So a multimedia text, or a visual text, is something you will analyze in college.
And if you develop the communication literacy, or ability, to be able to
look at those as objects of study, you'll be in great shape for when you enter.
>> Well, students need a variety,
a wide range of skills to prepare for university, but three,
I guess I'd like to mention three that I consider to be particularly important.
The first one is the ability to communicate effectively
with lecturers and tutors.
Because it's important at university to be, if you don't understand things
to be able to speak to your lecturers and your tutors and to ask them questions.
And you might do that face-to-face or you might do it via email.
So for example, it's important to have good email writing skills so
that you can write emails that are polite, clear and effective.
The second skill is really being able to read academic texts,
because students often experience when they come to university,
that there's a big difference between the kinds of texts they're used to reading,
and the kinds of texts they suddenly read at university.
So if they've come from high school, there's often a big difference.
If they're preparing for something like IELTS, there's often a big difference.
And just in general, there's a big difference.
So I would say getting experience with reading textbooks and
journal articles before you go to university.
And the third thing is to become aware that there are many,
many different types of texts that students write at universities.
It's not just essays and reports, there are many different kinds.
And I think being aware of that before you go to university makes it a bit easier.
>> The communication skills students need to better prepare for
university begin with actually reading and listening.
And you might not think that they are actually communication skills but
they're the basis of communicating or speaking and writing.
So what you need to do is to think about the subject that you
think you're going to study.
So perhaps economics,
perhaps political science, perhaps biological science, engineering.
Whatever it is, and do a bit of reading in that area, or
listening, there's lots of online resources there that you can listen to,
and of course, visual as well.
And whatever catches your eye, maybe make some notes about that,
actively questioning some of the things or the things that you find particularly
interesting in that reading or what you're listening to.
So that will help you to develop your writing skills.
And the other thing to do is to perhaps talk about whatever it was
that really caught your eye or interested you to your friends, to your family.
Because these are the things that are going to really engage you
when you get into the university context.
And that's a really good preparation before you actually get into the uni.
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