How To Create a Power Point

Hi, guys!

Today, I want to go back to tips on certain academic projects, and one of them, which we use extremely often is Power Point (or Keynote). I personally recommend you purchasing Power Point, since it holds much more features than Keynote, but the tips I'm about to give you will suite both softwares:

1. Research

Any good presentation will have a lot of research done for it. Since this blogpost is not about researching, I won't cover what exactly to fit in there, but you should cover everything outlined by the rubric if it exists. 

2. Template

When you're choosing a template, make sure it suits the type of information you're giving. For instance, if your presentation is about child abuse, don't choose a beach and the sun as your template, rather choose something in neutral tones. Note, that Power Point has much more templates than the Keynote. 

3. A Few Essential Pages

Outside of your topic, your Power Point presentation must include the following slides:

1. Title Page (title + name)

2. Overview Of The Topic/Table Of Contents

3. "Thank You" Page 

4. Sources Used Page

It is simply polite to the audience to include those slides on your Power Point, as well as you should orally pronounce the greeting, the title, and the appreciation for listening. 

4. It's a Power POINT, not a Power PARAGRAPH

This is the most frequent mistake I can observe in people's Power Points - they read off of it. This style of presenting is not effective at all. The only instance where one can include full text, is the quotes. Other than that, make sure you include the actual points of your thought, not the thoughts themselves. Each point would ideally contain 1-3 words, and each slide would ideally contain 3-6 points. 

5. Pictures

Depending on your topic, you might or might not have a lot of pictures. Try to have some, though. Don't forget to source them appropriately if they are not owned by you. Again, choose them wisely, since you don't want to have an awkward slide. 

6. Grammar

One very common mistake is the incorrect capitalisation of words. I can relate to this mistake as well, but for the most part, here is the rule:

You Capitalise:

- Nouns (man, bus, book)

- Adjectives (angry, lovely, small)

- Verbs (run, eat, sleep)

- Adverbs (slowly, quickly, quietly)

- Pronouns (he, she, it)

- Subordinating conjunctions (as, because, that)

Do Not Capitalise:

- Articles: a, an, the

- Coordinating Conjunctions: and, but, or, for, nor, etc.

- Prepositions (fewer than five letters): on, at, to, from, by, etc.

Other common mistakes is the misinterpretation of 'its vs it's', 'were vs we're' etc. To avoid that, firstly, learn the actual rules, and secondly, don't use the short-hand notation (we're, it's, we'll etc.) since it is informal. 

Also, don't forget to underline or bold the subtitles if they exist, and don't forget to italicise the names of the books/movies/poems/etc.

There is much more to grammar than I just mentioned, so watch out for any mistakes. It will be beneficial if you will pronounce your presentation out loud, and that way, you will catch more awkward-sounding fragments and mistakes. 

7. Animations

Animations appeal to the audience way more than the regular flip of the slide, and even though it is just a little thing, it will boost you up by a point to two for creativity. Make sure to choose appropriate animated transitions, though, since no-one wants to see the sparkles while presenting about the World War II. 

8. Interactives

This tip will boost your grade by a few percent guaranteed. Do some sort of interactive while presenting to your audience. It might be one or more of those:

- Quiz

- Questionnaire/Questions

- Skit (with or without volunteers from the audience)

- Activity

- Game

etc.

9. Other Visuals/Features

Feel free to insert a table, chart, or a statistic or two. This will solidify whatever fact you are talking about, and it will also appeal to the audience, since humans naturally like numbers (not math, just numbers ;))

You can also insert a video, but make sure it is not longer than 2-3 minutes, since it will bore the audience. You can insert a little fragment of the video if you wish, instead of the complete one. Make sure you introduce and source the videos, and make sure that it doesn't repeat the information that you are presenting in the exact same way (video Power Point). 

A good way to introduce a video is to say something like: "And now, I would like to show you guys a little video, for those who are visual learners out there, which will interactively sum up what I was talking about. Enjoy"...

