Once you have built some momentum and working at home has become a routine, it is important to ensure that you are getting as much out of your study/homework time as possible.
The key to having a successful homework session (and by this I mean work done at home, not only work that has been assigned) is to have a clear goal in mind. Before beginning your session you must be clear about what you want to achieve within the session. Your goal for a session will depend on the types of ‘must do’ (MD’s) assignments that you have for the day, if any. If there are no upcoming assignments then your session may focus entirely on studying the content of a subject or two. However this is a rarity and therefore I will focus on a typical day in which the goal is to both complete assignments and study.
With the volume of work that a typical high school student has to complete, it is important to develop the skill of prioritizing. In order to efficiently utilize your time, you must be clear about your MD’s. Assignments typically fall into three categories or MD’s, namely, MDN (must do now), MDS (must do soon) and MDL (must do later).
‘Must do now’ assignments refer to work that is due the following day, ‘must do soon’ assignments are due within 2 – 3 days and ‘must do later’ assignments are typically due in 4 days or more. To ensure that the work does not pile up, for a given homework session, it’s important to work on all assignments due for the week at hand.
Say it is the beginning of the week and you are aware of all your assignments due that week. It’s obvious that you must complete all of your MDN assignments, but you should try and complete 50% of your MDS and at least 20% of your MDL.
As the days go by MDS’ will become MDN’s and MDL’s will become MDS’ and so forth. The percentage completion rate remains the same as you work through the week. What you will find is that by the time the week comes to an end, you would have completed your assignments with very little stress, because this system eliminates procrastination.
What has been discussed so far describes a system for completing assignments, but it is usually wise to also allocate time to study your various subjects. Your assignments will take up most of your time and therefore it would be wise to use a ¼ of your time to read through your notes, ½ of your time complete assignments and the last ¼ of your time to study. For a typical 2 hour homework session this would mean spending 30 minutes to read over your day’s notes, 1 hour to complete assignments and 30 minutes to study a subject of your choice.
Note that this just a template and by no means has to be religiously adhered to, it only serves as a guide. Any system that is too rigid will never last, there has to be room for tweaks to account for differences in individuals.
However, if you holistically use the system offered here, you will find that you will more efficiently cover your work and the stress that normally comes with the rigours of high school life will be significantly reduced.
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