Stephanie

Hi I am a law student at the University of Sheffield and I am just about to go into my final year.

I am very bright, eager and hard-working. I am completely receptive to all advise and appreciate your efforts to make me better student. I am 22 years old, and I have lived and studied in England for 13 years.

I have been having difficulty studying law. I work so hard but I still manage to fail. Clearly I need help on my coursework and exam style. My coursework was not the best, they said that I did not answer the question at all. It may be that I do not understand the material as well as I think I do or I am not processing the material in an effective way or I have not memorised the information sufficiently. One of my professors said to me `it is as if you are trying to learn all the information without understanding what exactly and why we are asking you to look at that material." They said that I need to look at the assessment criteria again.

I have always had a difficulty with comprehension, clarity of expression and critical analysis.

Every semester I have tried a different approach to studying and revising:
first year. I used all lecture slides and made notes on the whole chapter per topic,
second year - first semester I used mind-maps in lectures, seminars, revision (it worked perfectly for understanding the material but not structuring answers or writing coherently, plus it was not practical for writing thorough notes). second semester I used Microsoft Notebook which allowed me to record and make notes perfectly for my lectures,seminars, and unlike my first year I based my revision solely on what the lecturer wanted. But when my results came out they were terrible. I also did more group work and we visually represented information on whiteboards, contributing to each others understanding.

It is clear to me that I need to be more strategic with essay writing skills and revision skills. I need to understand and spend a lot of time practising critical analysis. I really like studying law, but I would love it if I knew what I was doing.


If you were to tutor me it would be a challenge, because there is so much that I still need to learn. But I know that if you were to guide me in the right way my success would be yours well.

Availability: fridays and saturdays

Willing to travel: 30 miles