10 Great Features of Our Study Hub

We are constantly adding to and updating the resources we provide for our students. One of our latest additions is our Study Hub, which was designed with all our past, present, and future students in mind to amplify their studies and help them approach exam day with confidence. With our Study Hub, students can study anytime and anywhere if they have an internet connection. We know that our students are often juggling other responsibilities in addition to their review course, which is why we ensured that our Study Hub be accessible on mobile phones and tablets as well as computers. While developing this tool, we considered every aspect of learning from our students' viewpoints, resulting in a streamlined study resource our students love for its many features, like:

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1. The ability to watch, pause, and resume lecture videos where you left off

2. The ability to make timestamped annotations on lecture videos

3. The ability to bookmark recordings for further review

4. The option to download, review, and annotate instructor-provided lecture notes

5. The option to easily access eBooks

6. The ability to test your knowledge using different test formats found in the included Question Bank

7. The ability to study flash cards

8. The option to ask instructors questions while watching lecture videos

9. The ability to access discussion forums and communicate with other students

10. The ability to study using any device with an internet connection

1. The ability to watch, pause, and resume lecture videos where you left off

If you begin reviewing your flash cards on your phone during the bus trip home after work and then switch to studying from your laptop at home, your Study Hub will remember where you stopped and make it easy to pick up right from there.

2. The ability to make timestamped annotations on lecture videos

If your instructor mentions a concept you're not familiar with in a lecture, you can make a note that directly correlates with the time the concept was introduced, making it easier to go back and know which annotation refers to which minute in the lecture.

3. The ability to bookmark recordings for further review

If there is a subject you are having difficulty with, you can bookmark that subject within the lecture recording and move on to another subject. You'll know exactly where and when to come back for another try.

4. The option to download, review, and annotate instructor-provided lecture notes

Along with their video lectures, refresher sessions, and workshop problems, our instructors are responsible for generating their own "crash course" lecture-notes based on each subject they teach, a resource more than 95% of students considered to be necessary during exam prep.

5. The option to easily access eBooks*

School of PE has several different books available for our students in both physical and virtual form. Students who select eBook editions of their books can read and review them on their phones or computers with a few clicks as opposed to needing to carry around a book.

6. The ability to test your knowledge using different test formats found in the included Question Bank*

We wanted to provide several test formats for our students to experiment with, so we created three separate assessments for our students to use to measure their progress and content confidence. Our exam simulator replicates an NCEES exam with the exact number of questions and time allotted, giving students familiarity on what the final exam will look like. Our quiz generator allows students to select the subjects, number of questions, and difficulty to create a dynamic practice quiz. Finally, our diagnostic exams focuses on different topics to help students identify specific areas where they may need more practice. A score history is automatically generated each time one of these test types is completed, helping students track their progress.

7. The ability to study flash cards*

Retrieval, or the practice of recalling information from memory, has been documented to be one of the most effective learning strategies. Our flash cards provide the opportunity to first learn important engineering concepts and definitions and then practice retrieving them.

8. The option to ask instructors questions while watching lecture videos

We believe that contacting and communicating with instructors is an important aspect of learning, even though most of our students are watching lecture videos through a virtual medium. We have simplified the process of contacting instructors: at any moment during the lecture video, students can message the instructor, who will not only receive the message but also information about what part of the lecture it refers to. Our instructors respond to students in several days or less.

9. The ability to access discussion forums and communicate with other students

Another element that we feel bolsters a learning experience is communicating with peers. Our virtual discussion forums provide the opportunity for students to ask their peers questions and collaborate on practice problems.

10. The ability to study using any device with an internet connection

Our Study Hub can be accessed through from any internet-connected device.

Our Study Hub is a resource all students have access to regardless of their selected course format. We developed this tool with many effective features to give our students the confidence they need to Prepare, Practice, and Pass! Want to see our Study Hub in action? Check out this video for a tutorial: https://youtu.be/sILGvJukBKw.

*Not all features apply to all courses, see Compare Plans table tab for more details.

About the Author: Martha Hunsucker

Martha Hunsucker is a content writer for EduMind. She received her BA in English from Stetson University and has experience marketing, copywriting, editing, and blogging. In her spare time, she enjoys reading books by Jon Krakauer (her current favorite author), hiking with her two dogs, and sleeping in on weekends.

Why Our Personalized Study Plan Makes A Great Study Coach

Imagine you had your own personal coach to assist you with maintaining a study schedule. You could tell your coach which subjects you feel confident in, and which subjects you feel need additional review. You could tell them your exact schedule-when you'll be at work, when you'll be walking your dog, when you'll be attending classes-and they would be able to automatically block out the times you're busy. Your coach would notify you on your study progress and if you started to fall behind. Having a study coach would be a dream come true for most students, but what if we told you this dream is a reality with School of PE? Because our Onsite and Live Online classes have distinct, set schedules, we developed our Personalized Study Plan to serve as a private, virtual study coach for our Ondemand students. Some of the amazing features we included in this tool are as follows:

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1. Rank Knowledge

2. Specify Refresher Sessions

3. Schedule Daily Study Plan

1. Rank Knowledge: The ranking element in our Personalized Study Plan allows you to rank your knowledge level for all applicable subjects. With this feature, you can indicate your content confidence level on a certain subject, so the app has a better idea of how much time to dedicate on topics you know vs. topics you are less familiar with.

