Ask HN: How do I get myself on track with studying?
Perhaps this isn&#x27;t the best place to ask this question, but I&#x27;m not sure where else to turn.<p>I&#x27;m a first year undergrand Electrical Engineering and Computing student in a top-20 university in the UK. My first term has passed and mock exams show that I am barely passing what I have been taught so far, if even that.<p>I think the reason is that I simply do not put hours in. But I find it hard to make the mental connect between &quot;hours&quot; and &quot;success&quot;. I find it hard to motivate myself. Usually I just want to work on hobby projects (related more to programming than my course) or gaming.<p>Perhaps one of the reasons is beacuse I initially applied to do Compsci, but I didn&#x27;t make the cut, so I was offered E&amp;CE instead, which I accepted.<p>My main issue is that there isn&#x27;t much indication as to what I ought to be doing. At school I was given homework and textbooks, past papers etc. and I could work my way through them. Now I don&#x27;t really know what I&#x27;m supposed to be doing, and beacuse it&#x27;s not prescribed (and not checked) I&#x27;m left in the dark. The university is very sparse of past papers, too.<p>So I would like to ask,<p>1. What methods do you use to motivate yourself to study?<p>2. What methods to organise study and discover what needs to be studied?<p>3. What does studying for this topic, which is part knowledge (memorisation of certain facts, like the factors of an ideal op-amp, what a prime implicant is, how p-type and n-type works, semiconductor physics, finite state machines etc.) and part applied mathematics (integration, solving circuits, bode plots and all the usual Calc stuff etc.)?<p>And if anyone has experience with Electronic Engineering at university undergrad level, what would you recommend for this field of study? For example I don&#x27;t understand (complex impedance) phasors. The textbook I use doesn&#x27;t have a way which I can understand, and I find it hard to find time to discuss with my lecturers about this, because the pedagogy seems so impersonal.<p>Thank you for taking the time to read my question.