Your Study Environment
Where are you going to set up your work area? And how will this impact the rest of the household? With dialup connections, the PC is almost always right next to the telephone; with cable broadband, near the TV. Both are very poor choices as you can see. Improvising at the dining room table won’t last long. The height is all wrong, and no dining room chair will be comfortable for extended periods.
You’re going to need space for your books, a printer, and other office supplies - like ink-jet or laser cartridges, paper, file folders, calendar, etc. and a good reading lamp. In short, you need a home office. If you have a spare bedroom, that’s ideal, but you may have to shoehorn something into a few feet in a corner of a room. (I do more printing than most people I know, so I switched to a monochrome laser and cut the cost per page nearly in half over color ink-jet. The trick with either one, though, is to do your printing in batches once every two or three days.)
You can cram in a lot into minimal space with a well-designed computer workstation; or you can buy a folding 5- or 6-foot ‘banquet’ table and an office chair for about the same price. Any of these are much closer to the proper height for keyboarding and reading than your kitchen or dining room table.
Next, you really need a comfortable office chair. I’ve been very satisfied with the one I bought in the middle of the pack as far as features and price. The problem here is that you’ll have to physically go to an office supply to really find an assortment and put each to the test; so much the better if you can buy the same make and model on eBay or amazon or somewhere else cheaper.
My smartest investment was a reading lamp from Ott-Lite. In fact, I was so impressed with the one I originally bought for my piano, that I bought a table model for my desk and a floor model for my favorite reading chair.
All these can break your budget, but they are things you really need and all of them have a service life that should take you beyond undergraduate and graduate school. The real test, though, is whether what you set up makes you eager to go back for your next session because the environment you have set up is pleasant and comfortable, or not.
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Comments
Online learning is a wonderful opportunity for some while others will find it completely impossible. I love anything and everything computer related so when I found out I could go for my degree online instead of finding a sitter for the kids and paying the outrageous prices for gas I was immediately IN!
My learning environment changes from day to day…it all depends on who’s home, what the plans are for the day and if its not summer…where am I working…I am a substitute teacher while working for my full teaching degree. There are days where I’ll go “hide” in my bedroom with the laptop or days like today that I will be on the main computer in the “home office” which is located in the kitchen.
There are also days where I’ll meet my friend at the park r library and we’ll bring our kids. Whatever the mood of the day is and the temperature. Being in Las Vegas…it can get HOT!!
I agree with everything that Henry has said. My addition to that is something I have considered the smartest move (except for deciding to go back to school) I have made; a laptop with wireless capabilities. For me, having a television and a couch within walking distance is too tempting. I try to do the majority of my work at my local library where wireless is available. It is quiet (for the most part) and if I need suddenly realize I need a book for a reference, it’s right there usually. If it gets too noisy, I have some instrumental music downloaded and I put my headphones on and it helps me focus on what i’m doing. With the laptop I can work anywhere. It does require some forethought, like making sure I have copies of assignments that I may need at the library. I know this may be cost prohibitive for some, but the prices are coming down every day. Just make sure you have enough memory and power so you can download lessons and other information you need. Some of the lower end laptops may not meet your requirements so make sure you check it out before purchasing. WGU has this information readily available.
My wife and I both use a very simple desktop from IKEA for about $35 (http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/S79831622). We have an attachment on one of the table legs that gives us a drawer.
I have found that I don’t really keep all of my books at my desk. Too much clutter. I pull out what I need from the bookshelf in the other room and put it back when I’m done.(Or so the theory goes
My biggest obstacle is that I am not able to afford a separate computer from the “family” computer. My wife’s computer is a business computer for her business and is kept separate from young children possibly messing things up. Therefore, my computer IS set up in the living area with the TV and multiple distractions.