Spent the whole weekend, net of time taking kids to activities and parties, and attending Exam Review Session for Microeconomics on campus, preparing for Financial Accounting Final Exam, which is already on Wednesday.
I have to admit it is quite a brutal subject for a ‘right brain’ person like myself. As professor mentioned in class “Accounting is not really hard, like variable calculus, it is just complicated”. Complicated it is indeed.
I managed eventually to understand the things I missed on my quiz (professor posted correct answers on the blackboard already). I just realized how clueless I was at the quiz. The reason for that was my preparation method. I was trying to follow professor’s writings on the board during the class when he was showing various accounts and their effects. Most of the time I thought that I quite comprehended what he was doing. That’s why at home I was trying to supplement my class experience by reading straight through the assigned chapters in the textbook. This was a gross mistake.
Because my ‘feeling’ that I understood and retained the classroom material turned out to be misleading. Without keeping working on the problems to fortify understanding of whatever I got in class, it was out of my head in a couple of days.
The syllabus had a very strong warning against this pitfall, and I wish I heeded to that much earlier. Here is the excerpt from the syllabus:
“In reading the text, I suggest you begin each chapter by reading the assigned problems at the end of it….Without yet reading the chapter, using only your judgment and the knowledge of basic accounting principles that you gained in your first course in the subject, try to answer it. If you get stuck, it will probably not be because you can’t think of any way to proceed, but rather because you can think of several, and you are unsure which one is right (or rather which one has become generally accepted). In this way, get interested in the chapter, then use it as you would a reference work, looking for the answers to those questions, then return to the questions and finish answering them. After that, read the chapter straight through, which I think you’ll be able to do with more profit using the beachheads you established in it while working the problems. I suggest this approach because the detail in the reading can be overwhelming, and trying to read the textbook cold and then do the problems seems to me comparable to reading a dictionary in an attempt to learn all the words before talking to anyone or reading anything else.
I emphasize the need to work the problems for several reasons. The most important one is that, without doing so, you cannot learn the material. Trying to learn accounting without working problems would be like trying to learn to swim without getting wet.”
So during the weekend I focused on the problems we have had over the half-term, using the textbook only for reference. I recognize now that this approach would most likely have me much better prepared for the final, leave alone the quiz.
But now time is the issue. I definitely out of time to go over all the problems and concepts covered in the course. Just for the record, the issue in Financial Accounting I had the biggest problem with was (and still is) indirect method for Cash Flow statement. I spent most of the time on Sunday trying to solve the problems with this method, and I still don’t get it.
By the way, the reason I was trying to concentrate on straight reading during the course was that in class professor did not really pay significant attention to presenting and explaining concepts. Pretty much all he was doing was cracking the problems and explaining rather succinctly only what was pertinent to the problems in class. But apparently this is how the final is going to be structured. At least quiz did not have any conceptual questions, only practical problems like preparing income statement and balance sheet based on beginning balances and some transactions that occurred during the accounting period. Plus two questions on calculating turnover time for accounts receivable(AR) and inventory.
Anyways, I have hardly any time left for more preparation. As I will have to spend some time on Monday night reviewing materials for my Tuesday Microeconomics final.
