How to Study

Handson: Getting Your Hands Dirty
Classes such as science labs and various vocational education courses
(industrial arts, graphics, and so forth) occur at all levels from high
school up. They are concerned almost exclusively with doing some-
thing— completing a particular experiment, working on a project,
whatever. The teacher may demonstrate certain things before letting
the students work on their own, but the primary emphasis is on the
student carrying out his or her own projects while in class.
On the college level, science labs are usually overseen by graduate
assistants. Trade schools may use a combination of short lectures,
demonstrations, and handson workshops; you can’t become a good
auto mechanic just by reading a book on cleaning a distributor.
Primary emphasis: development and application of particular manual
and technical skills.
Exceptions to the Rule
Rarely can a single class be neatly pigeonholed into one of these
formats, though virtually all will be primarily one or another. It would
seem that size is a key factor in choosing a format, but you can’t
always assume, for example, that a large lecture course, filled with
200 or more students, will feature a professor standing behind a
rostrum reading from his prepared text. Or that a small class of 
a dozen people will tend to be all discussion.
Chapter 5
■
How to Excel in Class
103

---

During my college years, I had a religion teacher who, though his class
was one of the more popular on campus and regularly drew 300 or
more students to each session, rarely lectured at all. I never knew
what to expect when entering his classroom. One week it would 
be a series of musical improvisations from a local jazz band, with a
variety of graduate assistants talking about out-of-body experiences.
Another session would consist entirely of the professor arguing 
with a single student over one key topic...which had nothing to 
do with that week’s (or any other week’s) assignment.
In another class of merely 20 students, the professor teaching us
physical chemistry would march in at the sound of the bell and, with-
out acknowledging anyone’s presence or saying a word, walk to the
blackboard and start writing equations. He would wordlessly work
his way across the massive board, until, some 20 or 30 minutes later,
he ran off the right side. Slowly, he would walk back to the left
side...and start writing all over again. He never asked questions.
Never asked for questions. In fact, I’m not sure I remember him
uttering anything for three solid months!