Managing your Time
There are different ways to work and if you're in university you've figured out some kind of system to get work done. If its not be a good system (e.g. I can cram the night before and still pass"), you might not be pleased with how you'll do this year. But university (and life) requires more of you as you go along. So if your work system seems to have stopped working, reflect a bit about how you work and what motivates you.
I urge you to think about how you organize your work because I have found that university students are among the busiest people. At few other times in your life will you be have your attention pulled in so many different directions. You might be taking five classes in five different fields, with different assignments in each due at different times with different expectations. On top of this you might be involved in extra-curricular activites, you likely have a job and you might even want some time to hang out with people who are important to you. This means that you have way more to keep track of than someone working a 9-5 job.
Case study: your professor
When I got to graduate school I (Marc) realized that I had few skills allowing me to tackle big projects. Sure, I was motivated to work when I arrived. I was used to receiving accolades from my undergraduate professors and thrived on positive feedback. But in graduate school, you don't get praise (or at least I didn't, sigh). The biggest compliment tended to be "You did an adequate job". So, I so found myself motivated by fear - fear of criticism or disapproval, fear of seeming stupid in front of my peers. And while I had classes to take, fear worked well to keep me on track.
But there is a time in graduate school when you aren't in classes, you don't see your supervisor for months on end and you just need to work on your own. Its a nice time of the degree – you need to read and think and read and think and read and think and then maybe write a little bit. My previous fear-based system and its Just-In-Time-Production model, did not work anymore. When I needed to write a 300-page dissertation, I didn't have a way to keep me working consistently. It was only then (year 8 or so of university) that I realized spending time proactively making a plan really helped. I got a whiteboard for brainstorming and covered my room in poster-sized sheets of paper filled with my scribbles. Sometimes I would wake up from a sleep and realized I had had a eureka moment in my dream - which I needed to jot down before I forgot what I had realized (they were not always legible or rational...).
People today have loads of digital tools to keep track of deadlines and to help with project planning. It's never a great argument that "things will be easier if you do X now", but that is, I guess, the core of my reasoning.
Why worry about time management
When you have only a few things to do, you can usually keep track of them in your head. But in university there tend to be too many things to keep track of. I'm not sure if a pandemic is simplifying your life (e.g. there are not jobs so you're working less now) or making it more complex (e.g. I used to be able to get all the books I need from the library in an hour and now it takes me days to track down sources I can access online/ via pickup), but your lives are pretty filled with stuff. For many students, you can get away with little planning, in part because professors tend to outline work clearly and space it out in first and second year courses. But if you've ever found yourself surprised that an assignment is due the next day and you forgot about it, this is some evidence that you might be able to benefit from planning.
By planning your work, it will be easier to get it done. You don't spend time in existential angst wallowing about "What am I supposed to do" at the last minute, because, in advance (and when not too stressed about the deadline) you broke down the work into a series of tasks, that you can accomplish.
Breaking work into tasks
There are many different ways to think about work. One of the hardest things about being a university student is that you are often vaguely told "Go write a paper" and are expected to know how to do that. In this class, we will provide some step-by-step instructions for doing some assignments, but as the course continues, we will tell you what to do less and less. The idea is that after you've done it once, you've been given the tools to do it again (even if there are slightly different expectations and the project is different...). The best thing for you to learn to do is to plan - i.e. to break down a project, such as writing an essay into a series of smaller actions to accomplish. Trello allows us a place to do so.
Spend 30 mins once a week trying to write down everything that you need to get done – that week and also anything new to be done in the following weeks. You should also get into the practice of spending some time everyday determining what next steps you need to take. And make them basic and simple steps. Determine your next action for that top to-do that consumes 20 minutes or less, then take it.
For instance, even something like “Clean up desk” is too broad and no good.
It needs to brain-dead and easy to follow without any decision making.
Good “next actions” could include “Type all random to-do scraps into StickyNotes, then discard paper” or “Remove all paper, and stack on floor for later scanning in OneNotes at 5pm (set a reminder in your calendar/ reminder app)”
Steps to write an assignment
A paper which asks you to analyze a primary source has a lot of steps (many of which are outlined elsewhere on the course site). The major steps are:
find the syllabus and read about the assignment again
find your course reader
where did you leave it?
Or, where folder did you put it in when I downloaded the e-book version
what did you rename it when you downloaded it
Look through the reader
check the syllabus again for what primary sources you can write on
choose a primary source you want to talk about
figure out what kind of topic you want to write about: women, war, wine, work?
try to find sources that match you interest
read it
read the words
understand the words
make sense of the source as a whole
Read other things to help you understand the source
go to the online library catalogue
search for information about the field
before you start to search, figure out what are the key words to search for online. Write them down.
have you used Omni before? You might need to factor some time for figuring how to use it.
identify useful articles/ books to consult
acquire them
download
read online
request them. Figure out how to get to campus and pick them up
read them
realize that half aren't useful (return to the previous step)
feel like you understand what is going on in the source
Only at this point, do you actually start thinking about writing...
The important take away from this list is that there are many many tasks which have to be accomplished before you can start to write an assignment. It is very helpful to take time to think through all the tiny steps you need to take before you get to work on your assignments. A good rule for breaking down your work into tasks is that each task can be done in 15-30 minutes. If your task likely will take longer than that, break down the task into further tasks.
Pomodoro Technique
The Pomodoro technique is the practice of choosing one task and making the small commitment of using a timer and spending 25 minutes completely focused on that initiative, followed by short breaks.
Here’s how this technique, pioneered by Francesco Cirillo, works:
Choose a task to be accomplished.
Set a kitchen timer or Toggl for 25 minutes (preferably, a tomato timer).
Work on the task until 25 minutes is up.
Take a short five minute break (this marks the completion of one "Pomodoro").
Repeat steps 1 to 4.
After every four pomodoros, take a longer break such as 20 minutes or more.
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