College Orientation: Assessing Your Strengths and Weaknesses

Perhaps you're wondering if you should even go to freshmen orientation. Maybe you're thinking that it's all in the handbook or catalog, and, besides, you can find all your classes on your own now. Don't make this mistake. This article will tell you what sort of material will probably be covered, and what frosting-on-the-cake student services to request if it isn't. Make the most of this opportunity. I guarantee you will come away from it with some new amazing information if you follow the guidelines in this article.

First things first. What type of things do most freshmen orientation sessions cover? No doubt the two-day sessions will include:
*Learn more about campus life.
*Meet with academic advisers and discuss classes and major's
requirement
*Meet and mingle with other new students and make new friends.
*Become familiar with the university community.
*Find out what student services are available to you?
*What university resources will you want to take advantage of?
*Learn exciting things about campus life.
*Get help with financial aid.
*Get information about campus employment opportunities and student work-study

program.

*Time management help.
*Complete course selections and registration.
*Learn how to set up university e-mail account.
*Know important dates coming up.
*Become aware of the university's academic expectations.
*Familiarize yourself with campus and community.
*Meet with administrators.
*Explore opportunities to get involved on campus.

So you see, this is not your average official business time-waster, and we haven't even discussed the most important things yet.

What are the important things?:
*Assessing your strengths and weaknesses.
*Get direction to help you eventually choose a major and a career.
*Find out the academic areas that turn you on and avoid those you know
will be a long snooze.
*Learn about the nine types of intelligence, and discover your
strongest learning preferences.
*Get in touch with your likes and dislikes regarding majors and
careers.

The above goals will be met by taking some assessment tests on your own or through the counseling office of your university. They are often free of charge. Some may be offered as part of orientation. If you can't arrange it, you can find all of these tests on the Internet and take them and others like them online.

Which test is for you?

1. The most popular standard testing tool to help people understand themselves so that they can match a major or an occupation to their personality is THe Myer's Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) which was devised using Carl Jung's theory of personality traits. It asks questions about your likes and dislikes. It outlines eight preferences:

*Extroversion or Introversion
*Sensing or Intuition
*Thinking or Feeling
*Judging or Perceiving

Sixteen distinct personality profiles are then generated by these preferences. You will be provided information to help you match the profiles with majors and careers.

2. E. K. Strong developed the Strong Interest Inventory to help people exiting the military in the 1920's find suitable jobs. It has seen been revised to include electronic, computer hardware, marketing and other recent changes in career directions. This questionnaire shows how your interests compare to those of people successfully employed in specific occupations.

3. The Princeton Review Career Quiz has 24 questioned, and begins by asking you to choose between sets of two occupations. For example, "Would you rather be an artist or an accountant?" It then asks about types of work situations. For example, "I usually like to work cautiously" or "I like to work fast".

The results include an interest and usual style, both defined by a color. Interest describes the occupations and job responsibilities you'll like, as well as specific areas of interest. Usual style describes how you like to perform your work, and what types of environments you work most productively in.

4. Another popular and helpful test is David Kolb's Learning Style Inventory. Simply put, knowing your own learning style helps you to become a better learner. Kolb's experiential learning theory builds on the work of Rogers, Jung and Piaget. It also links with MBTI and with #5, The Honey & Mumford Learning Style Questionnaire.

5. The Honey & Mumford Learning Style Questionnaire will help you accelerate your learning as you take on activities that best fit your preferred style. You will learn if you are:

* Activist (Do)
* Reflector (Review)
* Theorist (Conclude)
* Pragmatists (Plan)

6. The 9 Types of Intelligence by Howard Gardner. This test will really help you discern what your learning strengths and weaknesses are. You will learn that the 9 types of intelligence are:

1. Naturalist Intelligence (Natural world smart)
2. Musical Intelligence
3. Logical-Mathematical Intelligence
4. Existential Intelligence
5. Interpersonal Intelligence (People Smart)
6. Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence (Body Smart)
7. Linguistic Intelligence (Word Smart)
8. Intra-personal Intelligence (Self Smart)
9. Spatial Intelligence (Picture Smart)

When you know what your strongest areas of intelligence are, you can rethink how you learn actively and how you study by drawing on those types. For example, if you are very intelligent spatially, you may want to devise your own study aids using diagrams, charts, mind-maps or even flash cards.

Some of the above-mentioned tests as well of other such tests are available at About.com: Homework/Study Tips.

You will be amazed by what you can get out of freshmen orientation if you apply yourself.