<p>I'm starting two summer classes in a few weeks and I want to know how you stay organized. I was a procrastinating scatterbrain for my first year of college and want to change my ways.</p>
<p>Do you use a planner, a calendar, a to-do list? Do you map out your day/studying, or just do it whenever you can? How many hours a day do you study? When do you start studying for a midterm?</p>
<p>My English project was about this, or more specifically “Stress in College.” </p>
<p>Basically:
-Know your class syllabus. The due dates for assignments and test dates will be on there.
-If you have time between classes that can be used to get a little work done, do it. You don’t want to be up all night doing work when you can be having fun.<br>
-know where your classes are and when they start
-cramming for exams usually never work, study moderately </p>
<p>^^^That’s just the organizational/academic part of my project on college stress. </p>
<p>I didn’t use a planner or anything like that because our school has a website that does that for us. For studying, it depends on the class I didn’t take any hard classes yet so I only gave myself a couple days of studying before the midterm and still aced them ( I have a final this Monday that I can get 68% on and still get an A in the course).</p>
<p>I have a monthly calendar on my computer desktop, use mozilla sunbird, keep a planner, use a monthly wall calendar, and i have a marker board that i scribble important stuff on. For how scattered I am, it is the only way to guarantee I will both write something down AND look at it again before it’s due. lol</p>
<p>I don’t map out my day because when I do I can’t adhere to it and then I get nothing done. I study four or five hours a day. I study for exams every weekend, and every day in the week/two weeks leading up to the exam. Rather than schedule out my whole day of studying, I set an order that things must be accomplished in. I get less stressed out and get more done that way than if I schedule a start and end time for each assignment.</p>
<p>Use a planner, those things actually work.</p>
<p>Learn proper time management.</p>
<p>“cramming for exams usually never work”</p>
<p>works for me</p>
<p>How do you stay organized and manage your time?</p>
<p>I don’t.</p>
<p>I use MS Outlook for everything…use the calendar feature to fill in classes, meetings, appointments, etc; use the task list to list assignments and stuff and their due dates.</p>
<p>Virginia Tech’s Web site has a nice time management link. It has you figure out where you waste time and how much time you spend doing different things. Then there are suggestions. You might look at it; I have my students look at it at the beginning of the semester.</p>
<p>Time management is a euphemism for studying 8 hours a day.</p>
<p>the best thing you can do is develop a routine. Humans are creatures of habit. Set aside time that you study. It may not even have to be every day. I used to take Tuesdays off from schoolwork during the week.</p>
<p>It was hard for me to focus in my room (people stop by, tv is on, i have a napping problem, etc) so find a place on campus that no one will bother you. I prefer the library because its quiet and my friends never go there.</p>
<p>I always make a list of “to dos” on my small whiteboard or post-it the day before. It includes homework, exams, essays, meetings, etc. Just cross out each thing when you complete it. Works for me.</p>
<p>I have a planner, but mine is really an appointment book. Every day is mapped out from 7am-7pm in a vertical column and it makes it very easy for me to figure out where I’ll be (class, etc) and when. It also shows me visually when I have huge chunks of free time, so I can fill them in with hanging out with friends, studying, or procrastinating. I just write the assignments in my planner on the date/time they were assigned and the date/time they’re due.</p>
<p>I always use a planner during Fall/Spring semesters. Instead of writing down assignments only when they’re assigned or when they’re due, I transfer all uncompleted assignments into each day’s to-do list (with specific due dates attached). I know it sounds overbearing and unnecessary, but it holds me accountable: every assignment I need to complete by a certain date is tallied every day so I can’t ignore it. It’s also a daily reminder since I have to manually transfer them.</p>
<p>It really only takes 2 minutes.</p>
<p>I’ve found it very useful. In summer session, I usually don’t do this, so I end up just reading for pleasure most of the day and cramming for tests. This is fine because summer session is easier, but it wouldn’t be very appropriate for the regular semesters.</p>
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<p>It works for you to get an A or it works for you to learn as much as you can/want? Personally, I’ve found I can get A’s with cramming, but not really learn satisfactorily.</p>
<p>Buy Cal Newport’s books. Read them. Live by them.</p>
<p>I lived by organization via written notes. Whenever I need to remember something I just write notes down and put them everywhere. For really important stuff I put it in two places- like right beside my computer and on my alarm clock. Putting notes on my alarm clock has always been my favorite way to remember stuff, lol. I tend to just forget a lot of things so I have to write notes everywhere. I think I once even put notes on my car steering wheel…but it did help! I also make to-do list, but sometimes I forget to look at those, or I just ignore it…</p>
<p>I also use iCal on Mac and I love it! Especially since you have the nice reminder that pops up when you need it too. I also have a desk calendar now, but that doesn’t really help because I usually forget to look at that too. Yeah, I’m that bad…</p>
<p>As far as time management goes, I’ve always worked and gone to school so I’ve just lived by the philosophy of “whenever I have the time for it”. I wasn’t able to set aside a certain time to study every day, so I just did whatever I could whenever I could. Not a very effective way to do college, might I add! But it’s what I had to do at the time.</p>
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<p>I read some reviews and these looks pretty promising, thanks for the suggestion</p>
<p>Get a group of friends that want to do well in the class (this is the important part), and study together as much as possible. I think it’s easier to get focused in a group, and other people can often help you if you don’t understand a certain concept.</p>