The fifth edition of FOCUS ON COLLEGE SUCCESS recognizes the varied experiences of today's students and guides them to be more mindful, motivated, productive, and focused. The text's research-based approach builds a solid foundation, helping students to see the relevance of this course. Increased attention is given to diversity, mindfulness, resilience, grit, financial literacy, technology, and productivity, college-related "life hacks," alternative presentation e-tools, and the newest strategies in career planning. Many students today are distracted, over-optionalized, and over-obligated. FOCUS ON COLLEGE SUCCESS addresses these issues head-on, creating teachable moments — and concrete results — in every face-to-face or online learning experience. New for 2021: Empower your students to connect the dots between what they’re learning now and their current or future careers with “How Transferable Are Your Skills?” – a new MindTap activity that challenges students to identify how their personal and academic experiences can help them become career-ready.
1. Becoming Mindful, Building Resilience.
2. Starting Strong, Setting Goals.
3. Learning Styles and Studying.
4. Managing Your Time, Energy, and Money.
5. Thinking Critically and Creatively.
6. Learning Online.
7. Engaging, Listening, and Note-taking in Class.
8. Reading, Writing, and Presenting.
9. Developing Memory, Taking Tests.
10. Working in Teams, Valuing Diversity.
11. Working Toward Wellness.
12. Choosing a College Major and Career.
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Constance Staley
Constance Staley is a professor of communication and acting dean of the Graduate School at the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs, where she directed the First-Year Seminar Program for nearly 25 years. An award-winning teacher, Dr. Staley designs and teaches online courses (Professional Presentations), hybrid courses (Communication, Training and Consulting) and face-to-face courses (Conflict Management). Her works include a faculty training package, TEACHING COLLEGE SUCCESS, as well as the groundbreaking resource manual 50 WAYS TO LEAVE YOUR LECTERN. She also is the author of FOCUS ON COLLEGE SUCCESS and the co-author of FOCUS ON COLLEGE AND CAREER SUCCESS with Steve Staley. A well-known name in FYE circles, Dr. Staley is a leader in faculty development nationwide. During a three-year leave from the University of Colorado, she joined an East Coast Fortune 500 company to design and deliver its management and supervisory training. In addition, she represented the university as a Fulbright Scholar, teaching in the former Soviet Union. She earned a B.S. in education, an M.A. in linguistics and a Ph.D. in communication.
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NEW - Increased Content in Three Areas: financial literacy, alternative e-tools for presentations, and career planning.
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NEW - Up-to-date technology: Staley's own engagement in the latest technologies comes through in her message to students. FOCUS now contains more infographics to capture students' attention and aid comprehension.
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NEW - Life Hacks: Life hacks are brief pointers, often technology-based, to save readers time and help them increase productivity. These short tips are placed in the margins for quick discovery. Without disrupting Staley's unique voice, this edition contains streamlined, yet robust, content for today's busy reader.
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NEW - A Letter for Later: Many chapters include a reflective prompt to help students gain a better understanding of their values, goals, and priorities. Based on Staley's "A Letter for Later" activity in her book 50 Ways to Leave Your Lectern, these short written reflections can be shared with the instructor or saved by students to read months or even years later as a memoir of their first days in college.
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NEW - Revised Reality Checks: FOCUS prompts students to discover personal meaning in what they're learning by completing "Readiness Checks" at the beginning of chapters and revised "Reality Checks" at the end.
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NEW - Revised Chapter 1: "Becoming Mindful, Building Resilience" introduces students to the practice of being "present," so universally sought after in the worlds of business, healthcare, relationships, parenting, sports, the military, and now higher education. The chapter also introduces students to the concept of grit as a set of traits that can and should be enhanced for long-term results.
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NEW - Revised Chapter 2: "Starting Strong, Setting Goals" introduces students to the concept of academic professionalism in the context of goal-setting as a personalized plan for success.
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NEW - New Instructor Annotation Categories: Beyond the traditional categorized instructor annotation, this edition extends instructor annotations to three new categories: "Growth Mindset," "Application Idea" and “Activity Selection."
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FULLY SUPPORTED. Make course prep a breeze with an instructor's manual, PowerPoint slides, and an annotated instructor’s edition that features author notes in the following categories: Diversity Discussion, Teachable Moments, Sensitive Situation, Activity Selection, Teaching with Technology, Application Idea, and Growth Mindset.
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CREDIBLE. Using concrete research to drive all content, this text delivers proof that the college success course matters and improves retention.
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FOCUS ON COLLEGE SUCCESS includes student entrance and exit interviews, which document for faculty and college administrators the fact that students have made progress in the course and illustrate students' reactions to individual sections of the text.
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RELEVANT. FOCUS Challenge Cases in each chapter present actual student profiles that focus on big issues and are immediately engaging. Readers will see their own experiences or those of friends and family and possibly even learn lessons from the "mistakes" of others. The text's unique and personalized learning system emphasizes the four C's of intrinsic motivation: the degree of Curiosity prompted by material, the level of Control over outcomes, the extent of focus on the Career Outlook students are in the process of developing, and the level of Challenge in course work.
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INFO/AFFECT BALANCE. Today's instructors realize that college success has both affective and cognitive components. One of Staley's best traits as a writer is her ability to blend the two seamlessly as an academic "storyteller." Much of the text's affect comes through evocative images and quotations, such that the author helps the instructor "educate the whole student." The updated photo program plugs into student engagement by offering a cast of students posing in real case studies/stories of Staley's students, stimulating students' interest and appealing to their visual learning preferences. The cast appears throughout the book so that readers feel they get to know these 12 students.
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RESEARCH-BASED. This edition contains critical issues to keep students and instructors abreast of the prolific research available on the scholarship of teaching and learning. One of Staley's strengths as an author is a remarkable ability to translate difficult concepts into relevant, contemporary analogies and student-accessible language. Specific areas of new research that are crucial to student success include the effects that being distracted by emails or phone calls have on student success, the time it takes to "reboot" after interrupting a task, the essential role of grit and mindset on college success, and the role a college degree has on a happier, healthier life.
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