Since 2018, Guangdong Technion - Israel Institute of Technology has implemented the Peer Mentor (PM) project, through which many GTers take the role as teachers and friends to help new GTers students as they transition to life on campus.

At the beginning of the new semester, the new PM team has already invested in intense orientation work. In their view, working as a PM is a kind of inheritance, passing on the support and warmth brought by the previous PM team, helping freshmen adapt to the transition from high school to university, from exam-oriented education to GTIIT model. Using the abilities of communication, overall planning and other aspects, the team will lead the freshmen to fit in the new group, and cultivate their ability to solve problems independently, so that they can adapt well at GTIIT after the PM project ends.

This year's PM team comes from five different programs. Based on their own experiences, they bring some suggestions on learning and life to the new students, helping them to pass the preparatory semester smoothly.

Q: At GTIIT, how to adapt to the English teaching mode and make better use of the preparatory semester?

Chen Changyang

How to adapt to an all-English teaching mode is a problem that all freshmen will encounter. However, the university has prepared a useful tool for everyone: Pananto. You can access recorded lessons of teachers through Pananto by entering the content you want to watch. Not only can you watch the video repeatedly, but you can also adjust the playback speed. In addition, content like TED talk and, stand-up comedies can also be used as an aid to improve English skills.

Yu Runyang

In the preparatory semester, the teacher will have PPT in class. You can combine the contents of the PPT and the context to understand what the teacher said. At the beginning, there will be a lot of new words that you can’t evade, but don’t give up. The best way is to preview them. Also, you should accumulate and review them after class.

Zeng Xianle

Preview before class

At GTIIT, teachers usually put the PPT on moodle in advance. You can go through the PPT or the relevant new words before class, so that you will feel more confident when listening to the class. Previewing in advance can help you have more interaction with teachers, which is conducive to enhancing your self-confidence.

Be brave to ask and communicate

At GTIIT, the most important thing is to ask questions. Questions represent thinking. Whether in class or after class, teachers are very willing to answer students' questions.

Communicating with teachers can improve your English. The way we used to learn English was mainly focused on input, and as a result we don’t know how to master and use some words and sentence patterns. Communication is the best way to improve your language ability. As long as you practice more in your daily study and life, after the preparatory semester, your English ability will be great.

Lin Ruochong

My advice is to learn more and use more. Learning more entails accumulating and increasing your own English knowledge through preparatory semester classes, including listening, writing and speaking in daily and academic situations. Using more means actively discovering the situation in which you can use English, utilizing what you’ve learned reasonably and efficiently, and solidifying your English ability.

Personally, I adapted to GTIIT’s English teaching mode in the middle of the fall semester of my freshman year. In the communication with the professors after class, I found the tricks of English expression and solved the language problem. Therefore, I strongly recommend freshmen to actively communicate in English in the preparatory semester.

Wang Zhaokun

At the beginning, it is not easy to understand, but this cannot be a reason for giving up. You should try your best. The English used in class has its own specific fields, and there are not many high-frequency words and usages. Pay more attention to them in class at the beginning, and then combine what you learned with the vocabulary list. It should not be difficult to understand. At the same time, taking every opportunity to express, asking questions in class and writing emails to teachers are very good ways.

Lin Jiongxi

I think in addition to listening to the class carefully, watching American TV series is also a good way to improve your English listening and adapt to the English teaching mode.

Qian Xinyu

The preparatory semester is a great time to learn English. In English class, teachers constantly exercise everyone's speaking skills and encourage everyone to ask questions and give speeches, which can consolidate the foundation of your English expression.

Q Do you have any study advice you can give about study?

Yu Haoran

I think the most important thing to study at GTIIT study is to pay attention to the class and learn to review, because there is a lot of new knowledge learned every day, if you don't absorb it in time, it will be very difficult to learn later. Take my program Biotechnology and Food Engineering as an example, it needs to memorize a lot of contents, so the course selection should be adjusted according to your memory and understanding of each person.

Li Yuebo

Find your own learning method, improve your learning efficiency, and make good use of office hours.

Xing Jiani

Personally, I suggest to take ideological and political courses at in year one, because you will have many specialized courses in the second and third years. You can also participate in campus activities to enrich your time and experience the excitement of university life during your freshman year.

Chu Hongshuo

I think that learning is not an involution process but has its specific laws and core ideas. If you want to get a good GPA, listening carefully is necessary. Every professor has his own teaching and questioning style, and they are individual and difficult to change. In this case, what we need to do is to master the core knowledge and use the professor’s teaching and question-setting ideas to think about the problems. Once you have grasped the core ideas and questioning style of each professor, you will be more confident on the exam. This is just a reference for you, I hope you can find a learning method that suits you.

Feng Haoxuan

The courses of Mechanical Engineering and Robotics are very coherent. Once you are behind, it will be hard to catch up. The basic courses such as calculus, algebra, and solid mechanics are very important. The grades in these subjects must be good, otherwise, even if your final GPA is very high, you may be rejected from a famous university. Furthermore, the high-frequency professional terms used in the class must be firmly grasped. If you have free time, you can also study IELTS or TOEFL vocabulary.

Zhao Luohui

The summary at the end of the semester is very important. You must sort out the course knowledge and establish your knowledge framework.

Chen Cheng

Specialized courses learning takes time. You can explore the connection between each knowledge, which can help you have a better understanding. Because of our English teaching mode, you should focus on vocabulary and listening at first. As for physical education classes, the results will be good if you devote yourself to sports. The choice of general education courses can be based on your own interests and at the same time refer to the opinions and experiences of the seniors.

Chen Haojie

When studying basic subjects, you must be serious, arrange your study plan reasonably, try not to wait until the deadline, and make good use of the teacher's office hour. As for English learning, you must focus on words because vocabulary is the foundation of English. Watch more American dramas, communicate in English, and do your best for every presentation.

Chen Songwen

Take the Material Science and Engineering (MSE) that I major in as an example, its courses cover a wide range and are quite difficult. You need to learn both physics and chemistry. For the freshman year courses, Python is a big difficulty, so if you have time, you can learn it in advance. MSE is one of the programs with the most required courses, so physical education and general education courses should be selected according to your credits. For learning methods, I think the most important thing is not to miss classes, not to be distracted in class; to take notes carefully, to understand the knowledge, and to complete the homework independently after class.

After listening to the opinions of Peer Mentors, are you full of confidence for the following study? Due to space limits, tips on living and organizing clubs at GTIIT will be published in the next article, so stay tuned!