Learning is the process of memorization, integration and application of new information and concepts. Attention is the process of prioritizing and applying information and concepts. The end dynamic of these two processes involves distribution of energy, priorities, and decision making once information is absorbed. All of us, at one point, or many, in our lives, have been told to “pay attention.” Distractions easily divert our focus, taking our concentration to conversations across the room, or to a passing train out the window, or to a spot on a speaker’s collar. Attention effects the way we learn and effects of college life. It can have negative effects and positive effects on the way we can be successful throughout college.
Most professors confront the reality that student attention wanders in class. They can be seen nodding off, sleeping, gazing distractedly at some point other than the front of the room, texting, or working on something for another class. It’s a problem, and one that teachers often find hard not to take personally. Dealing with the emotional reaction engendered by inattention is easier when it’s more fully understood, and here’s an example that illustrates why. At the opposite extreme, there’s the college student who listens to music with the television running in the background, friends talking loudly, e-mail scrolling on a laptop. Yet the student is able to hyper-focus, or “channel” her attention on a history textbook to study for a test. These
Choosing a good environment is a good step towards monitoring possible distractions. Distractions come in all shapes, sizes and sounds. External distractions include things like noise, people talking, TV, music, phone alerts, and anything else that diverts your attention from the task at hand. When it comes to studying, multitasking is ineffective. While it may seem like multitasking would be a good thing, research has shown that people who are multitasking are not doing two things at the same time. “People are instead switching back and forth quickly between tasks. The result of this movement is that performance suffers on both tasks, and people who are multitasking are less likely to remember information later”, (Dzubak, 2008). There may be other areas of our lives where multi-tasking is useful but studying and problem solving require deep concentration and interruptions make it harder to focus and decrease your chances of recalling information later. Brad Zomick has steps for time management and finding the right way to study by, “Evaluate your study locations, identify your distractions, make a list, set up your study time so you minimize internal distractions, schedule breaks, putting away obvious distractions, and use rewards to motivate yourself throughout your study period”
Students can be distracted from working in class or passing a test because their mind will always be on left field.
Focus is needed to learn most efficiently and effectively. If students are unable to focus in class, they won’t be able to listen to the teacher or complete their work. Many students struggle to focus and stay awake in class due to such a busy day. If a student participates in an after school
Learning and understanding lessons/lectures covers an appreciable amount of time and work is given out to make sure you understand it. In “Losing Focus? Studies Say Meditation Can Help,” John Cloud provides a physical technique for students to focus on their priorities. In the study, it is proven that “meditation may help keep your brain focused and help you absorb more information than you otherwise would” (3). Meditation reduces stress, improves concentration, which allows students to reduce daily procrastination. Adolescents are able to keep their workload and their priorities straight by organizing the activities based on its importance, avoiding procrastination. In “Outliers,” Malcolm Gladwell explains that “success is a function of persistence and doggedness and the willingness to work hard for twenty-two minutes to make sense of something that most people would give up after thirty seconds” (Gladwell 246). In order to be successful, adolescents prioritize and put time in their agenda to study/practice lessons they don’t understand. Another example from the “Outliers,” Malcolm Gladwell quotes from the beatles “We had to play for eight hours, so we really had to find a new way of playing” (Gladwell 49). Most adolescents are only limited to a few hours of work time when they are caught up with personal matters and after school activities. They tend to find it hard for them to
While there are too many distractions on a college campus, it is also what makes it college. Parties, friends,
Sometimes when I’m in a class and the professor is giving a lecture, I think about what my other professor said from the other class, and what I need to do to get the assignment done on time. Other times I think about problems I encountered in college. These are all accumulative distractions that can move me away from my goal. Assignment #1 includes that there are a lot of distractions in college. I’m currently searching for a way to optimize my assignments, so I can minimize distractions.
Fighting for attention erodes the teacher’s confidence and threatens their authority. Even with policies in place, and overt attempts to enforce it, without constant surveillance it is difficult to ensure that students aren’t negatively using their devices. Constant monitoring distracts the teacher just as effectively as the technology distracts the students. Eventually feeling defeated, a professor may ultimately revoke the privilege of using tech devices in class and if caught confiscating the device. Having a confrontational or restrictive policy might create a "professor versus technology" perception. This hurting student-teacher relations and potentially causing harm to faculty reputation. “Fighting boredom”, is what 55% of students said in McCoys UNL student survey is the reason for turning to devices during class time. Professors can create new ways to engage college students in classroom activities that might reduce boredom and minimize disruptions for all parties involved. If implemented correctly this incivility can be
In college, many stimuli and variables start to erupt into view as students learn to live independently, and respond to these events with their intuition. These variables represent biopsychosocial influences. A few biological influences, lack of exercise and sleep. Some psychological influences stand as stress or burning out mentally and emotionally from homework. In addition, trying to appease multiple peer groups, and family’s expectations represent socio-cultural influences that will affect me.
When considering the developmental stage of life that these students are in, we can understand there are many events that may cause them to lose focus of the tasks that are most important for furthering their education. Though this age group can vastly vary, a large number of students just beginning college are going to fit into the emerging adulthood category, ranging between eighteen and twenty-five years-of-age (Nevid, 2015, p. 359). Therefore, these freshmen will likely be approaching their peak of physical and cognitive maturity, as this typically occurs in the early twenties (Nevid, 2015, p. 357).
This absence of focus caused me to prioritize my classwork at the bottom of my list. My priorities were in chaos. I would place going out and having fun over staying in and studying, every time. This ultimately led to me falling behind in classes and in the end, failing. My summer course showed me that I needed to be focused in order for me to learn and keep up with the online learning environment. The course was already complicated, add in a virtual learning arena, and now everything has become twice as difficult. I quickly learned that I needed to be focused when reading lectures and notes in order to pass this course and earn the credits that I
When a human brain receives stimuli it enters the Sensory Register which is unlimited in terms of capacity but retains things only briefly. Only the stimuli that are attended to will make it into working memory. Our attention acts as a filter of the vast amount of input we receive as the brain is only able to process a limited number of stimuli, and only what we focus on, either consciously or unconsciously. Therefore, the ability to grab, engage and direct attention is important for educators as students will only learn what they
As has been mentioned, life of an employed student can be easily turned into a nightmare due to high-level stress. They are dealing with double pressure from work and schooling in one time. Neither school 's responsibilities nor duties at work could be ignored. Therefore, working students may struggle to maintain their attention in class or at the workplace because of overexertion. Also, employed students may have problems catching up with assignments and exams. The shortage of time may cause low school performance or low productivity at work. For example, working in the school library during
College life for the twenty-first century student is not what it used to be. According to an American College Health Association-National College Health Assessment survey, eighty-five percent of college students feel so tremendously overwhelmed they walk through the day blind and just hoping things work out (Fisher). Students lack the ability to focus and manage everything that is piled on them during class.
Higher education is extremely important because it improves an individual’s quality of life. It also enables you to get higher income, acquire jobs, get promotion at the workplace and enhance social status. With education nowadays becomes more expensive, it has been difficult for people to afford their education. That is why most students decide to work and study at the same time. However, sometimes doing both can bring some consequences that can affect your life either positively or negatively. For instance: Less time for family and friends; not enough time to get assignments done. This can cause the student to suffer from physical and mental exhaustion.
Transition into the college life may have an impact on how first year students prioritize and manage their time. First year students have to learn how