The Sneaky Student

Obsession is a dirty word, to put it bluntly: like addiction, to obsess is often to be irrational or unproductive.  Yet, if you go too far in the opposite direction, you’ll literally get nowhere.  What is needed is something called a productive obsession. A productive obsession is about finding the balance between what you are driven to and enjoy doing (and therefore, will happily obsess over), and something that adds value (be it in a business situation or in your leisure time). Indeed, Psychology Today reports that cultivating a productive obsession can be one of the best things you can do.

Having read their article, I was able to distill three main reasons to utilise your healthy obsessions:

They … Continue Reading

I know a lot of people who get to University and still don’t have a clue about the language they are studying, especially in joint honours courses. I’m no exception: spoken french has always been my sticking point, and my language marks are what I need to improve the most of the next few years.

That being said, anyone interested in learning a language, or required to, can benefit from the resources I’ve found and compiled for you below. They range from vocabulary tools for learning by rote, to useful flashcard websites that are compatible with mobile devices, to language hacks that allow you to understand around 80% of a language in very little time at all, just by learning … Continue Reading

Modern students have an “always on” mindset, that is, we like to be plugged in to email and social networking round the clock. Indeed, a majority of students now wield some sort of smartphone or ultraportable device, be it a blackberry or an iphone.

With that in mind, here’s is our list of the top 5 mobile-accessible apps for students. Our list bridges music apps to organisational ones, the essential student staples.

1. Grooveshark

We were considering a number of apps for our music app spot, but in the end Grooveshark won us over, because of the price and native blackberry support (be it slightly buggy). This is really the only viable Blackberry music app as of July 2011.  Its … Continue Reading

I don’t know if it’s only girls that have this problem but once I return home from uni with about four hundred bags to unpack I realise that there is no where ( well apart from wearing all my clothes at once) to put the mountains of ‘stuff’ I’ve accumulated and lovingly brought home. This year I’d had enough and operation deadwood began in earnest, instead of modest aspirations of tidying and charity shopping all the rubbish in my room I decided to embark on a whole house cleanse. If it’d been a cupboard for the last 10 years did we really need it?
What I hadn’t taken into consideration was just how much of a hoarder family we really … Continue Reading

Anyone taking a modern language, or two, at University needs a good way to learn and memorize as much useful vocabulary in their chosen language as possible. It’s not easy finding a way to do this that’s not dull or even entirely fruitless. Well, I found a great website that allows you to learn 1500 useful words in over 25+ languages, for free.

I like QASANA for 3 separate reasons:

1. The style of learning. I find that whatever memory experts may tell you, some rote-learning of vocabulary is sometimes required, and has done me pretty well over the years. QASANA puts vocab in chunks of 20 words, all categorically similar, and then tests you on all of them, from your

… Continue Reading