Ahhh #midtermszn… the part of the year that approaches before we know it…the part of the year where the amount of time we stare at a screen or paper exponentially increases while the amount of sleep exponentially decreases…and the amount of anxiety we have increases while the amount of sanity we have decreases…
Enough of that! The best way to make midterm season not seem like a chaotic apocalypse is to try our best to stay organized throughout the season.
After a year at college and spending last semester literally getting tutored on how to develop better organizational skills, I have found the following ways to be very effective:
Use Google Keep and color code your priorities.
As a person who LOVES colorful things, I put things I need to do today in red, things I needed to do today or tomorrow in orange, and went down the whole rainbow to eventually optional tasks in purple. You can organize your notes however you want and can share them to others.
As soon as you know you’re going to want to do something later, set a reminder.
I’m not sure about other smartphones, but for iPhones the reminders application is quick and easy to use; the other day I timed myself how long it would take to remind myself to print something out later, and it took only 8 seconds.
Google Calendar.
I’m not sure about other schools, but at Bucknell, it’s becoming more trendy to use Google Calendar. What’s so handy about it is that you can checkmark when you want to overlap your calendar with someone else’s, that way if you want to make plans with someone like working on a project, all you have to do is checkmark the person’s name and both of you can agree in a few seconds when you’re available. No more back-and-forth questioning “are you free at this time?”
Jot down your plans on a calendar pad.
Don’t like typing? Calendar pads are great placeholders to put on your desk while also being easily accessible whenever you’re at your desk doing work and need to plan events coming up.
Get a trendy, cute agenda.
I used to not think much of agendas but what I discovered is that I love adding trendy and cute qualities to tasks to make it more tolerable. The agenda I have now has a bunch of cute stickers and pages with trendy patterns and it makes writing down what I have to do more fun. Add your own spice when being organized so that it makes it more enjoyable for you and in a better mood!
Allow yourself break time.
I know how it feels to be in the middle of something and not want to take a break. However, if you don’t split up work time, your brain is going to feel fried after doing hours of work and it’ll be even harder to delve back into it again.
And amongst all these methods, don’t forget to TREAT YOURSELF. It’ll give you an incentive to work even harder on your papers or study harder for your tests. And bonus if it’s a healthy choice because your body will love you for it too!