Lesson Overview

What We Cover Here!

Lesson overview
Developing a schedule that works for you
Breaking up a task
Time management and lectures
Time management checklist
Points to keep in mind and helpful resources

Time Management is the key to your success and is a skill that is continually developing as our lives adjust to daily demands. University life is exciting, but it can also be stressful when you feel like you don’t have enough time to get everything done. You might suddenly find that your world is very busy, and you may be having difficulty working out how and what to prioritise. Or the complete opposite may be true. You might feel that, since you have started college, it feels like you have loads of time on your hands. You might even miss the structure of the second level school system.

Managing your time efficiently allows you to feel in control of your time and helps you to get all your assignments done with plenty of time to relax and have fun. This lesson aims to explore different strategies for planning your time and will help you gain insights into how to achieve the study/work/social life balance and integrate your academic life with your personal life.

Developing a Schedule that Works for You

Firstly, you should consider large chunks of your time, which can be reviewed and broken down later. This schedule maps your main tasks of the week. This shows how much of your time is taken up by only a small amount of the weekly tasks. It is not the same for all students but consider if anything stands out to you. For example, does your travel to college afford you time to study or can you free up time in the evening?

Time Blocking

The practice of planning out every moment of your day in advance and dedicating specific time ‘blocks’ for tasks and responsibilities. This may look like:

A standard to-do list tells you what to do
Time blocking tells you when to do it
Include weekends or get a monthly overview
Add as many different calendar categories as needed

Using Calendars and Planners

Due to Umail being a Gmail account, UCC students have access to a Google calendar via their Umail accounts. You can access your calendar via Google Apps, once you have signed into your student account. You can download the app for your phones, tablets and can link it to the main calendar app on your phone.

You can use different online calendars for different activities, and they can be synced together, (i.e., Outlook or Google calendar). You can create several calendars within the Google calendar to differentiate the type of activities you are doing by colour.

Include specific times for college tasks like lectures, tutorials, reading, and assignments. Also schedule personal and work activities like family, friends, exercise, and hobbies.

Breaking up a Task

The Pomodoro Technique

The following step-by-step guide on how you can complete your tasks is based on the Pomodoro technique:

Decide on the task to be done
Set the Pomodoro timer (traditionally to 25 minutes)
Work on the task
End work when the timer rings and put a checkmark on a piece of paper
If you have fewer than four checkmarks, take a short break (3–5 minutes), then go to step 2
After four Pomodoro's, take a longer break (15–30 minutes), reset your checkmark count to zero, then go to step 1
You can adept the timespan as needed for your work

NOTE: There are many free apps out there and will do all of these steps for you.

Eat the Frog

Another good way to manage your time is to do the "Eat the Frog Method". This is when you start your day or afternoon, whenever suits you, by tackling the task you are dreading the most. Once you complete the most difficult task first, everything else will seem easier. It also means that you can alleviate any anxiety and stress from repeatedly putting something off.

Time Management and Lectures

Be on time and get a good seat
Have your pen and paper/laptop ready
Streamline your pre lecture choices to reduce distraction
Avoid sitting with friends if it is a distraction
What are the learning outcomes and objectives. See UCC Book of ModulesLinks to an external site.
Regularly check Canvas and student account emails
Have you any unanswered questions?
Remember that you have access to your lecturer during their official office hours
Can you ask your academic tutor the question?
Is there anything you need to do (or should do) in preparation for the next lecture

Time Management Checklist

When developing your personalised schedule, try to consider the following points. This will help you review and be realistic about making changes to become as efficient as possible. Firstly, your calendar should be reviewed on a weekly basis and, as time goes on, it will need to be looked at less.

Requirements, Priorities and Responsibilities
Choice
Honesty/Realism
Sustainability
Enjoyability
Well-Roundedness
Big Picture Thinking
Cull/Review
Discipline vs. Procrastination

Requirements, Priorities, and Responsibilities

What is it that you must do each semester (i.e., lectures, tutorials, assignments, exams)?
What will take up most of your time?
Family/voluntary obligations
What other priorities do you have (i.e., taking care of your mental and physical health, running a marathon, learning a new language)?
Do you have to work part time?

Honesty and Realism

Be honest with yourself
Get a clear picture about what you need to do and what you want to do (Mind mapping may help at the start)
Observe your own response to your schedule and see how you feel about your schedule
What is your capacity to realistically achieve what is on your schedule?
Is your schedule over ambitious?
Could you add more but are under scheduling?
Are you punishing/cheating yourself?
Have some white/blank space in your schedule

Sustainability

Are you happy to partake in the schedule you have created for yourself?
Are you setting yourself up for burn out or a challenging yet achievable schedule that will enhance your life?
Is your schedule ordered and tidy?
Is it a workable system?
Does it make sense to you in how it flows as a system?

Enjoyability

Will you actually enjoy your days and weeks over the course of your study?
Will you be at ease, or constantly stressed?
- This does not mean that you enjoy every single activity on your calendar, but that you enjoy your overall time allocation

Well Roundedness

Your schedule should allow enough time for:
- 8 hours of sleep
- Good nutrition and time for cooking/preparing meals
- Exercise/movement
- Community (friends/clubs)
- Rest
- Joy/fun and ‘me-time’
Do you view academic work as an integral part of or separate to your ‘real life’?

Big Picture Thinking

Why are you doing what you are doing? Short term? Long term?
What does your time and schedule create for you in practical terms?
Does the schedule need to be reviewed more regularly?
What are your1/3/5-year plans?
What can you do now to get a step closer to those goals?

Cull and Review

Things do not always go to plan and flexibility is important in any schedule
Do you need to cull or review elements of your schedule because it takes from main priorities or are not sustainable?
What would make your time and schedule flow well? (This can be reviewed regularly)
Be open to try ‘out of the norm’ schedule decisions
- Get up earlier (e.g., 5am) and go to bed earlier if that works for you
- Grocery shop only once/twice a week to save time
- Meal prep on Sunday afternoons

Discipline vs Procrastination

Do you honestly practice discipline around your time?
- If so, what are your strengths?
- If not, what are your weaknesses and how can they be dealt with in a sustainable way?
Discipline is not punitive; it is the structures freedom to excel. However, procrastination may be symptomatic of a problem in the scheduling system which needs to be reviewed
Try to build habits to get repetitive tasks done on autopilot

Time management is for you. It is not supposed to be a punishment or feel like one. Maybe you need to combine certain things to get them done. For example, always wash your clothes after you come home from swimming.

Video: UCC Skills Centre: How to manage your time: GIMME TWO MINUTES

https://youtu.be/S4umyNPVDgg

Points to Keep in Mind and Helpful Resources

Points to Keep in Mind

Busy is not a badge of honour, it is a lack of prioritising your own life
Time management is only for you, and you can do (almost) everything with it as long as it works for you- No one is judging!!
It will take a few trials before you find the right schedule for your life
Don’t be afraid to try different methods

Helpful Resources

Bullet journalling
- https://bulletjournal.com/
- Lots of YouTube Videos
Time blocking
- Reading: https://blog.rescuetime.com/time-blocking-101/
- Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MFFzIxHy9k

Have a look around for paper planners and decide on what is the best layout for you

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Time Management skills & techniques