10. Written Speech

It is always great to have a written outline of what your presentation will look like, but do not read off of it. Remember, you are talking to your audience, and if your presentation will be just a formal monologue, it is not going to seem very interesting.

The only fragments worth of fully writing out are the quotes, big lists, or (sometimes) sources. Other than that, your text should be in point form as well. 

11. Check

If you were hopefully, managing your time wisely while creating your Power Point, you will have a day or more to just leave it alone. After some time, though, go through it, and you will most likely find a big number of mistakes seen only by a fresh look.

It is also not a bad idea to go through your presentation with a teacher (if possible), to see if you've satisfied the criteria. 

Timetable Planning + Schedule Of My Preference

Hi, guys!

The subject selection process is awaiting for me at the end of June - beginning of July, and today I want to discuss the pros and cons behind having morning or afternoon classes in post-secondary institutions. I don’t know my schedule yet, but according to my little analysis here, I will let you know what kind of schedule I would prefer at the end of this blog post. Obviously, you know yourself way better than I know you, so take my advice with a grain of salt, and plan everything according to your own needs. So, let’s do this:

Morning Classes:

Pros:

• More Studying Done (For each hour in class, 2 or 3 hours of studying is recommended, and a full-time student will have 5 courses/week)
• More Time to Yourself (As long as the planned studying is done ;) )
• More Time to Work/Research/Extracurriculars
• You Are Already Used to That Kind of Regime from High School (The majority of high schools begin their classes at 8:30-ish a.m. Your brain is simply used to begin processing information that early after practicing it for 12+ years!)

Cons:

• You Might Be The Night Owl (In which case it is literally physically painful to wake up in the morning)
• You Might Not Be Able to Function Efficiently Throughout The Day
• You Might Be Prone to Procrastination (if you cannot properly manage a lot of time off)
• You Might Have Inconvenient Breaks Between Your Classes

Afternoon Classes:

Pros:

• Pleasurable not to wake up very early
• Usually, One Would Feel More Energetic (unless you were sleeping for 10+ hours)
• They Day Will Pass Faster (it’s great if you’re enrolled in boring or hated subjects)
• You Might Avoid The Inconvenient Breaks Between Your Classes

Cons:

• You Won’t Have a lot of Time For Yourself
• You Might Not Have Enough Time for Work/Research/Extracurriculars
• You Might Not Have Enough Time to get all Your Studying Done

The Timetable Of My Preference:

I would love the majority of my days started in the early morning. I can’t say that I am an Early Bird, really, but I would sacrifice my sleep to get good grades and extracurriculars done, since that way I’d feel more accomplished. I would much appreciate if one out of 5 of my days would start from 11-ish in the morning, and that way I will enjoy some more hours of sleep. In a Science program, though, one would have tutorials (1-2hrs) and labs (2-3hrs) in addition to lectures, so I can’t expect a very easy timetable on the first place. Those tutorials and labs, by the way, are more likely to happen in the afternoon or even in the evening, so I better make myself some time by elongating my day from the early morning. 

So, good luck while deciding on the way you want your schedule to be before the actual subject selection :)

Why I Recommend Doing a Minor Degree (as well as Major, obviously)?

Hi sweeties,
I hope your summer is going well, and I hope you are looking forward for whatever next step you have in your academic journey. My 1st step, as you know, is my freshman year, and today I wanted to discuss why am I planning to pursue a Minor. So, firstly, I am 95% sure, that my minor is going to be Health, Aging, and Society, and this blog post will include the benefits of having a minor, and as I'll list them, you will see my own thought process about my minor:

Before I begin, here is a definition of a Minor Degree: a degree received in university by taking 8 or more courses in a specific area

1. Unique
Surprisingly, not a lot of people pursue a minor in their post-secondary career, and if you pursue one, it will make you unique. On your job/graduate/professional school interview or any applications, you will have an additional little story to tell to the committee, and you will increase your chances of getting accepted. Having a minor will show them that you are committed to that specific area, and it will bring up your well-roundedness.

