10 Steps To Become a More Productive University Student
You have probably started your second term at university with a bang, given that we’re clearly in 2009 now, and some of you will be in hectic research mode for your dissertation, it should be clear that you could be productive with your time during your university years.
With Easter on the horizon, it won’t be long before you’ve got a few weeks off to relax (or revise) and think about how things are going to develop, and at the end of this month having exams, more essays and papers to write.
When on campus your time is limited, there are only so many hours in the day and you’ve got to fit in daily lectures (if you get up in time ;-)), scramble for books in the library (before everyone else gets them), and get up to date with what happen over the last week. You, therefore, want to use the time that you do have productively, because when you’re not there you probably won’t be thinking about it.
I’ve listed the top ten productivity tips that will help you as a university student in the rest of 2009.
Now, you’re probably saying to yourself “here we go, another one of these lists!” and you’d be right, you probably have seen this type of list a thousand times over on a number of other boring and uninteresting sites and some of those mind numbing books that you’re advised to read. Well, this is my take on things and to be honest I have a really short attention span when concentrating on things, so hopefully you’ll learn something new different.
1. Cut out distractions – If you’re at home or at a friend’s, then you’re going to want to eliminate the distractions from around you. Turn the TV off, your mobile and pop a ‘do not disturb’ sign on your door. If you study better when you have some music on, then you should leave it on, just don’t turn on the radio for music as you’ll become distracted will the news, talking and adverts that crop up. Cutting out any unwanted distractions will make sure that you can focus on studying and use your time effectively.
2. Clear your mind – you’ll want to ensure that you’ve not got a hundred and one things on your mind that you have to remember for next week, or that your mind is full of worthless stuff that is happening in your life. When this happens, you’ll want to take a couple of deep breaths and try to relax – you could also try going for a quick walk around the block or popping on facebook for some jucy gossip, but you only want to do this for 10 minutes or so; so, if you decide to do the latter then you should time yourself – spending all evening on facebook might be fun, but isn’t going to be productive to your university studies is it?
3. Go set some goals – where do you expect to get to if you don’t know where you’re going? That’s always one question that you should ask yourself and it doesn’t matter is you’re writing an essay or studying for an exam, you should have an end goal(s) in mind, don’t just mingle along for the sake of it. These goals should set out an end game, where you want to be with a task or achievement. If you were thinking about completing an essay then you could think about going to do some research, or reading a number of chapters in a book or a number of articles to help you understand the topic – not knowing where you’re heading to, and the steps that you have to take, can lead any university student to become confused and annoyed.
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