Arranging your priorities starting from the big picture and going into details helps you to identify what you need to do for each school subject and extra-curricular task, and in what order you should perform them according to their importance and urgency.
Here are some tips to help you organise yourself and be more effective in what you do. Planning is the key, so try to prepare both long-term and daily plans.
- At the beginning of each school term: mark on the calendar the main deadlines, the assignments and the tests, and also the holidays that your school has planned.
- Each Sunday, take time to create a weekly schedule with the classes that you have every day, the assignments and tests planned for that week, besides out-of-school activities. You need to update it as the week progresses and tasks are added to your obligations.
- Every evening you should also make a daily schedule for the following day, filled with the tasks to be done, taken from weekly and term calendars, in addition to what you did not manage to complete the previous days.
- When you’re done with programming your activities, start accomplishing the most difficult tasks first: you’ll do them when you’re still fresh and have more energy.
- Find dedicated study spaces where you do not have easy access to distractions, and stick with them.
- Try to avoid procrastination: when you have a plan, respect it and you will be able to complete all your tasks.
- Create blocks of study time of about 40 to 50 minutes: in order not to overload your brain, allow yourself some breaks, have a short walk and refresh your neurons. There are some techniques that can help you to manage time, one of these is called The Pomodoro Technique.
- Joining study groups may also help you out with the subjects you struggle most, but be careful with the reliability of your resources, being them people, books or the web.
- Get exercise, eat right and allow you enough sleep: you’ll gain concentration during study time.
- Try to review your lecture notes immediately after classes, in order to have them still clear in your mind.
- Flexibility is strategic: allow extra time in case you realise you need longer to accomplish some tasks; don’t let it become your routine, though.
- Add a check mark for each activity that you have accomplished to do, so to have a clear picture of what is left to be done. Moreover, it is really satisfying to tick the items you have completed.
- Last but not least tip, do your school work first and let fun activities for later.
If your organisation has been effective, when you’re done with the to-do list, have some fun and relax, you earned it.