2. Minor Might be a Specialisation...or it Might Not
Lots of schools offer tens of different minor degrees, and it is your choice to choose whether it will or will not relate to your general major. For instance, for somebody who is going to pursue the Bachelor of Philosophy, The Medieval Philosophy might be considered as a specialisation, or a concentration, rather. In my situation, Health, Aging, and Society belongs to the Social Sciences faculty (whereas my major is Honours Life Sciences) and I picked it for the following reasons:
- I enjoy learning about society, health systems, health demographics, and medical ethics
- I will be a more well-rounded person and a MedSchool Applicant
- I will do better on the Multiple Mini Interviews (MMI's) for MedSchool, which also test ethical applications
- I will be a better physician, since I will understand more about people's backgrounds
- I will improve my critical thinking skills
- I will be better at making healthcare decisions
If you are planning to pursue a minor within a different faculty than that of your major, make sure you choose your electives wisely in order to be able to enrol in certain courses to pursue the desired minor. Start planning your courses before 1st year!!

3. Plan B
So, in case your major is not going to be exactly what you want to do in life, you can of course switch it....or you can keep it, as well as keep the other doors open. For example, if someone is unsure whether he/she wants to pursue Law or Medicine in the future, that person might major in Law, but minor in sciences. That way the Med Schools' prerequisites will be covered, and of course the ones for Law School. The person might even double major (but that is a little harder, as you won't have a lot of room for electives).  

Good Luck!

Acceptances and Rejections

Hi, guys!

It’s time to finally discuss the acceptances and rejections I received from my universities. As a recap, here is where I applied in the order of from low priority to the highest: York University - Kinesiology and Health Sciences, UofT - Life Sciences, Waterloo - Life Sciences (Co-op), McMaster - Kinesiology, Waterloo - Health Studies (Co-op), McMaster University - Life Sciences, and McMaster University - Health Sciences. I also applied to CAP (Conditional Admission to Pharmacy) in Waterloo, which would allow me to pursue Pharmacy in 6 years without an admission test; there were only 24 spots reserved. This blog post will include the universities’ decision on my applications, the application procedure, and something that I wish I could have done better. Here we go:

Accepted:

York University - Kinesiology and Health Sciences

UofT - Life Sciences

Waterloo - Life Sciences (Co-op)

McMaster - Kinesiology 

Waterloo - Health Studies (Co-op)

McMaster University - Life Sciences

Rejected:

McMaster University - Health Sciences

Other:

Waterloo - CAP

Application Procedure:

After applying through OUAC (Ontario Universities Application Centre), I had some additional application papers to submit to some of my universities. Waterloo just wanted me to fill out 2 sets of questions regarding my choice: why I applied there, why Waterloo, and so forth. That application was nice and brief. McMaster’s Health Sciences, however wanted me to write the responses to 3 questions, so that they can assess me on a more personal basis and evaluate the way I think. One question was related to “Anything That I Think Is Applicable to Write” and the other 2 were the responses to a complex question. For CAP, I had to answer a question “Why Do You Want To Become a Pharmacist” and they wanted me to complete 200 hours in a pharmaceutical industry during the first 2 years, which I began to complete, but then I stopped. Why would I apply to Pharmacy, you’d ask, and the answer is - because this is a wonderful opportunity to get involved in health care, and I wanted to try myself out. There was also an interview to this program, which I didn’t go to, so my application was never completed fully, but only 48 people or so actually get to the interviews. 

Something I’d Do Better:

Because English is not my first language, I wish I’d come to Canada a little earlier. That way I would feel more comfortable with the grammar and syntax in English language! Other than that, I’m very much satisfied with my achievements, and even though I’m rejected from Health Sci, I am not losing any opportunity to pursue what I want in life :) 

Academic Plans For 2016-2017

Hi, honeys! 

So, I’m extremely honoured to now belong to the Faculty of Life Sciences at McMaster University! It was such a long journey (12 years in high school) and I have just accepted my lovely offer. 

