Goals
What do you want out of your Dartmouth experience? Make a list, then number the list items in order of importance, and rewrite the list in that order. For example:
Lifelong friends 3 Lifelong friends To get into med school
To get into med school 1 To get into med school To learn time management
To learn time management 2 To learn time management Lifelong friends
Hiking experiences 4 Hiking experiences Hiking experiences
Now that you have your goals in order, organize your time such that you’re spending the most time on your most important goal. If you have a goal that is urgent but not time consuming, such as learning time management skills, make time for it as soon as possible, but don’t spend more time than necessary on it.
Budgeting your time based on your goals will help you feel satisfied with your time spent. You can make a list of long-term goals and weekly short-term goals to help you allocate time for specific projects or studying for an exam. Revise your long-term goals monthly and your short-term goals as needed (daily/weekly).
Planners
The most basic time management tool is a planner. As some meetings might still occur via zoom, I recommend using Google Calendar. With Google Calendar, you can put the zoom link in your calendar and easily access it. We also offer a Dartmouth weekly planner with the start time of courses built in. You can print it out and highlight the time blocks of your commitments, or you can fill it in using text boxes in Microsoft Word.
Now that you have your goals established, you should plan your recurring time blocks according to your long-term goals. Be sure to include rest time. Using the free space, you should add in time for accomplishing your short-term goals.
Other Tips
The Foco lines are long. If you want to be productive while you wait for your omelette, you can pull up a pdf of an assigned reading, (for psychology students: you can do your InQuisitive assignment on your phone), you can review pictures of your notes, or do whatever you can do for your classes and extracurricular commitments. If you have an audio version of readings, you can listen to them while you walk around campus!
Use your goals as a guideline for your priorities, but trust yourself as you determine your priorities throughout the day, and stick to them.
Only concentrate on one thing at a time. This will help you get your work done faster, and you’ll find that you have more time this way.
For more information and time management tips, check out our website!
