If your instructor doesn’t assign a series of deadlines, set your own. Use campus time-management software, if available. Count on a research paper taking longer than you expect. If you procrastinate and try to toss it together in an all-night siege, you will not be satisfied with the result. Instead, start with a clear-cut schedule that breaks your project into a series of small tasks.
SAMPLE SCHEDULE
Each week you can make up a more detailed schedule, identifying tasks by the day or by the type to increase your efficiency.
| DAILY SCHEDULE | ACTIVITY SCHEDULE |
| Monday — finish catalog search | library search — LexisNexis? |
| Tuesday — start article indexes | Web search — government sites |
| Thursday — read e-mails and printouts from databases | reading — new printouts and e-mails from databases |
| Sunday night — organize files and add notes | writing — revised research question — thesis? |