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University Freshers - 5 Top Tips

2018-08-15 · Long video (solo, talking head or whiteboard) · Ali, Matticus · recording, 22:38 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Learning and studying (also: Productivity and time) · mode: List of tips or lessons · tags: Aimed at students, Sponsor segment present, His medical past

Ali and physiotherapy student Matticus give freshers tips on settling in, Freshers' Week, clubs and societies, free time and studying: leave your door open, don't worry about Freshers' Week, join every mailing list, make the time, and study a little every day with active recall instead of cramming.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Ali and Matticus introduce themselves and their two-part freshers' tips collaboration

  • ★★ Ali and Matticus, a physiotherapy student who runs the channel Matticus Vlogs, give tips for freshers starting university in two videos: five points on Ali's channel and five on Matticus's. — 00:00:02

00:00:55 — Primark homeware sponsor read

  • ★★ Ali's freshers' tips video with Matticus is sponsored by Primark, whose new homeware range he recommends for decking out a university room at reasonable prices. — 00:00:55
  • ★★ Matticus's most important tip for settling in is to move into university accommodation as soon as you are allowed, so you can start socialising with people sooner. — 00:01:05

00:01:14 — Settling into university: moving in early, an open door, snacks, unpacking, posters

  • ★★ From a tip on The Student Room, Ali advises bringing a door stopper and leaving your door open in halls: people walking past feel compelled to come in and say hi, since everyone wants to make friends. — 00:01:45
  • ★★ Ali took cans of Diet Coke and Capri Sun to university and offered them to anyone who came into his room, which he found a really nice way of meeting people. — 00:02:15
  • ★★ Ali says he has kept a very liberal open-door policy throughout his six years at university, leaving his door open even sometimes when he is not in his room. — 00:02:44
  • ★★ Matticus: Because homesickness is a big thing, Matticus advises unpacking as soon as you can and making your university accommodation as homely as possible. — 00:02:44
  • ★ Where halls forbid hanging things on the bare walls, Ali advises putting posters up with Command strips, which leave no mark when taken off. — 00:03:13
  • ★★ Ali, who does not drink, was very worried before starting university because he had heard that Freshers' Week is all about drinking, clubbing and partying. — 00:03:53
  • ★★★ Not drinking in Freshers' Week is completely okay, Ali says: most colleges, clubs and societies run alternative freshers events with something else going on. — 00:03:53

00:03:59 — Freshers' Week: not drinking, alternative events, clubbing, early friendships

  • ★★ Ali has realised that no one really cares what you do in Freshers' Week: despite the pressure he felt to fit in and make friends, it is pretty much just another week that everyone forgets. — 00:04:58
  • ★★ Matticus, who does not drink, went clubbing as the only sober person and had a good time; he says that if you have never been clubbing it is definitely worth a go. — 00:05:31
  • ★★ Ali agrees that clubbing is worth a try, provided it does not clash with your own personal morals or beliefs. — 00:05:31
  • ★★ Matticus found clubbing was not for him and got into sport; he says you draw more like-minded people by sticking to what you want to do and not giving in to peer pressure to go clubbing. — 00:05:56
  • ★★★ Ali says you can make of Freshers' Week and university whatever you want: since no one really cares what you do, you can be an independent free spirit, and everyone learns they can just be themselves. — 00:06:36
  • ★★ Ali worried that his Freshers' Week friends would be all the friends he ever made, but looking back there was almost no overlap between them and his long-term friends. — 00:07:02
  • ★ Matticus no longer spoke to the people he hung out with in his undergraduate Freshers' Week by the end of that year, nor in the years after. — 00:07:31
  • ★★ Ali concludes that everyone has some anxiety about Freshers' Week, but it does not really matter in the grand scheme of things: don't worry about it and enjoy it. — 00:07:54
  • ★★ Matticus did his undergraduate degree at the Royal Veterinary College in London, telling people he was at King's because few know it; tied to University College London, he joined UCL's many clubs and societies. — 00:07:54 · University College London
  • ★★★ Matticus advises freshers to sign up to the mailing lists of loads of clubs and societies: you might get spammed a bit, but it is good to have the options. — 00:07:54

00:08:07 — Clubs and societies: join the mailing lists and try things out

  • ★★ Matticus: At UCL Matticus took up Muay Thai kickboxing again, competed at amateur level and in inter-club events, got really fit and strong and met many like-minded people. — 00:08:40 · University College London
  • ★★ At university Ali joined the Pakistan Society and the Islamic Society, tried rowing, started squash, joined the chess club and signed up to the mailing lists of about 100 societies. — 00:09:18
  • ★★★ Ali wishes he had tried more things at university: he boxed himself in early with the societies he joined, and advises a scattergun approach, joining the mailing list of everything and trying things out to see what sticks. — 00:09:53
  • ★ Matticus: In his undergraduate years Matticus joined many clubs, including the taekwondo, live music and capoeira societies, and tried wushu at Imperial College at a friend's invitation. — 00:10:23 · Imperial College London
  • ★★ Matticus: Now on an MSc in Physiotherapy at the University of Southampton and knowing what he likes, Matticus has joined only the gymnastics society; it is fine to box yourself in if you know what you want, but a fresher who doesn't should join loads. — 00:10:52

