Planner ~ Study Skills: Priorities, Stage 1

Column A Tick if the statement is generally true of you. 

Column B Rate how important it is to acquire this skill: 6 = unimportant; 10 = essential. 

Column C Rate how good you are at this skill now: 1 = very weak; 5 = excellent. 

Column D Subtract the score in column C from column B (B–C). Items with the highest scores in column D are likely to be priorities. Then turn to page 36.

Later  in the  term, do this  exercise again. Compare your  ratings, then and now.

Study-skills statements	A This is true (✓)	B Skill needed? (scale 6–10)	C Current ability? (scale 1–5)	D Priority (B–C)
I am aware  of how I learn best,  and  how to reflect upon and  evaluate  my own work
I am well motivated and  know how to set myself manageable goals
I have good time and  space  management skills, and  am able to organise my workload
I have strategies for getting going  with a new task or assignment
I am confident of my research skills
I am aware  of which  strategies suit me best for reading under different  conditions
I am able to make,  organise, store,  find and use my notes  effectively (checklist,  page 127)
I am able to use lecture  time effectively and get the best  out of lectures
I know how to prepare for and  deliver oral presentations, playing  to my strengths (page 113)
I know how to make the most  of groupwork and  seminars  (sub-skills list, page 108)
I am able to manage a range of writing tasks appropriately (sub-skills list, page 144)
I know how to use IT to help in academic study
I am able to think critically and  analytically, and evaluate  my own and  other  people’s arguments
I have good memory strategies
I have good revision strategies and  exam techniques (sub-skills list, pages  260 and 266)

Self-Evaluation ~ Turning Personal Skills into Academic Skills

The Current skills and qualities exercise includes specific skills which have more relevance to some courses than in others. For example, ‘selling’ is more relevant to marketing than to history.

The following exercise is an opportunity to map out your current skills in terms of the general (or 'generic') skills required for most academic courses, and to rate how well you already perform them. This will give you a better idea of how well you may cope with academic study.

Academic skills (skills used  in everyday life which  relate  to academic skills)	Self-rating 5 = good; 1 = very weak	Examples: Where or when you developed this  skill
e.g. Managing deadlines	4	Get children to school on time Got UCAS form in despite illness
1   Managing deadlines
2   Being self-motivated and  able to persevere with difficult tasks
3   Having the confidence to ‘have a go’ and  to express  my own ideas
4   Finding out information from different sources (research)
5   Reading  complicated texts or forms to find the gist of what  they are saying
6   Being able to select what  is relevant  from what  is irrelevant
7   Comparing different  opinions and  deciding what  are the best grounds for deciding who is right
8   Being able to weigh  up the ‘pros’ and  ‘cons’, the good points versus the bad
9   Writing things  in my own words
10   Being able to argue  my point of view, giving good reasons

Self Evaluation ~ Current Skills and Qualities

People:

• Ability to get on with people from different background.
• Ability to see and understand other people's points of view.
• Dealing with the general public.
• Teamwork.
• Managing other people.
• Teaching or training others.
• Negotiation.
• Helping others to arrive at decisions. 
• Being sensitive to other's feelings.
• Caring for others.
• Ability to read other people's body languages.
• Dealing with others by phone.
• Ability to cope with 'difficult' people.
• Speaking clearly and to the point. 
• Being able to take direction from others.
• Courage to speak out against injustice. 

Activities:

• Creativity, design and layout
• Ability to see the ‘whole picture
• Classifying and organizing information
• Being good at argument and debate
• Making decisions
• Managing change and transition
• Setting priorities
• Working out agendas
• Organizing work to meet deadlines
• Stay calm in a crisis
• Facilitating meetings
• Reading complex texts
• Word-processing
• Computer literacy
• Working with numbers
• Selling
• Problem-solving
• Practical things
• Seeing how things work
• Writing reports or official letters

Personal Qualities:

• Ability to recognize my own needs and ask for help 
• Ability to learn from mistakes 
• Stress management 
• Willingness to take risks and experiments 
• Assertiveness 
• Determination and perseverance 
• Ability to set my own goals 
• Maintaining a high level of motivation 
• Ability to take responsibility for my own actions 
• Trust in my own abilities

Personal SWOT Analysis

One of the main ways an individual can succeed in life is to identify the talents to the fullest extent that can be revealed. Most of the society points out that identifying your own personal weaknesses would undermine the self confidence of an individual and this would lead to problems. But the true aspect is that if an individual is able to identify his/ her weaknesses, the he/ she would be able to manage these weaknesses and not let it develop more so it would be a hindrance to the development and to the work of that individual. This would cause less problems than expected. The SWOT Analysis is a useful technique that will aid in identifying the strength, weaknesses, opportunities and threats .

Source: Learning3.0(2012)

The most valuable aspect of the SWOT Analysis is that with little effort an individual is able to reveal the opportunities that was not identifies before and was unknown to the individual. By understanding and identifying weaknesses, managing and eliminating threats would be easier and this would aid in the development of the individuals path to success.  

Sample SWOT Analysis Templates:

Source: CBS Interactive(2012)

Source: Knowledgevatra(2012)

Source: CC blog(2012)