Today, I will talk about my academic plans for the upcoming year, as I’ve made some decisions during Mac’s Open House! 

1. GPA

GPA or grade point average is your overall grade measured on a North-American scale of 4.0.

As you guys know, I’m striving for MedSchool, and in order to be a successful applicant, you must have a competitive GPA of at least 3.7. Here is the approximate scale of conversion between the percentile and GP system:

MedSchools look at the cumulative GPA which consists of all years you’ve been to the university, but if one is applying from the 4th year and onwards, some privileges such as 3 or so lowest grades dropped from the overall GPA. That being said, 3.7 is the lowest I can go in my first year, and I will hopefully greatly improve in my other 2+ years. 

2. Courses

I have fabulous mandatory courses in my program: Cellular and Molecular Biology, Diversity, Evolution and Humanity (Biology), Intro to Psychollogy, Neuroscience and Behaviour, Calculus, and Intro to Physics. I will however have to take other prerequisite courses for MedSchools this year in the form of electives: Med-physics, 2 General Chemistries, Aging and Society(or other social science), and Intro to Health Studies (or other social science). Taking these mandatory subjects and electives will let me choose any major, but I will look into Biochemistry (Biomedical Sciences) and Honours Life Sciences. I will totally make a blog post regarding the overview of all my courses as soon as my 1st month in uni passes. 

3. Clubs 

As soon as the year will start, I will join multiple clubs of my interest, and hopefully, they will not be focused solely on academics, since I’ll have enough of that :) I will look into any volunteering-related clubs, pre-med (academic, though), and the club related to arts and crafts. They will help me with my skill-building and I will also enjoy myself the most being the member of those clubs. 

4. Volunteering

This year I will be a little dormant in terms of volunteering in order to have my focus turned completely on academics, however, I will still participate and help organize any events held by my clubs and I would love to help the university out during next year’s Welcome week. I will also apply for the summer volunteerism in all kinds of hospitals in Toronto and Hamilton starting from January 2017, since being in the hospital and interacting with patients is all I can wish for to have a wonderful summer. 

5. MCAT Studying

I don’t know exactly how my MCAT studying is going to go, but I know for sure that at least half of my prerequisites are going to be covered in the first year. As I will be studying for my subjects, I will also constantly refer to my MCAT reviews by Kaplan in order to take as much as I can from those books. 

I have also decided that I will do co-op during my undergrad, but that’s a topic of another blog post ;)

Study Plans For Summer

Hey sweeties!

Long time, no hear, and that’s because I was on a vacation, where I unfortunately, didn’t have access to Internet. On the other hand, though, it gave me a wonderful opportunity to think of some new topics to address, and this one is going to be about my study plans for this summer. 

I recently purchased a Kaplan MCAT review series (7 books) and I am going to read everything, except for the Verbal Reasoning, Biochemistry, and Organic Chemistry. The reason for doing that, is because I want to prepare myself for the 1st year of university, which covers all subjects I will study from my MCAT books this summer (Biology, General Chemistry, Behavioural Sciences and Physics with Math). Biochem, Orgo, and VR will be covered a little more in depth in my 2nd year. So, my current strategy, is just to skim through the material 1 chapter (some days, more) per day, and answer all the free-standing questions at the end of the chapter. That way, I will get used to the type and amount of material taught, as well as the questions asked. 

A month before starting the uni, I hope to review my grade 12 material on the subjects listed above, and I will undoubtedly bring those binders with me to my apartment in Hamilton. I don’t quite know, however, whether bringing them with me will help me in any way, but it’s better to be over-prepared, than underprepared. 

In addition to that, I printed a 2.5-inch binder full of ethical scenarios, Multiple Mini Interview (MMI) questions, and other material which will help me prepare for the CASPer test while applying to MedSchool. The reason why I started learning that so early, is because I might potentially not have enough time while in university to study that while studying for other subjects. So, from now on, I’m aiming to study the Code of Ethics, Canada Health Act, etc. each summer to improve my comprehension on diverse ethical and controversial concepts. 