00:11:25 — Free time: making the time, work as the default, time is like a muscle

  • ★★ Matticus: After watching one of Ali's videos, Matticus agrees that there is no such thing as not having enough time: it is all about making the time. — 00:11:26
  • ★★ Matticus says free time depends on what you prioritise: after a day at university he usually spends an hour or two at the gym or doing flips on the common, time that could go on socialising. — 00:11:57
  • ★★★ Ali's approach to free time at university: work is his default activity when he has nothing else to do, but anything else that comes up, such as a social event, takes priority over it. — 00:12:24
  • ★★ Matticus, who calls himself very good at wasting time, now plans out his day, sometimes a week in advance, and writes a to-do list with tick boxes every day. — 00:13:22
  • ★★ At medical school Ali's second year was the busiest; third year was insanely chill, with about a lecture a week, and in the hospital years the afternoons were mostly free, which gave him the time to start his YouTube channel. — 00:14:06
  • ★★ Ali's rule for free time is always to have something to do, rather than ever sitting down to work out what to do with it. — 00:14:32
  • ★★ Matticus: Contact hours depend on the course, Matticus says: his biological sciences degree had about 22 hours a week, his physiotherapy course once had 35 hours of lectures a week, and history or English students have about eight. — 00:14:32
  • ★★ Matticus says you get better at managing your time when you realise you have less of it, because you see how precious it is. — 00:14:32

  • ★★★ Ali took as profound the advice of a medic in the year above, who did loads of sports, an Arabic course, singing and guitar with good marks: time is like a muscle, and the more you exercise it, the more you get out of it. — 00:15:12

    “time is like a muscle and that the more you exercise it, the more you can get out of it”

  • ★★ Ali's summary for free time at university: make the time to do things, keep a priority list and find some kind of balance. — 00:15:41

00:15:55 — Studying: balance, consistency over cramming, flashcard apps, efficient techniques, hands-on learning

  • ★★ Matticus did not work very hard in his undergraduate degree, averaging a mid 2:2, then pulled his socks up in third year and still got a 2:1. — 00:16:07
  • ★★ Matticus advises studying hard if your first and second years count towards your degree, because it makes the third year much easier. — 00:16:07
  • ★★★ University is about balance, Ali says, whatever Asian parents say about studying all the time: people who did badly almost invariably wish they had studied harder, while friends who came top five in their year think they may have studied too much. — 00:17:05
  • ★★ Ali thinks either extreme of studying may not be optimal, though it depends on what you want; what has worked for him is making studying the lowest priority while still doing a bit of work throughout the year. (hedged) — 00:17:35
  • ★★★ The one study advice Ali thinks applies to everyone: you benefit a lot from doing a little work consistently, because of active recall and spaced repetition. — 00:17:35 · active recall, spaced repetition
  • ★★★ Studying for 20 minutes every day is far better than cramming for the exam, Ali says: with 20 minutes to an hour a day and efficient techniques such as active recall and categorisation, you will sail through university. — 00:18:10 · active recall
  • ★★ Leaving it all to the last minute and cramming a whole medical degree into the month before the exams, Ali says, is a struggle and a really stressful experience. — 00:18:39
  • ★★ Matticus says cramming may work for GCSEs and perhaps A levels, but not beyond that at university, where spaced repetition is the way. — 00:18:39 · spaced repetition
  • ★★ Matticus tried Anki but stuck with an online flashcard app called "Debt Revise" (as heard), which you log into with Facebook and where you create your own question-and-answer flashcards. — 00:18:39 · Anki
  • ★★ Flashcard apps such as Anki, Memrise and Quizlet bring harder cards up more often, Ali says, a good way to get work done each day without thinking too hard about it. — 00:19:20 · Anki, Quizlet
  • ★★★ Ali says how hard medical school will be is hugely over-glamorised: students feel good buying massive textbooks and poring over them, but medicine is quite straightforward, with few concepts that are difficult to grasp. — 00:19:55
  • ★★★ With a large amount of content to learn, Ali calls the traditional idea of hard work, making notes from an open textbook and highlighting, a total waste of time; the efficient techniques involve making questions for yourself. — 00:20:25 · active recall
  • ★★ Ali advises anyone who spends hours poring over a double-page textbook spread because they feel they should to reconsider: more efficient study techniques leave much more time to enjoy the rest of university. — 00:20:54
  • ★★ Matticus learns well from practical sessions on his physiotherapy course, such as manual techniques, mobilisations and range-of-motion tests on coursemates: doing it hands-on really drills it in. — 00:21:23
  • ★★ Hands-on learning is doubly true in medicine, Ali says: about half of the exams in clinical school are practical exams. — 00:21:23

00:21:52 — Recap, part two on Matticus's channel and sign-off

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: Matticus

Also: Organizations: Cambridge University Pakistan Society · Emmanuel College · Imperial College London · King's College London · Primark · Royal Veterinary College · The Student Room · University College London · University of Southampton

Concepts: active recall · spaced repetition

Products: Anki · Memrise · Quizlet

Also centred on Matticus: James Arthur - "Say You Won't Let Go" · Acoustic cover ft. Matticus Vlogs

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