Whenever possible, schedule pleasurable activities after study time,
not before. They will then act as incentives, not distractions.
Monitor your progress at reasonable periods and make changes where
necessary. This is yourstudy regimen— you conceived it, you can
change it. If you find that you are consistently allotting more time
than necessary to a specific chore, change your future schedule
accordingly.
As assignments are entered on your calendar, make sure you also
enter items needed—texts; other books you have to buy, borrow,
or get from the library; and materials such as drawing pads, magic
markers, and graph paper.
You may decide that color-coding your calendar—say, red for
assignments that must be accomplished that week, blue for steps in
longer-term assignments, yellow for personal time and appointments,
green for classes—makes it easier for you to tell at a glance what
you need to do and when you need to do it.
Adapt these tools for your own use. Try anything you think may
work—use it if it does, discard it if it doesn’t.
Do your least favorite chores (study assignments, projects, whatever)
first—you’ll feel better having gotten them out of the way! And plan
how to accomplish them as meticulously as possible. That will get
rid of them even faster.
Accomplish one task before going on to the next one—don’t skip
around.
If you see that you are moving along faster than you anticipated on
one task or project sequence, there is absolutely nothing wrong with
continuing onto the next part of that assignment or the next project
step.
If you’re behind, don’t panic. Just reorganize your schedule and find
the time you need to make up.
90 How to Study