I am stuck in the same AeSI subject, what should i do?

Saw this email from an AeSI student.


"
afraid if i m to stuck in SecA due to that paper only. so i need ur urgent help regarding which books to follow that adheres to the question pattern so that i can at least pass the exam. its my 3rd year running..and i have no time. "

My first comment to him will be, go to a quite place, have some time and brainstorm what is it that he is getting wrong?

Keep AeSI out of the blame game and think hard on what can be your faults.

Just write out wherever comes to the mind. Don't judge. Keep thinking and pushing yourself for the reason on what is going wrong. Think back to all exams and find the causes.


Once you have number of causes, you will definitely begin seeing a pattern emerging. Now is the judging time. Find the main reasons that you see now.

Is is the lack of your understanding of the subject? Or is it your lack of expressing it in the exams. Or is it a combination of both?

You can fail in the exams only for two reasons, either you lack understanding of the subject or the understanding is not expressed well in the exam papers.


Find the reason and implement steps in your study routine to eliminate it.

Hope this helps. Blog readers, do you have any other ideas, feel free to share them here.

Action brings results.

Unless you begin, you won't know what you are going to accomplish.

Planining and planning and only planning will never accomplish you any
results.

It's the action that produces results.

Start that routine you are planning for so many days. Load on that
software your are planning to learn. Create that first fortran program
than trying you that get a perfect compiler.

Action brings results.

My prefered method is fire and aim. I like to start shooting and then
adjust than spending loads of time perfecting my aim before even
firing a single shot.

So which category do you fall in? Do you shoot before you aim or do
you perfect your aim before you shoot?

Myaesi blog is back.

Yes myaesi blog is back.

For last 3 years I had been constantly updating this blog for every single day. So in mid march I decided to have a life without myaesi for sometime.

So I took this long break. No updates.

This experience was revealing. There were 3 times when I had some new info that I wanted to pass on but I had to resist.

Although I wasn't writing posts, I still received some comments on the blog.

I needed this break so that I can bring something more useful to you guys. I don't know if I have got anything, but from now on myaesi is back.

Getting into the routine will take sometime, but hopefully the posts will become regular from now on.

Hope all of you guys/gals are doing well!

5 simple steps to have a productive day.

Be it in AeSI as a student or as a trainee in NAL or in your day job, here are 5 simple steps that can help you have a productive day.

1. Plan ahead.
Planning the day well in advance or the night before works great. This works because it untangles planning and action.

2. Make a routine.
Very similar to first point. Having a routine for all routine tasks helps in separating the action from planning. Frees you from day to day decision. Be it in what to study or what to work on next. Clearly maps your path.

3. Mix and match.
Working on one thing hours on is not going to cut it. Imagine how monotonous Sachin's batting would have been if he just used one shot all the time. Similarly, mixing different subjects or different activities in your work life goes a long way in keeping you alert and productive.

4. Not just work.
Work and no play is a bad combination. So Work and play. Don't just do serious stuff. Do the trivial stuff. Mix essential tasks with fun but non essential tasks. Life will be much more easier.

5. Process is important.
"Karam kiyae ja, fal ki chinta mat kar" says Bhagvat Gita. The process is important. The journey is the core. So make it a point to enjoy it. Destination will eventually arrive.

Most successful students and professionals use one or combinations of these steps. Why are you waiting for?

Good luck.

More tips at http://my-aesi.blogspot.com

Breaking inertia

After a few days of good posting and setting up a momentum, an external routine change brought everything to a stop.

One day I didn't post and then the next day and then the next, it continued and I realized I was in a rut of inertia.

For a couple of months I have been observing how difficult it becomes once I loose the momentum. The inertia restricts getting into the previous mode.

So over the years I have seen these three techniques valuable in conquering inertia.

1. Time yourself for a simple task. For example to break my posting inertia, I set a timer for 7 mins and then allow myself to write whatever comes to my mind. This initial jolt of action usually does the trick.

You can employ it to break your non study inertia, to set your routine to include some fortran learning or something more specific to your need.

2. Take up the simplest task and do it. If the project is overwhelming, then take up the simplest task related to it and resolve to work on it in next 10 mins. Notice I haven't mention complete it. I said work on it. Make a huge difference.

For my current personal project, I am building a patron neural file reader, and to curb the inertia that has developed because of my break from it, I sat down and just choose to do the simplest task of writing a flow chart for what I need to do.