Hopefully, this summer is not going to end up being very academically intense for me, since I need to relax before actually beginning my pre-med and medical journey in September :)

11 Things I learned From High School

Hey guys!

As I am DONE with high school, I want to talk about 11 things I learned/I wish I knew before coming into it. It is all based on my personal experience, however, I'm happy, if you can relate

1. Grades DO Define YouThere is a very common misconception among high-schoolers, that says that grades do not define you. They do! To a certain extent, but they very much do. Here is what your grade fundamentally covers in itself:- work ethics- time management skills- ability to comprehend the material- self-disciplineYes, it doesn't define how good of a person you are, but in the modern world, if you have a certain professional goal, you must be the best you can in academics

2. Group Projects Aren't Really Real
That may sound very judgemental, but I found that group projects in high school is just an opportunity to avoid responsibility for the most part, but not to work cooperatively, or learn new skills. This is because some group project partners are assigned involuntarily, leading to some awkwardness during work. That being said, the ability to work with new partners is a very important skill, even though it may be uncomfortable. What I'm trying to say here, is that the schools have to arrange some workshops or something to promote, teach, and encourage group work 

3. A Lot of Closed Competition
Have you ever had somebody random asking about your grades, and then your study tips and advice? If yes, it may (not always, though) mean that somebody is closely competing with you, and using your own advice against you. Don't get me wrong, helping your fellow classmates is extremely important for their, and your own benefit, however, make sure you do not just share this information with strangers, in order to avoid closed competition. 
You have to understand, that competition, in any of its kind, will follow you throughout your life, and that is why you must keep some information closed from strangers

4. Get Involved
Those 4 years spent in high school make me wish I would be even more involved than I was. The reason for this is not only that it will look brilliant on your post-sec applications, but also it will teach you very valuable life skills, such as independency, collaboration, responsibility, time management, communication, etc. 

5. Not Everyone is Your Friend
Referring back to point 3, there is a lot of competition involved in your high school career. That being said, do not trust your personal information to strangers, and even your classmates, since you don't know them well enough to tell them everything you feel. Respectively, do not demand sharing their own secrets from someone, and respect people's privacy

6. Everyone Has Their Own Story
You will most likely often experience awkward situations in high school, where you will be judging people without knowing or encountering all their personal circumstances. Do not be such person, and never judge someone without knowing their reasoning.

7. Popularity Means Very Little
If you are concerned with your popularity, just keep in mind, that it won't matter at all as you graduate. It means that you are very social and likeable, so good for you, but do not put yourself above others. 
If you are a "victim" of popular individuals (as it sometimes happens) at your school, be strong enough to understand, that the reason why you are bothered by them, is because you are worth attention, in the good sense. Also, remember that popularity in high school really means close to nothing, so don't take it all seriously 

8. Get to Know Your Teachers
Getting to know your teachers will help you in 3 things:
- learning about their academic preferences (style of writing/presenting, answering a question, etc.), therefore, improve your grades
- meeting a new person with their stories
- get a reference letter
Teachers are a wonderful source of guidance and advice, and they are also people, like us :)
Treat them with respect, and if you don't really like your teacher, still, try to respect their actions and intentions, and try to be communicative with them

9. Use The Resources
Some high schools more than others, but all have some resources to share. Whether it would be a nice, quiet study space, a library, a resource centre, extensive guidance counselling, connections, etc. use all of it to maximise your potential

10. Be Open-Minded
That tip is contradicting to everything I've said about competition and trust in high school, but remember that you WILL find the group of people whom you can share your interests with, and who will support you in your beginnings. Practice being a good friend and/or classmate, since the majority of those social skills are learned in high school! 

11. Never Gossip
Fundamentally, you should respect people's right to privacy. Sure, you are not a doctor, and haven't given an oath, but just be a polite and a trustworthy individual. Gossips distribute very fast, and even if you are really tempted to release a certain rumour, beware that somebody might do the same thing to you. Will you like it?...
So be your best judge.