Syllabus, paper, books, articles, and downloads all get very confusing if you don’t have a plan to stay organized… and unlike school, professors don’t remind you about upcoming assignments every day! Follow these steps to get ready.
Print out or collect syllabi for every class. If you have syllabus of each subjects in hand, you will know how much you are supposed to study and how much you have complete so far.
Purchase your books, a stack of unlined 3x5 cards, and a heavy duty, brightly coloured, plastic folder.
Place all your syllabi in your plastic folder. This is your syllabi folder. Keep it with you any time you study, go to the library, or go to class.
One every syllabus, highlight what is due the first week in one colour. Highlight what is due the second week in another colour. Now you can keep an eye on your assignments on a week-by-week basis.
Assign one card for every book. Holding the card vertically, write the dates that you have assignments from that book only, and next to the date, write the pages that must be read. (For instance — Write ‘Chemistry’ on the card. Then in one column, write 9/5, 9/12, 9/19, 9/26, or whatever you have class. Next to the dates, write 1-47, 48-102, 151-160, 161-194, or whatever your assigned reading is.) Use this card as a bookmark, so you know where you left off, and what needs to be done next. Now you don’t have to look in your syllabus to know what to read, just grab the book and go!
Get a write-in calendar or academic planner, and write the assignment due on certain dates. Don’t forget to write down test dates!
Make a ‘Project Syllabus’ for yourself. Write out a chronological list of every assignment that will require more than one sitting to complete. Now you can easily look ahead so you don’t spend all night writing a paper.
Draw or write your schedule on paper or on a computer, so you know when your classes will meet. Now schedule out minimum one hour of study time for every hour of class time. Schedule those study hours and don’t miss them; treat them as permanent commitments. If you can get ahead early, you’ll have some cushion time when your many papers and projects come due at the same time.
Get working! Now you have very little time to spend trying to figure out what needs to be done; you can just do it! — Agencies