3. Change your activity. If the activity is indoors. Go do something outdoors. If it's computer related, do something non computer related. Just changing the context for sometimes helps you crumble the inertia.

These were the techniques that has helped me curb being stuck in inertia.

Inertia has featured a lot on this blog and you can found how and where via this link http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=inertia

Why are you failing?

If your routine is not working, if you aren't studying, if you aren't
passing aesi exams and if you are not getting any job after so many
interviews then most likely there is one of the following two core
reasons.

Lack of organisation or lack of focus!!

Either the task or the steps towards the goals are not well organised
or there is missing or miss directed focus. Either you climbing the
wrong stairs or you are walking in the rails instead of the steps.

Yes this and only these two reasons can explain why you aren't
acheiving what you want.

Finding the reason is half battle won. So identify which of this is
dominating the ruins of your goals. And then take action to eliminate
it.

That's the only way to hit your targets.

More advice on passing aesi exams at http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=passing+aesi&max-results=100

Consistency

Greatness is directly proportional to consistency. The more consistent
you are, more remarkable you become.

Sachin became great not because he made centuries, but by being
consistent in his early days and amassing those incredible numbers.

Consistenty is everything.

From your study routine, to training and from training to your job,
if you are consistent in action and performance, you are on your way
to be a star.

If I can advice you to develop one character trait then it will be
consistency!!

Statistics

Every since AeSI days, statistics has been my interest. Crunching
numbers and getting something meaningful has been my passion.

As the reader of this blog, you might have since manifestation of that
in this blog over the years.

I have done these analysis of amaesi exams since 2000! Playing with
those vast arrays of numbers have since been a routine yearly task for
this blog.

Now what has this simple interest has done for me?

It has taught me excel, it has taught me graphs, it has taught me
animation in excel. It has taught me statistics in action.

The whole point of the post is follow your interest. Do something with
your interest that you can share. This will only make you better!!

What are your interests?

Take a day off - How to study for AeSI?

This took me a long time to understand.

When I was in AeSI, i read many times about benefits of taking a day
off but was never able to get myself to do so.

But in section B, with 5 subjects at one go, I had to take a day off
as all the other days were filled with GIE, and Natrajan Sir!!

This is when my studies and study habits improved a lot.

The result was that I cleared, propulsion 1,2,3, aero 1, and advance
strength of materials in one semester.

Studies is just like being in a gym. If after a heavy exercise, you
don't give your body proper rest, you won't see much of an
improvement. Have rest in your exercise routine and you will see your
body blosom.

Similar thing happens with the brain. Give it a day of rest, it gets
the time to reorganise and regroup.

So my advice to every aesi student is take one day off. Study for 6
days. And on the seventh day give it complete freedom to do whatever
it likes. Do everything but studies!!

Choose whatever day, that's not important. Important is choosing a day
to rest and wonder!

This post is part of the series on how to study for AeSI?

Read more about how to study for AeSI by clicking the following link http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=AeSI

Good luck!!

Remove the decision engine- How to study for AeSI

As discussed in my last post, if I knew before hand what I wanted to
study, I was preety sure to do that. But on days when this decison was
lacking I procrastinated. I delayed and by the time I came to senses
the day was almost over.

So the lesson to learn is make a routine or plan of study and stick to
it.

Eliminate the day to day decision engines. Create a plan and then
carry on based on it.

No getting up in the morning and thinking, what should i study? Which
chapter etc.

Eliminate this decision process and you will gain immensely and have a
productive studying.

This post is part of the series on how to study for AeSI!!

How are you faring in your study? Do tell me in comments?

You can find another series on myaesi by following this link. http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=series&max-results=100

Springboard.

Yes that's what the training and your first employment in the industry
is. Springboard !!

The power of the springboard is not in the spring. A quality
springboard will be worthless if you don't apply enough pressure on it.

It's useful only when you know how to use it. The higher the pressure
you apply to it, the greater will be it's upward reactions!

So in your training days, don't get slack. Don't make training a
routine, something you have to complete. Push. Push harder. Learn as
much as you can.

Expand your knowledge, learn new things and push toward excellence.

Don't settle. This is place from where you will launch.

Training is part of every aesi student and I have written quite
comprehensively about it here in this blog. Find them all via this link
http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=training&max-results=100

Randomness and your new semester

A routine give you a framework. Its an easy reference to what to do
next.

