Time management
Table of contents
Time spent on various courses and related learning tasks
When working on smaller learning tasks or writing a bachelor’s or master’s thesis, it’s important to have a clear idea of what parts and steps are involved and how much time they take. Remember to allocate time for things like planning your work, working on drafts, and finalising the task.
Having a regular writing rhythm also helps to keep the work on track. In other words, you should not put your writing work aside for too long, but rather maintain a steady working rhythm with a schedule that includes intermediate goals.
Planning your schedule
Managing your time will be easier if you pay attention to things like the following:
When planning your schedule, start by writing down the key points:
- When should the learning task or thesis be ready?
- Write down the deadline in your calendar, for example.
- Write down the deadline in your calendar, for example.
- What are the different parts of the learning task or thesis and how much time do you estimate you will need for them? What can you get done in a month, a week, a day or an hour? Set yourself concrete intermediate goals, such as:
- Find suitable sources.
- Read source material X and make notes on it.
- Plan the structure of the text.
- Write one chapter or section of text by a certain date.
- What time of day do you work most efficiently?
- In your plan, take into consideration how you prefer to work. What kind of work tasks suit you best in the morning, afternoon, or evening? Schedule
tasks that require concentration at times when you’re most energetic.
- In your plan, take into consideration how you prefer to work. What kind of work tasks suit you best in the morning, afternoon, or evening? Schedule
- Is your schedule flexible and does it allow for changes?
- Be realistic about your schedule and take personal commitments and potential surprises into account.
- Be realistic about your schedule and take personal commitments and potential surprises into account.
- Will you have enough time to rest and enjoy your free time?
- Rest and a healthy work–life balance are important.
You can make your schedule in whatever format suits you best, for example, in a dedicated calendar, Gantt chart, Excel or on paper. As for planning your work weeks and days, different may be helpful.
Remember to stick to your schedule and update and revise it as necessary.
Help with time management
Do you need more support with time management? This topic is covered in the Centre for Multilingual Academic Communication’s UVK courses and in the course HYVY001 Brush up your Academic Learning - Skills over Credits. You can also contact the Goodie wellbeing advisers.
Here are some online resources to support you and give you ideas for managing your time: