Kids, and Grown Ups, Gotta Move: Five Ways to Get Active RIGHT NOW!

You're tired of feeling tired all the time. You've decided to get more active. You watch the kids running and jumping in the park. You remember when you were like that. You want to be like that again.

Watching the kids is fun and inspiring. But you can learn from them too. Often, when we grown-up kids decide to get more active, our plans become rather complicated rather quickly. We feel the need to buy gear, look into gym memberships, subscribe to magazines . . .

You probably want to do some of that at some point. You are a complicated grown-up after all. But, while you're just getting started, learn from the kids. Kids are active simply by being active. You put my kids in an empty room, they'll start jumping up and down. After that, they might run around in circles.

Kids gotta move. And so do you.

Here are some ways to start moving right now. Three of them involve walking. This is no accident. Walking is a great way to get your body moving without much risk of injury or exhaustion.


1. Canvass for a Charity

There are lots of people in need. The list is endless: the Cancer Society, the Children's Wish Foundation, OxFam, the Apostrophe Protection Society . . . Now more than ever, charities need enthusiastic volunteers. Pick whichever charity is closest to your heart and start your walking from house to house (to house). At one of your stops, you might make a new friend . . .

2. Get a Walking Buddy

Walking alone has its merits, but the conversation is a little thin. Getting a walking buddy is a great way to make sure that you look forward to your next walk. Make sure that you pick someone interesting . . .

3. Start a Home Repair or Building Project

Those of you in apartments might need to get inventive but, surely, even in the smallest of city sardine cans , there are jobs to do. Jobs that require you to move things about, lift, bend, or strain with a screwdriver.

4. Get a Dog

Dogs need to be walked. Get a dog and be a responsible dog owner by walking your dog often. Couldn't be simpler.

5. Cancel Your Cable

Some recent experience has reminded me: TV is a time-sucker and gut-expander. When you're feeling a little tired at the end of the day, there's nothing easier than sitting down and picking up the remote. Within seconds, you can be lost in the latest doings of Brangelina or Kate Gosselin. Do yourself a favor: Stop watching people who are in great shape and start getting into better shape yourself!

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Throw Away the Highlighter! Three Effective Study Habits for Better Grades (The Professor Speaks)

A student enters my office. He is upset. He studied really hard for my test but his mark is low. The student is frustrated. This has been happening a lot. He's wondering if he should leave school. I ask him how he studies. He pulls out his textbook and . . .

Oh my goodness.

The pages are covered with highlighter. Many colors of highlighter in fact.

"Yes, I see the highlighter marks," I say, "but how does the highlighting help you? How do you use it?"

"Oh," he replies, "Well, I read over the highlighted parts and then I make study notes."

The student reaches down and pulls out a large sheaf of papers filled with dense writing.

This really breaks my heart. Here is a young man who has paid a good deal of money to get himself an education. He has also spent dozens upon dozens of hours trying to be a good student, desperately trying to get the knowledge in his textbooks into his poor tired brain.

There is a solution, though.

Throw Away the Highlighter!

And throw away the 'highlighter mentality' that often goes with it. Students who get themselves to university are smart and they are hardworking. Far too many of them, though, do not know how to study. I see them sitting in the halls, in the library, and on the bus. They read their textbooks and, whenever something even remotely informative appears on the page, they highlight it.

But, textbooks, it turns out, are packed with a lot information. There isn't too much redundancy. So, a lot ends up getting highlighted. In fact, most of the textbook in a lot of cases! Never fear, though, those diligent students will make study notes which will begin to distill the information. They'll make notes from their notes, they'll summarize, BUT . . . .

They won't do much learning!

They are far too busy organizing the material. They are far too busy being busy. They need to throw away the highlighter and acquire three important study habits:

1. Read Read Read! (and then read some more)

Read the textbook over and over again. Read it until you know what the author is going to say next. But it's more than reading and re-reading. It's how you read. You need to read for understanding. You can be sure that you're reading for understanding by making making it a habit to . . .

2. Test Yourself

After you read a chapter, or a section of a chapter if it is rather long, go back over what you read and write down some questions for yourself. Then put the questions aside for later. You want to make sure that you can retain your new knowledge long term, so testing yourself immediately after reading won't be of much help in gauging your level of understanding. Don't write "list questions" for yourself. For example, "In ascending order, list Maslow's hierarchy of needs" That kind of question pulls for what psychologists call "surface level" processing. You want deep processing. Ask yourself a question like, "Explain the rationale underlying Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Make reference to each need. Illustrate with examples." If you can answer a question like that, you can easily answer the first question. In other words, understanding of material means that memorization happens as a matter of course. Also, by processing the information deeply you are more likely to retain it for a test.

Writing test questions for yourself has another benefit. It turns out that there are only so many questions that a professor can ask about the material. There is, after all, only so much material. So, by asking your deep questions about the material, you are probably going to ask some questions that are strikingly similar to the ones that show up on the test. At the very least, you'll cover the same ground.

3. Start Early!

I know that you've heard this one before, but it bears repeating. The findings from psychology are extremely clear on this one. Cramming doesn't work. The only thing that does work is continued reading and re-reading, with a lot of self-testing thrown in for good measure. For those of you who have been using highlighters and making copious amounts of study notes, it just means that you can start when you usually do. This time, though, there will be a huge benefit to all of your hours of hard work.

University, like life, is hard. There is a lot to do and not much time in which to do it. You want to succeed and you've been putting in the effort. I am confident that, if you throw away your highlighter and follow my advice, you will do better on tests. And, bonus, you might even remember some of what you studied the day after the test!

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The Five Fairly Good Habits of Mostly Effective Canadians

A summer time post as weighty as an August evening breeze . . .

My American friends sometimes ask me about being Canadian. The basic thrust: Are Canadians just Americans from another country? Heck no! There are differences. The differences are often subtle, but they are there nonetheless. So, for the edification of many Americans and for the benefit of several Canadians, here are the

Five Fairly Good Habits of Mostly Effective Canadians

1. Always make sure that you're the first to say "sorry" if something bad happens. It doesn't matter if you did anything wrong. The first one to apologize wins!

2. Always know the location of the nearest Tim Horton's. Being up on the whereabouts of the next-closest two or three is a bonus. Listing four or more is just showing off.

3. At every opportunity lecture Americans on the benefits of Universal Health Care. Emphasize that wait times continue to improve.

4. Talk about getting back to nature. If you are one of those types who actually get back to nature, all the better. Bonus points for portages and eating what you caught. Remember to keep your stories short and sweet. Nobody likes a bragger.

5. At every opportunity list all of the Canadians who have made it big in Hollywood. This is especially fun if Americans are present. Watch their looks of horror as you tell them that William Shatner is from Montreal. Captain Kirk!!??!! This can be especially entertaining when in a long Tim Horton's drive-thru line. And do remember to apologize for the wait.

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