Many students at Dartmouth may struggle with time management due to the fast pace of the 10 week term and numerous academic, extracurricular, and social commitments. The ASC has compiled a list of free time management apps below that can help you plan, prioritize, and complete tasks in a more timely and organized manner.
Flora (free)
“Forget water, grow your garden with focus and concentration”
Flora is an app designed to gamify your ability to concentrate. Set a timer for how long you want to focus, and if you do not open another app during that time - you grow a tree! Open another app, and your tree dies. The more you concentrate, the bigger a garden you have. If you choose to, you can put a price on your focus where Flora will charge you anything above $5 if your tree dies; the money goes to planting trees in rural communities. If you get a phone call your tree does not die, so you can still respond to emergencies if need be. You can collect your concentration trees in your ‘garden’ and the app gives you an optional daily summary of your ‘time growing trees’. Other cool features include being able to plant seeds with other people! Whether you’re trying to stay off your phone during dinner or working on a group project, you can grow a tree together if both people resist the urge to look at their phones.The app is free and available to both Android and IOS users.
Plan (free)
"Sometimes it's best to go with the plan"
Plan app is both a planner and a project manager all in one. It allows you to add things to a calendar and a daily agenda (including to-do lists for those list lovers out there) with due dates if you would like to. It helps manage group projects particularly, where people can assign tasks to others and track everyone’s progress by creating a new ‘Workspace.’ Documents can be shared via Plan using Google drive too! Not only can you manage your work life here, but you can plan your personal life too. Make categories of different types of tasks and how important they are. Use this app to make to-do lists both for your CVS run and your economics class! The app also organizes your data into a fact sheet, which is cool - it tells you how many people, places and activities you have had contact with, been to, or done; as well as your average hours per task, average days to complete tasks, and time spent by list. It can be used online on any sort of computer through the web, but the app is only available on iOS (Apple devices).
Remember the Milk (free)
"The ultimate to do list"
This app can be used to create lists of things you need to accomplish on a specific day. These lists are organized according to different parts of your life (school, work, personal, etc.) and the tasks on them can be broken down by day or by week, have set priorities, due dates, and be repeated. You can share your lists and delegate tasks to others on Remember the Milk which makes setting a large amount of reminders and recurring tasks very simple to do.
Focus Keeper (free)
“Tangible Productivity”
Focus Keeper is an app that helps you do Pomodoros. If you’re not familiar with the Pomodoro Method, you will study for one Pomodoro which is 25 minutes, take a five minute break, then do another Pomodoro, and repeat until you have finished four Pomodoros. Every four Pomodoros, you will take a longer break, often between 15 and 30 minutes. The Pomodoro Method helps you maximize focus and productivity during your study periods. Please note that while you are studying or on break, the clock ticks for the entire 25 or five minutes. If you don’t like the ticking, you can always turn your volume off, but if you do, you will not be able to hear when the alarm goes off. You may find that Focus Keeper is a good tool for you if you have solid self-discipline and want the clock ticking to function as a sort of white noise in the background while you study.
Studious (free)
“A hub for all your planning needs”
Studious is an app that consolidates all your planning needs. Once you input your class schedule, the app will silence your phones during these times automatically, which reduces distraction. The app also will send you reminders at regular intervals to let you know when your homework assignments are due and when your upcoming exams are scheduled. Its built in features for scheduling will allow you to plan when you will work on different assignments and engage in various extracurricular activities. You can even centralize your academics in one place by tracking your progress in each class with up-to-date scores, task lists, and grades.