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Difficulty attending lectures

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aussiebloke
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12 Nov 2013, 10:39 pm

Lonermutant wrote:
FrostSA wrote:
I'm in my fourth year at university and was recently diagnosed with Aspergers. From the get go lectures have been a problem for a number of reasons. The main one being frustration. The lecturer will introduce a new concept which I'll grasp straight away. He will then go on to explain it in nauseating detail for the rest of the class. I understand it is necessary, but having to sit still in a room full of people which isn't fun at the best of times, listening to someone talk about something I already understand for 45 minutes drives me insane. As a result I find it hard to motivate one self to attend lectures. On top of that I have chronic insomnia which just adds to the social discomfort and makes early morning lectures impossible.

As a result in the past 4 years I can't have attended more than 30 lectures. My grades are consistently high but there is no denying that I am missing out academically. Has anyone here been in a similar situation and figured out a way of coping?


Quit University and go and get a street-sweeping job.


as all ways some good advise their . :wtg: I think you should take over autism tv.


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CosmicKitten89
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14 Nov 2013, 5:49 pm

Why do you even bother with lectures period? Can't you just read the books, or have somebody take notes about the important points in the lecture?

I can't handle lectures. It wasn't bad when I was in high school, because first of all I was super-bored at home (evil foster parent, long story) and so anything was a welcome change from that; secondly, the teachers would only lecture for a few minutes and then let you do whatever you want for the rest of the period; thirdly, unlike college professors in my experience, high school teachers let the class engage in discussion, which I tend to dominate to the point that the teacher has to take measures to make me shut up. I speak mainly about math and science lectures, since history lectures can be entertaining sometimes, and the subject matter doesn't require the same intensive level of thought.

Mandatory lecture attendance is especially a problem with community colleges. It burns out my concentration so that I have none left to focus on my homework or studying, and when the information comes from a teacher there is a disruptive social element that causes it to be encoded in the memory in the wrong way, say in episodic memory as opposed to semantic memory, so in my case attending lectures is not only unnecessary but poisonous. Also, weekly mandatory homework assignments disrupt my ability to learn. I don't know why, I know it sounds counterintuitive, but I believe it's because it makes you worry about getting it done and turning it in on time and burning out all your daily quota of concentration (yes even with medicine my concentration comes in only a limited daily quota, unless perhaps I up the dose enough to give me a panic attack) on that instead of actually learning the material. If they would just let me chill for the semester and then take the test I will probably ace the test; otherwise I will get a D or a high F (mostly because of small ADHD errors that even medicine cannot completely fix).

They need to just write out ALL of the contents of the lecture somewhere. Just gimme the equations; I don't care how they're derived I can figure that out on my own, and if you try to do that you will just lose me to the activity in my head. Write a few quick and to the point explanations, and work out a few problems so I get the general idea of what you're actually talking about (telling me in a lecture won't get the point through to me; I don't understand math in terms of English, my method of understanding is visual, with the gaps in the visual filled in by abstract logic. Putting it in English, especially spoken English pulls my head out of that space.)



Kinme
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17 Nov 2013, 1:48 pm

Usually, when I get bored of the lecture, I just start reading the book and getting homework done. I don't hear anything while I do it, lol.



enigmeow
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17 Nov 2013, 3:16 pm

FrostSA wrote:
I'm in my fourth year at university and was recently diagnosed with Aspergers. From the get go lectures have been a problem for a number of reasons. The main one being frustration. The lecturer will introduce a new concept which I'll grasp straight away. He will then go on to explain it in nauseating detail for the rest of the class. I understand it is necessary, but having to sit still in a room full of people which isn't fun at the best of times, listening to someone talk about something I already understand for 45 minutes drives me insane. As a result I find it hard to motivate one self to attend lectures. On top of that I have chronic insomnia which just adds to the social discomfort and makes early morning lectures impossible.

As a result in the past 4 years I can't have attended more than 30 lectures. My grades are consistently high but there is no denying that I am missing out academically. Has anyone here been in a similar situation and figured out a way of coping?


My issue was that the lecturer would make a aside on something interesting and then move on while I would suddenly deep dive into what he just said. A hour later I'd look up and the class would be over. Sometimes I would have to get up and leave to stop the annoying sound of his voice so that I could focus on the new idea or concept. A day or two later, after I knew everything possible about the new concept, I'd be able to again be able to listen again

Needless to say, I was a great research assistant but a absolutely terrible student.. :)


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aussiebloke
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17 Nov 2013, 5:00 pm

Lonermutant wrote:
FrostSA wrote:
I'm in my fourth year at university and was recently diagnosed with Aspergers. From the get go lectures have been a problem for a number of reasons. The main one being frustration. The lecturer will introduce a new concept which I'll grasp straight away. He will then go on to explain it in nauseating detail for the rest of the class. I understand it is necessary, but having to sit still in a room full of people which isn't fun at the best of times, listening to someone talk about something I already understand for 45 minutes drives me insane. As a result I find it hard to motivate one self to attend lectures. On top of that I have chronic insomnia which just adds to the social discomfort and makes early morning lectures impossible.

As a result in the past 4 years I can't have attended more than 30 lectures. My grades are consistently high but there is no denying that I am missing out academically. Has anyone here been in a similar situation and figured out a way of coping?


Quit University and go and get a street-sweeping job.

with our low self worth combined with co morbids we ask ourselves are we even capable of that . :wink:


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Theirs a subset of America, adult males who are forgoing ambition ,sex , money ,love ,adventure to sit in a darkened rooms mastering video games - Suicide Bob