College life

[Mith]

Another thing to note is that the good lecturers aren't always the good teachers.

In my first year (we go straight into our major in effect) I had a module on Digital Logic and Microprocessors, taught by two members of staff. One was a really good lecturer, taught the class from his own book (which I'd recommend to anybody interested in the basics of Digital Logic*), and made me suspect he'd done amateur dramatics at some point because of how much he'd ham it up. It really made you remember the information when he'd act so excited at logic gates outputting a one.

The other was a rubbish lecturer, but if you went to his office during his drop in hours was really good at teaching you what you'd missed. Rubbish at giving the information to a load of students, great at teaching one on one or to a small group.

* Not giving the title because I'm kind of wary about giving out details of the University I attended until earlier this year.

^ This is my experience with all but one maybe two professors. If you didn't learn well from them in lectures, they were usually better in office hours as they could adjust the explanation to fit your question. The one exception was a professor who couldn't give a straight answer. For example he allowed an open book exam with the textbook but wasn't sure if he was going to allow students to bring notes until the morning of the exam we got an email.

Other notes about course work. If you go into a math based course like Calculus, there are sources that can solve equations for you. Only use those to check your final answer, never copy it. It will only screw you up on the exams which are the only things that matter, and it won't prepare you for the courses where you cannot just let the computer do it.