Randomness on the other hand gives you new experiences. It gives you
hope. It surprises you.

I think the reason for germany's defeat in worldcup was lack of
randomness in it's team.

The german team was well structured, disciplined but lacked any
randomness. The other team took advantage of this and succeeded.

So why am I writing about this here?

I want you to add bit of randomness in your life. While studying,
having routine, and timetable is a good idea, but keep one day of the
week to explore. Let that day be randomness day. On this day you try
any crazy idea you have. Read whatever fancies you? Do something that
isn't in the tutorials!

Don't plan the day, let it decide it own course. On that day read off
topics from your core syllabus.

In that day, explore wikipedia for any random topic that just pop up
in your mind.

Mind is a powerful entity and it needs a routine and burst of
randomness to function well. So give that to it.

With amaesi results stated to release any day now, it's right time to
plan for the next semester with a pinch of randomness added to it!!

Past discussions on how to have a great semester can be found via this
link http:///my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=semester&max-results=100

Small projects- why they are important?

If you are following this blog for quite sometimes, you know how much
I am involved in small projects. I try to spend my maximum amount of
free time in such projects.

From cube mesh generator to alumni website, from brouchure design to
creating games for my daughter, from making posters for home to create
excel based expense calculator, I try to devote some time on this
offshoots type of work that I call small projects.

Why small projects are important?
Working in a company brings stucture to our routine. In the intital
period, when there is lot to learn and grasp, things are pretty fast.
But gradually, as one begins to gel into the work and culture of a
company, everything becomes routine. Although we get to do some good
work, but lack of freshness criples our productivity and we begin to
stagnate.

It's here where small projects come in. They provide the randomness.
They provide the required bypass bleed to get things going.

Learning is a constant pursuit and spending time on small projects
enables us keep that spirit of freshness alive.

This is the first post on small projects, will post another one on
what and how to incorporate them in your routine?

Are you working on any of your small personal projects?

Start small

In the begining of the year, I bought a treadmil from a friend. He was
going abroad and was selling his stuff. I got it from him.

He informed that he has used the machine for ten days and then it just
remained.

In the week he bought the treadmill, he used it for every single day
for 45 minutes. He set this goal. But in a weeks time, his enthusiasm
fizzed and the machine took backseat.

Knowing this, I fixed a modest target, I resolved to just sit 5
minutes on it. And ever since I have been doing it.

If I would have not come here, I know I would have continued the
routine and steadily progressed.

This is the magic of starting small. If you are failing to study each
day, resolve to do just 30mins per day and put in that time. Same way
if you are falling behind on learning a new tool, resolve to put 10
minutes in it than an hour. You will see a difference.

Hope this helps. Good luck!!

Find more tips on learning different CAE tools by hitting the
following link http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=tools

Have you downloaded the free ebook on AeSI? Download 'After AeSI-
career guide to AeSI' from MyAeSI now!

It might rain?

It's an assumption. It's a guess. Basing your routine on this will
just delay everything.

So carry a umbrella and get going with your tasks and plans.

Waiting for things improving, something getting right is a wrong
strategy. Start with what you have.

Begin now. Waiting on assumptions or hope of a better alternatives
tomorrow is stupid.

Start today. Start now!!

Want to explore more in myAeSI hit the following link http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=advice

'Keep in touch' Study technique

Keep in touch. It's as simple as that. If you keep in touch with what
you are studying and is being taught in the class, you don't have to
toll hard during exam time.

By this i am reffering to follow active revision policy. Revise
everytime. Revise at the start of the study session, revise at the
end of the study session and setup a revision day.

So make a revision centric timetable. Sandwich your study hours with
small slices of revisions. Do recall and summarize session for 3
minutes before every study hour.

This simple change in your study routine can help you leapfrog way
ahead of anyone.

Try it!!

More study technique tips can be found at http://my-aesi.blogspot.com/search?q=study-tips

4 tips to help you cook your studies well

In the last post, I talked about how giving time to the food cooks it well. I discussed why this technique works and I encouraged you to apply it in your studies.

Here in this second post, I will give four tips that can help you to have stress free and enjoyable study experience.

So lets begin....

A. Set up a minimum no of hour of study. Keep it low. Keep a number such that you have no difficulty doing it everyday. The last point is the key. Miss or fail to comply with it, and you have wasted your time on this post.

