Library Research and Study Skills: Time Management

As a college student you will learn very quickly the value of their your when you are struggling to balance work, school and a social life. With so much to do it can be easy to become overwhelmed, stressed and eventually burnt out. Students can help themselves stay sane and still get everything done by developing good time management skills early on. These skills will not only be valuable during your time at school but can carry over later into the workplace. Here are some important basics of time management.

1. Write things down. With so much going on it’s hard to remember every little thing you have to do — unless you write it down of course. Get a student planner or a notebook to take down all your important engagements, assignments and more.
2. Don’t take too many hours. Unless you’re ultra ambitious, taking more than 18 hours a semester is unnecessary and will result in extra stress and less time to concentrate on each class. Take a reasonable number of classes each semester so you won’t feel completely overwhelmed.
3. Stay organized. You’ll save yourself loads of time later by staying organized from the get-go. Instead of having to hunt around for notes, assignments and misplaced papers, keeping them all in one place makes studying and doing homework easier and less stressful.
4. Focus on one thing at a time. Multitasking may seem like a good idea, but really you’ll get more done by focusing your energy on one task at a time. Once you’ve finished one thing you can check it off your list and move onto the next.
5. Take charge of your time. At the end of the day, only one person has control over how you spend your time, and that’s you. Take charge of your day, get important things done and learn to say no if you have to.
6. Resist the urge to procrastinate. Everyone knows how hard it is to want to stay in and study for finals when it’s perfect outside or you’ve just gotten a new video game. The world is full of distractions, and to really be effective at managing your time you have to find a way to ignore them when it counts. Give yourself little breaks as rewards for not putting off tasks.
7. Get an early start to your day. College students aren’t usually known as early bird types, but you can be doing yourself a huge favor by getting up early. You’ll have more time during the day to work on homework and study, which will leave your evenings free to do things you enjoy.
8. Learn material the first time around. If you don’t understand something in your classes don’t just gloss over it and assume you’ll learn it later. Take the time to ensure you learn it the first time. It can help you to more easily understand concepts that follow and will save you the time of revisiting the topic later.
9. Control your surroundings. While you can’t always make your study environment distraction free, you can do your best to create an environment that is most conducive to getting work done. Go to the library, put on headphones or whatever it takes to keep you from straying off task.
10. Have confidence in your abilities. Sometimes your schedule will seem almost impossible. Have confidence that you can do things, and you may surprise yourself when you truly step up to the challenge. You’ll never know how much you can do unless you test yourself, so give yourself opportunities to shine, even under pressure.
11. Get the most out of class. If you’re just going to class to sleep or talk to you friends, you’re wasting time you could be using to do other things. Read over class materials ahead of time so you have a rough idea of what class will be about. This will allow you to concentrate on the elements of the lessons that are truly important and make it easier for you to study in the future.
12. Know what’s important to you. Everyone has a different idea of what they want to take out of college. Some people want to get perfect grades and others are more concerned with making friends and building relationships. Figure out what things are most important to you and concentrate the bulk of your energies on those.