5 SIMPLE WAYS TO MANAGE YOUR COURSEWORK IN 2021

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Coursework can be very stressful. In fact, it is easily one of the most stressful parts of your life in school. You will have to deal with copious amounts of work, hard and sometimes unreasonable deadlines, and numerous other obligations and a social life while you’re at it. For this main reason, many students feel overwhelmed by coursework and experience an insane amount of stress.

That stress is not good at all. It is virtually paralyzing, and students often find themselves procrastinating over work as a result. The enthusiasm you once had for the subjects in your course is suddenly drained from you, and your interest and grades both wane.

But it doesn’t have to be that way. With the right kind of personal organization and a few hacks here and there, coursework can be easily managed. Or use some coursework writing service, of course. However, if you want to go it yourself, you’re in the right place. In this article, we are going to give you tips for just the right kind of personal organization, and just the right hacks to make sense of it all.

1. Planning is your friend

The first step to managing your coursework is to plan it all. You need to layout all the work you expect to do over the course of the semester. Most schools will give you a course outline at the beginning of the semester, with all the topics to be covered and even some reading recommendations. You can then use this outline to do your planning, including the topics and sections you intend to cover.

With your course outline near you, it’s easy to determine the requirements for the specific written parts. You can also divide each written part into sections and figure out how many words you will need to write per section. It’s also easier to do the research, knowing what kind of information is required and where it will go, as well as what final structure your written piece will have.

Planning is and has always been useful. Spend as much time as you need to planning, even if it takes days. With a solid and practical plan, your work will be much easier and will end much quicker than it otherwise would.

2. Have realistic expectations

While I have spent the previous section extolling the virtues of planning, it is important to point out that you should also be realistic. It is especially important when planning to set realistic timelines for different sections in your written piece. Don’t block out an hour for a section when it is more likely to take you four.

When you give sections unrealistic timelines, you place undue pressure on yourself to finish them, which then makes it even harder for you to work. On the other hand, when you are generous with your timelines and finish earlier than the expected time, your confidence will get a much needed boost.

That said, don’t be too generous with timelines either. Ever heard of Parkinson’s Law? Work will always expand to fill the available time. What this means is that if you give yourself 3 weeks to finish a task, you will probably take 3 weeks, even if the task could easily be done in a week. It’s just a thing with us humans. We have grown incredibly good at procrastinating. So the moral of the story here is not to give yourself unreasonably tight deadlines, but also not to give yourself unreasonably lax ones either.

3. Take enough breaks

Taking breaks is just as helpful to your productivity as actually doing the work. For that reason, working for several hours without taking a break is one of the worst things you can do. Your brain gets fatigued and your work gets sloppy, which does nothing to help your grades. You will start to make silly grammatical errors that will ruin what is otherwise a masterpiece. The solution is to work in chunks and take breaks in between.

4. Reward yourself

This ties in to the advice about taking breaks above. Our brains work via simple feedback loops where we feel motivated to do something we would otherwise consider a chore if there is some perceived reward at the end. You can train your brain to be productive during busy time blocs by rewarding yourself during breaks. Play your favorite video game, or eat some chocolate, or something like that. It doesn’t have to be big or complicated. A reward is a reward, and even the smallest one can do wonders for your motivation levels.

5. Proofread your work

Once you’re done with the first draft, take some time to proofread it before the deadline. Go over it a couple of times yourself and then hand it over to family or friends to proofread it and pick out mistakes you might have missed. This will help you polish your work.

Conclusion

While coursework can be quite stressful, it is also manageable, provided you apply the right techniques. Hopefully, you feel a lot more hopeful about tackling the task ahead of you now. Don’t worry, though, you can do it!