How you manage your time is vital for success when studying – poor time management can result in missed classes, missed information, and late assignments. You want to avoid these issues as much as possible in order to meet your deadlines and study successfully. There are seven key ways in which you can improve your time management. Read on to find out what these tips are and how they help you in managing your time effectively.
1 – Define and Prioritize tasks
The first step to successfully managing your time is going over your tasks, understanding what each task involves, and prioritizing which tasks you need to complete first. A good way to do this is to define each task that you need to complete – write down exactly what it is in clear terms so that you can easily understand what you need to achieve at a glance. This will help you start your work with an organized mindset and confidence in what you have to achieve.
2 – Break Up Big Tasks
As a student, you are likely to have some larger tasks to complete, such as essays, presentations, or dissertations. It is easy to become overwhelmed by these larger, longer-term projects, so in order to keep calm and organized, break up bigger tasks into smaller ones that are more manageable. You will be able to complete these smaller tasks in shorter amounts of time, allowing you to take the necessary breaks to maintain motivation and energy. Study sessions for these smaller tasks will be easier to schedule, as you can break them down into one-two hour time slots.
3 – Use a Checklist
In order to maintain good time management, it is vital to make a checklist. This helps you to keep track of how much work you have completed, particularly when you have broken up bigger tasks into small ones in order to make them more manageable. It may be worth making smaller individual checklists for larger projects to outline what smaller tasks correspond to which projects. This means that you can work through one checklist at a time, and one checklist per project.
4 – Create Rewards
Studying can be draining and often demotivating. It is important that to effectively manage your time and stay on track, you reward yourself with rest breaks and treats. This could be giving yourself a break for self-care – a shower, bath, face mask, or walk – or taking time to cook a meal or have a snack. You should also set larger rewards for when you have completed larger projects, such as a day out doing something you like, or visiting friends.
5 – Set a Schedule
Time management is almost impossible without setting yourself a schedule. Set out what times you work most effectively (morning, afternoon, or evening) and plan your schedule around this. Make sure that when you are writing out your schedule you include breaks – it is advised that you take a break at least once an hour for five to twenty minutes. Sticking to a schedule will help you to complete work to the correct deadlines without last-minute stress.
6 – Use Audext.com for transcribing lectures
One of the key aspects of good time management is a good note-taking. This is where Audext.com can help you. Audext.com is a transcription service that works with audio to text converter technology, allowing you to record and transcribe your lectures, seminars, or classes. This means that it is far easier to reference back to different topics that have been covered in your studies and obtain the correct information for assignments, revision, and projects. With the help of Audext.com you will cut down the amount of time that you will spend searching through notes for information – you can simply return to your lecture content in easy to follow text form.
7 – Set Realistic Goals
Lastly, it is important that you set realistic goals for yourself. In order to effectively manage your time, you need to think realistically about how much work you can do in a set time and adjust your aims accordingly. This may involve altering your schedule and checklists so that they are achievable, and planning ahead so you do not get caught out by your deadlines.