• Question: how long was each day of study on average

    Asked by Tom chambers to Triona, Simone, Kieran, Julia, Hugh, Emily on 13 Nov 2018.
    • Photo: Hugh Manning

      Hugh Manning answered on 13 Nov 2018:

      The amount of time I spent on study changed from when I was in secondary school, in 6th year I would usually spend 3-4 hours or so a night on homework and study.
      In Trinity college we only had exams around April. But throughout the year we would have lab reports, or tutorials or projects to work on. Sometimes if we had a lecture I didn’t fully understand I would do some study so I didn’t fall behind for the next lecture.
      Lab reports for the experiments we did usually took 4 or 5 hours a week to write up. Tutorials took another 3 or 4 hours, and then general study or revision probably another 2 or 3 hours. As exam time approached I would spend more time in the library. Lectures would usually finish 2 or 3 weeks before exams and for those week’s I would spend allot of time studying (6 or 7 hours a day).
      Do you think thats too much time? How long do you spend on homework and study?

    • Photo: Emily

      Emily answered on 15 Nov 2018:

      Hi Tom,

      Studying now is much more of a dynamic process than it was in college or high school- before we would have homework and tests and would study for those and then start over for the next homework or next test. Now it’s very different, because there are no tests or assigned homework.

      For every experiment, I do research on the topic so I know what I’m doing and then study it to make sure I do it correctly! That involves looking up articles and finding papers where other scientists did a similar test, and then finding which test fits the best for what I’m trying to do. From there, once I figured out what I should do, I then run the experiment and double check that I’m doing it right. Then I analyze my data, which involves a bit more research to check if my controls are similar to other scientist’s work. From there, my ‘homework’ involves writing up a nice report or powerpoint presentation to show my boss and hopefully publish in a journal, so other researchers can study my work and compare their own as well.

      Essentially, it’s all studying, but it’s much more fun because you’re studying things that you’re working on in real life!

      Hope this answers your question, thanks for asking!

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