B. After the study. Let the information sink. Don't just keep adding ingredints. After the minimum hour of study, let the book rest. But latter when you are doing some mundane job or walking towards the tea shop, recall the  information. See it from another angle. Use your imagination to visualize what you read about.

C. If possible discuss what you studied with your peers, amaze them with something that you found interesting. Turn the theory into some practical insight and share that insight.

Did you know first machine to turn chemical/thermal energy to mechanical energy was a gun! Recently a friend who is revising thermodynamics shared this with me.

D. Have lot of mixed activities in your life. Begin a small project. Explore something that is in news. Like MNIK, IPL or the hockey world cup etc. The point is to completely think of something else.

In student life you should have a varied mix of stuff to do. This increases your sharpness and you are exposed to varied sources of input which can stimulate your imagination further.

Apply this few tips in your study life, they are bound to increase your productivity in studies and make your life more interesting.

Please do let me know what works for you and what doesn't!!

Read More

Why keeping minimum hour is so essential?

How I used to setup a study routine for next

5 study tips for studying for AeSI

How to study fluid mechanics and mathematics?

Someone just mailed me and asked the above question.

I don't have very specific answer to this since I am far removed from study right now. So guys and gals out there, have your say and suggest your tips on studying this specific subjects.

From my side, I will add this.

Fluid mechanics is a subject that you will be using in your career long after you have passed AeSI, so I suggest that spend maximum time in understanding the concepts. Relate them to your life and make them spring out of the text book.

Source sink, fluid dynamics, viscosity, Reynolds's number are the core pillars of further studies. So while learning understand them well, use your imagination to connect them to your life.

Study with question answer style for maximum retention.
While reading the material, write down small quiz questions on the topic you are reading. They will be used to revise the concepts latter. My tuition teacher used this approach. While going through the topics he made us write down trivial questions like what is source? Give examples of sink? What is the most viscous materials you have seen? etc.

That time we felt, the questions were waste of time, but latter I realized how useful they were for revising the concepts.

For every study session. Spend ten minutes revising what you have already studied. If you have formed those small questions then use them to jog your memory. This ten minutes jogging session not only reinforces the previous studied material but help you begin the next session with a positive momentum.

This three concepts can be applied to mathematics and the other subjects. Just remember, that if you can setup a simple process for your study and follow it consistently, that is more than sufficient to help you tackle any subject that AeSI throws at you.

Good luck!!

If you have some specific tip, do chip in and comment!!

Further reading Effective routine and how to study mathematics ?  and How to study mathematics.

6 smart things you can do today to give a great start to your semester.

Here is a list of 6 tips for all AeSI students to give a great start to your new semester.

1. Set a fixed routine.
   Identify the time you will study and the time you will nor study. Fix it.  
   
2. Set minimum hour of study and keep it low.  Maybe just two hours of study at the beginning of the semester is what you want. Keep it light. The aim is to set the minimum hours and stick to it.
   
3. Plan to use the first waking hour productively.
   Once you fill the first hours with the most important work rest of the day you can use to whatever that comes to you. So think about what is the most important task of your life right now and schedule it to the first waking hour of your day.
   
4. Set reminders of the your goals.
   We fall short of goals not because we have low potential but because we forget our goals. We forget to do revision. We forget the intention for which we are working. So set reminders. 
   
5. Set one day for total fun activities.  No Study Day.
   Choose a day when you will not study. Will not do anything related to AeSI and career development. This is your recharge day. Use it to recharge. Be active in all other actions. Try including sport activities.
   
6. Research and set one base book for each subjects that you have for this semester. Setting one base book gives you consistent definitions and understanding. Hoping books is like going to ten tuitions for one subject. Gaining too little with so much hard work. so be smart, stick to one book for at least the first 3 months of the semester.

All the tips that are mentioned above can be implemented right now. so what are you waiting for. Go ahead and create a successful semester.

I am sure you might have your own list of tips, so what are you waiting for write them in comments.

Two things AeSI student should adopt in 2010

This year whatever your goals or resolution is, if you are student of AeSI then there are two things I would like you to adopt.

• One is study with a set routine.
• The other is don't miss classes and use them where most of your learning takes place.

Adopt this two habits and make them a part of your life and you won't have to struggle all semester.

All the best and a have a great year ahead!!!

Read more on how to set your routine? and How to start next semester with a Bang?