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Couple of questions

S56
edited July 2008 in General
1. When do we buy textbooks for our classes?

2. What kind of supplies do we have to buy for first year? I'm guessing that it's not like high school where you have a binder per class...? I will probably have a laptop if that helps.

3. Do we need to buy tape recorders for lectures, or will using a laptop be sufficient?
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Comments

  • edited July 2008
    You can buy textbooks for at least a few weeks before and after the term begins. I usually wait to see which books are mandatory and which ones aren't used.

    I only bring my laptop and a few pieces of paper to lecture. Taking notes is pointless in most classes and you'll get a better grasp of the material by paying attention to the prof and not trying to scribble down every word that he/she says.

    Some classes have the lectures taped and put up on a website somewhere. Most profs will make any slides or notes available to you online.
  • edited July 2008
    You only need paper and a pen for classes where lots of diagrams and formulas are involved.

    Otherwise if you're getting a laptop, you just need a laptop.

    Sometimes you don't even need take notes since its provided prior to class so just go and listen or download the recording later.
  • edited July 2008
    1. any time you want, really. if you do it earlier you could shop around for better deals, some cheap chapters books have to be shipped to you, so leave something like 3 weeks for that. You're fine as long as you get all your books by the second week.

    2. since you have a lappy you pretty much don't need anything else.

    3. many profs record their lectures, and you're mostly not allowed to record them/take pictures/videos yourself anyways.
  • edited July 2008
    Theres a big thing in classes:

    Some profs base their tests only on their notes
    Some profs base their tests only on their texts
    Some profs base their tests on a mix of both

    Some classes you NEED to take notes, sometimes the prof will even say what portion of the class is based on lectures of notes, or you can ask, on the first day theres always a point for questions. Hell, sometimes I've had classes where I didn't even go most of the semester and just studied the textbook and got an A.

    I have a laptop and I personally find it annoying to lug around, and realized sometimes it'd be more convenient to just have a pad and paper

    Dont carry around binders or pencil cases.

    Also *****don't try to write down every word they say, instead try to listen and think of the point theyre trying to make, rather than what they say word for word.*****
  • IVTIVT
    edited July 2008
    also, much of what you learned in high school will become obsolete within the first 2 weeks
  • edited July 2008
    IVT;33345 said:
    also, much of what you learned in high school will become obsolete within the first 2 weeks
    unless you're in computer science :P
  • IVTIVT
    edited July 2008
    primexx;33353 said:
    especially if you're in computer science :P
    i agree!
  • edited July 2008
    Ether;33307 said:
    You can buy textbooks for at least a few weeks before and after the term begins. I usually wait to see which books are mandatory and which ones aren't used.

    I only bring my laptop and a few pieces of paper to lecture. Taking notes is pointless in most classes and you'll get a better grasp of the material by paying attention to the prof and not trying to scribble down every word that he/she says.

    Some classes have the lectures taped and put up on a website somewhere. Most profs will make any slides or notes available to you online.
    How do you know which books are mandatory and which books aren't used? I'm planning not to buy the "recommended" ones, but aren't all "required" textbooks... well... required?
  • IVTIVT
    edited July 2008
    if you don't buy the required books, the prof will beat you with a baseball bat :wink:
  • edited July 2008
    Uh, depends on the course and instructor I guess...

    If you're taking philosophy, don't buy any book. It's useless cause it's not even a textbook, it's just a giant collection of essays, articles, and etc. published by philosophers. Useless since it makes no sense and the notes provided are clearer.

    Math and Science courses you'll probably need the book. Other classes, probably not.

    You can actually go through a course without the textbook. The notes should be sufficient. But some lecturers base exam questions on material from the book.
  • edited July 2008
    If you're taking philosophy, don't buy any book. It's useless cause it's not even a textbook, it's just a giant collection of essays, articles, and etc. published by philosophers. Useless since it makes no sense and the notes provided are clearer.
    A lot of times the notes may be clearer, but you'll still need to quote or reference the original. That's no problem though because a lot of philosophy stuff is public domain and you can find it online. Also, you can find some more popular textbooks for math and science on torrents/google.
  • edited July 2008
    Most writing based courses, you can probably wing it without a textbook. And almost especially not a courseware.
  • edited July 2008
    I would never not by the required textbooks, ever.

    Maybe it depends what department you are in, but in -most- of my classes the textbook was a must. There are profs who just use their lecture time to ramble.

    Also, not everyone's learning style is best suited for lecture as opposed to text.

