O3-a: Setting priorities and managing your time effectively
Online classes require that you manage your time wisely. Because the course is accessible twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, you might be tempted to procrastinate, telling yourself that the material “will be there tomorrow.” By contrast, if you’re a first-time online learner and are especially nervous about missing some information, you might become obsessive about logging on to your course several times a day when only one check-in is necessary.
Creating a personal schedule to manage assignments
One of the best ways to manage your academic workload efficiently is to create a schedule. As you might with other courses, you can use a personal calendar or planner to mark due dates and establish a plan for completing assignments. By following these steps, you can create a schedule that will help you manage assignment deadlines and other time commitments.
- First, referring to the syllabus or the calendar that your instructor provides, record the course due dates for major assignments, such as essays, projects, and midterm and final exams.
- Next, add the due dates for shorter assignments that you need to submit, such as discussion posts, quizzes, and short writing assignments.
- Finally, with your personal and other academic commitments in mind, set your own personal due dates for these assignments and the smaller steps you need to take to complete them. Your personal due dates might fall on or before the actual course due dates, depending on your obligations.
MY ONLINE LEARNING
“Contrary to what I had expected, the online class forum is a more thought-provoking environment. It demands more carefully thought-out responses to the course work than I was ever able to produce in a classroom.”
—Natalie Kok, student, Regent University
You can tailor these three easy scheduling steps to your own needs and planning style; for example, you might write all major assignments in your planner at the beginning of the semester but then plan out your personal deadlines for weekly assignments at the beginning of each week. You could also look ahead to major assignments as they approach, perhaps on a monthly basis, and set your schedule so that you allow yourself time for each stage of a multistep assignment.
Keeping track of due dates and times
Check both the due dates and the times very carefully. Many course platforms allow instructors to close assignments at particular times—noon or midnight, for example—on the due dates. Carefully read the assignment information so that you do not miss the deadline. Because assignment settings might be automated by the software system, minutes—and sometimes even seconds—may make the difference between being able to turn in an assignment or not. If you live far from your school, pay attention to possible time-zone differences.
Budgeting extra time to learn course navigation
Give the course—and yourself—a chance. Every new experience has its own learning curve, and you might feel a little overwhelmed when you start your first online course. Your progress might be slower at the beginning of the semester, while you are still learning how to navigate the course platform and tools, so make additional room in your schedule as necessary. As you gain confidence with the software, you will be able to navigate through the course more quickly and to devote most, if not all, of your study time to the course content itself.