2. Specify Refresher Sessions: As indicated in our last blog article on our Question Bank, it is important to keep reviewing content that you have previously studied or have confidence with. Our Personalized Study Plan takes this idea into account, as it allows you to select which topics you would like to continue to receive refreshers on and for how long. For example, you can indicate high competency in calculator use and our plan will designate more time to studying other topics.

3. Schedule Daily Study Plan: Taking into account all the times you marked you would be unavailable. Our Personalized Study Plan generates a study schedule with each calendar day indicating the subject and number of hours dedicated to that subject. The study plan is adaptive and can be modified by rearranging subjects, changing your availability, or completely creating a new plan. Each day is also color coded so you can visualize in which subjects you are progressing positively, and in which subjects you may be falling behind. You will receive emails updating you of your progress and reminding you to stay on track!

According to MIT's Study Tips blog, "creating a realistic and effective plan to prepare for a test" includes setting priorities, surveying available time, and making sure you stay on track¹. Our Personalized Study Plan checks all those boxes! Set priorities by ranking your knowledge, survey available time and mark any days you will be busy, and get daily reminder emails on which subjects need more attention. Studying is one of the best ways you can prepare for your exam, and our Personalized Study Plan makes staying on track both easy and achievable!

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¹"Draft a Study Plan." Study Tips: MIT Office of the First Year. MIT. Accessed June 15, 2021. https://firstyear.mit.edu/tutoring-support/study-tips/mastering-tests/draft-study-plan.

About the Author: Martha Hunsucker

Martha Hunsucker is a content writer for EduMind. She received her BA in English from Stetson University and has experience marketing, copywriting, editing, and blogging. In her spare time, she enjoys reading books by Jon Krakauer (her current favorite author), hiking with her two dogs, and sleeping in on weekends.

Top Three Reasons You Should Use Our Question Bank

Are you fully prepared for your upcoming exam?

You may have watched all your lecture videos, studied your flash cards, and reviewed your refresher notes, but what else can you do to gain confidence for exam day? Get practicing!

One of the best study tools we have to offer is our Question Bank, which contains a bank of practice problems and solutions that closely mimic the NCEES' computer-based test experience. You will be able to see and work through problems that are in the same format and style as your exam in addition to having access to detailed answers so you can cross check your work and pinpoint if and where you made errors. Here are the top three reasons our Question Bank is such a beneficial study tool:

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1. Memory Test Is Best

2. A Note on Rote

3. Don't Eschew Your Review

1. Memory Test Is Best: Research in long-term content retention corroborates the importance of taking memory tests that encompass not only concepts you are already familiar with, but also topics on which you have less confidence. A 2006 study by Washington University in St. Louis found that "taking a memory test not only assesses what one knows, but also enhances later retention."¹ This concept is known as the testing effect and has been used to explain how testing is a powerful means of improving learning, not just assessing it. We developed our Question Bank to take advantage of this test-enhanced learning concept because retrieval practice is one of the most potent learning strategies².

2. A Note on Rote: It is worth noting the difference between retrieval and another strategy called rote learning, which consists of simple memorization based on repetition and is "short-lived, poorly organized and does not support the ability to transfer knowledge, make inferences, or solve new problems,"³-obviously not an educational aim. We wanted to create a resource outside the realms of rote learning with our Question Bank. Not only do the selected problems require critical thinking to work through them, but they also help you begin connecting which equations pair with certain questions, which will help with time efficiency on the exam.

3. Don't Eschew Your Review: Even if you feel completely confident in one subject area, we suggest you keep revisiting that area occasionally, as research shows that reducing study efforts toward familiar concepts can be detrimental to content retention. According to a 2009 study by Purdue University, once a student can "recall an item, they tend to believe they have 'learned' it", which "leads students to terminate practice rather than practice retrieval, a strategy choice that ultimately results in poor retention."⁴ Just because you feel confident on something doesn't mean you should completely abandon it. Instead, you should focus primarily on concepts you are having difficulty understanding, with an occasional review of known concepts.

Our goal with Question Bank was to help students study smarter, not harder using a retrieval-based learning activity. We believe our Question Bank provides a comprehensive and timesaving means of exam preparation. Our students have access either immediately or once their course starts, depending on which course format they select.

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¹Karpicke, Jeffrey D., and Henry L. Roediger III. "Test-Enhanced Learning: Taking Memory Tests Improves Long-Term Retention." Cognition and Learning Lab. Purdue University, 2006. http://learninglab.psych.purdue.edu/downloads/2006_Roediger_Karpicke_PsychSci.pdf.

² Karpicke, Jeffrey D. "A Powerful Way to Improve Learning and Memory." American Psychological Association. American Psychological Association, June 2016. https://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2016/06/learning-memory.

³ Karpicke, Jeffrey D. "A Powerful Way to Improve Learning and Memory."

⁴ Karpicke, Jeffrey D. "Metacognitive Control and Strategy Selection: Deciding to Practice Retrieval During Learning." Cognition and Learning Lab. Purdue University, July 2009. http://learninglab.psych.purdue.edu/downloads/2009_Karpicke_JEPGeneral.pdf.

About the Author: Martha Hunsucker

Martha Hunsucker is a content writer for EduMind. She received her BA in English from Stetson University and has experience marketing, copywriting, editing, and blogging. In her spare time, she enjoys reading books by Jon Krakauer (her current favorite author), hiking with her two dogs, and sleeping in on weekends.