    That said there have been courses where i regretted spending 100 dollars on that i could have gone without out
  • S56
    edited July 2008
    yeah, i guess laptop + pen and paper incase will be sufficient. when do we buy the textbooks? first day of school just goto the library and tell them what you need and pay?
  • edited July 2008
    you buy your books at the book store and its your responsibility to find out what books you need:

    you can find out on my.sfu.ca, you may have to hit refresh after you log on, and it should show you waht books are required in your enrolled classes tab

    or you can check in the course outline wherever it is on sfu, sfu hasnt standardized this so i cant tell you where

    or you can wait util the first day of classes to get your course outline then buy them

    id reccomend buying them a week or two before classes to get as many used as possible to save money, also used textbooks often have highlighted passages which is good if you forget to do your readings
  • edited July 2008
    When does mysfu update so that we can see the list of required books? I can't seem to find an enrolled classes lists on mysfu...
  • S56
    edited July 2008
    Hey, yeah your right it says on my.sfu.ca all the books I need once I've logged in.

    That makes sense, so the textbooks we get we take them into class? Or we just use these for our own studying at home/library?
  • edited July 2008
    IVT;33356 said:
    i agree!
    did your high school not teach shit in ict?
  • edited July 2008
    summerheaven;33408 said:
    When does mysfu update so that we can see the list of required books? I can't seem to find an enrolled classes lists on mysfu...
    Hit refresh once or twice, its a piece of shit and wont show it all the time.
  • edited July 2008
    S56;33412 said:
    Hey, yeah your right it says on my.sfu.ca all the books I need once I've logged in.

    That makes sense, so the textbooks we get we take them into class? Or we just use these for our own studying at home/library?
    Generally, in 1st and 2nd year courses you do not need your textbooks in class. Really depends though, in math / science classes more so, other classes not so much.

    In my 1st and second 2nd years I never brought my books except to tutorials. In general your first class per semester is a write off. You do not do anything, the instructor goes over the class, you get an outline, you can ask questions, and most of the time you go home early.

    You are assigned a weekly reading schedule, and each week a lecture corresponding to the readings (maybe not, depends on the profs style).

    Bringing your books may help in tutorials when you have to discuss stuff, so on days you go to lecture probably dont bring your books, on days you go to tutorial bring your book.

    In 3rd and 4th year classes I'm in all the classes are seminars, no lecture, and no tutorial. I bring whatever books are relevant to the readings im assigned.
  • IVTIVT
    edited July 2008
    primexx;33420 said:
    did your high school not teach shit in ict?
    they did, but the emphasis was on using applets to calculate areas and draw squares and stuff
  • edited July 2008
    Yeesh, there must be something wrong with my account because I refresh a bunch of times, log in and out and go into mysfu.ca AND my.sfu.ca (no difference I'm guessing, it redirects to the same place but worth a try) and still... no change. Are the textbooks supposed to show up on the front page?

    And I'm kinda glad about not bringing all the books all the time... my HUM 102 class has 6 books according to an outline I found (may be outdated though...) Hopefully the prof tells us ahead of time what to bring for the next class...
  • S56
    edited July 2008
    Yeah, they show up on the front page of my.sfu.ca
  • edited July 2008
    But like everything else, it's faulty sometimes.
  • edited July 2008
    Oh I see mine now... HOLY! I have to get 20 textbooks.... crazy!
  • S56
    edited July 2008
    I just need these:

    PRECALCULUS W/CALCULUS PREVIEW & SG PKG

    LITTLE BROWN COMPACT HDBK CDN W/MCCL2
    COMPLETE PLAYS

    CANADIAN CRIM TODAY&BOUNDARIES RDR

    That's not that bad I guess.
  • edited July 2008
    I hope its not actually twenty, only buy the required, and see if you can sign them out in the library first.
  • S56
    edited July 2008
    I hate how SFU emails you saying things like "Congratulations on your admission to SFU!" when your still waiting for provincial marks... :(
  • edited July 2008
    randomuser;33504 said:
    I hope its not actually twenty, only buy the required, and see if you can sign them out in the library first.
    No, seriously, 20 books... well 19, to be exact. 80% of them come from my two humanities courses though.
    Every single one of them says, "Required" sooo darn.

    Can textbooks be found in the library??? Can't I just borrow it and scan it instead of buying it =_=
  • edited July 2008
    Some of them can.
    I would suggest checking out Amazon.ca as well. You can buy your books for cheap from sellers...I've saved quite a bit of money going that route.

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