero movies and shows. Captain America is my favorite!
10. I love sports! My favorites are; baseball, football, rugby, and NASCAR.
11. Whenever I go to Target or the bookstore I always buy stationary and notebooks.
12. I go to the chiropractor weekly to bi-weekly and have seen an incredible difference.
13. I drink coca cola or cherry Pepsi once a day
14. My prized possession is a stuffed seal I got from my parents as a baby.
15. I love Toms! I have at least 10 pairs.
16. I have 2 dogs that I love. One is a pocket Pitbull named Chloe and the other is a Great Pyrenees mix named Harvey.
17. My favorite holiday is the Fourth of July. I have no idea why it is my favorite though.
18. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
19. I got engaged at 21 years old. Things did not last with him though.
20. I love rodeos. I have gone to at least 1 every year for the past 3 with my best friend.
21. I am not a huge fan of sweets. However, when I do eat any it is sweet tarts (not the yellow ones) or chocolate cherries.
22. I love reading! I will not read Jane Austen though. When I read Pride and Prejudice for high school I screamed “I want my life back.”
23. I love shopping! My favorite places are target, kohl’s, amazon, and etsy.
24. My favorite music genre is country music! Josh Turner and Dierks Bentley are my absolute favorites.

I hope you all enjoyed this post! I would love to know more about you guys! Leave a fact about yourself in the comments below!

-A

The Brooke Burke Body App

Hi everyone! Today I am going to talk to you about one of my new favorite apps. I just downloaded it a week ago and love it! This app is the Brooke Burke Body app. If you could not tell by the title of the app, this is a fitness app.

On the app you will find many different workouts, for every part of your body! The categories you will find warm ups, booty burns, total body, abs, legs, and upper body. If you need a more set schedule for workouts there is a challenge going on right now. You can also look under Brooke’s Workout Week, and follow those videos.

I have been taking part in the New Year, New You Challenge and it is such an amazing workout plan. I am feeling sore which I love! It just shows how hard I am working out. After each workout I feel great! What I really love about this app, besides the amazing workouts, is that each video takes very little time to complete. If you are in a hurry one day and just need a quick workout you can go and find a 5 minute workout! This is great for me, because sometimes after a day at work and/or school I come home and do not feel like exercising, but I can turn on a quick workout and do what I am supposed to. They do have longer workouts if you would like that too!

The Brooke Burke Body app is available in the App Store on iPhones and in the Play Store for Androids. The subscription is $7.99 per month, which equals 25 cents a day! It does not get much better than that! You will not regret downloading this app.

-A