Task Management

Spring 2011 semester is almost coming to an end. We have less than 3 weeks left. The end of the semester is when college students are busy preparing for finals and doing major assignments. I decided to use the strategies Post-It Reminders andDivide by Four to help me manage all the work I have for the next few weeks.

Post-It Strategies is a strategy that helps me keep myselforganized. I color coded what I wrote on the post-its. I have 4 exams coming up very soon. Two exams are exams similar to previous exams I have taken for my courses and the other two exams are finals. For the final exams post-its, I used the color orange to write down the dates for the exams. For the other two exams, I used blank ink. As a student who can't remember things without writing them down, I can look at these post-its to remind me of these importantdates. In addition to exam dates, I made post-it reminders for my Major/Career Exploration project and last IC meeting to keep remind myself. Posting these reminders in front of my desk, I can look at it and be constantly reminded of the upcoming exams, assignments and meeting.

Divide by Four was another assignment I used. I used this strategy for CLS 105. On April 25th, the Major/Career Exploration Project is due. I have been working on this assignment for the last 2 weeks. I divided this project into four. The four steps of this strategy is prepare, start, continue and finish. First I wrote a proposal, then started working on the six strategies. Then I continued to collect documentation and finally I wrote my reflection. As a procrastinator, I do my work last minute. But by dividing my work by four, I was able to avoid cramming and working on my work the last minute. This strategy helped me get my work done a little bit at a time.

Because I am constantly reminded about my exams and finals, I will be able to get a head start for studying. Procrastination can be avoided a bit as well when using these reminders and the strategy, Divide by Four. I hope to do well academically for the remaining of the semester.

[TASK MANAGEMENT] Divide by four and Post-it reminders!

To manage assignments, I need to use some strategies to spend time wisely. Because I don’t make a plan to do my assignments, sometimes it is hard to finish them on time and I need more time than what I expected. I have tried two strategies this week, which are Divide by four and Post-it reminders. Since there are a lot of work to do for Pre-calculus, I applied the strategies for the class, MAT 194.

Divide by four is to help me accomplish a task successfully and to prevent procrastination. There are four steps to use this strategy: 1. Prepare, 2. Start, 3. Continue, and 4. Finish. I applied the steps to my third exam coming up for MAT194. First, collect all the materials that will be covered on the exam: textbook, notes, webassign assignments, and quizzes. To prepare this, I collected them by each section. Second, spend 2 hours on each section. To start this, I read my textbook first, followed by notes, webassign assignments, and quizzes. Third, review each section for 1 hour. To continue this, I picked random questions on webassian assignments and solved them. Lastly, ask my professor about what I still don’t understand. To finish this, I drew star marks next to questions that I don’t get it and went to her office hour to ask questions. This strategy made my task organized.

Post-it reminders is to help keep me organized about the tasks that need to be done. Different colors can be used to indicate the importance of tasks. I have three colors: pink, green, and yellow. For yellow one, I decided to use for the most important tasks such as due dates in one week. For pink one, I decided to use for Exam3 coming up. For green one, I used for the assignments next week. On yellow post-it, I listed assignments by ranking priorities: lab 4 report 4/21, webassign 4/21, and webassign 4/23. On pink one, I first wrote the exam date of 4/28 and listed the chapters that will be covered and dates that I will study as chapter 5 on 4/22, chapter 6 on 4/23, chapter 8 on 4/24, and chapter 9 on 4/24. On greed one, I listed assignments next week: webassign 4/26 and handed-in homework 4/28. Because of the colors of post-it, it was easy to see and to know what tasks I should do first.





To sum up, the effectiveness of Divide by four is that it makes me get the task done and prevents procrastination. Because it has four steps, it was easy to follow the steps. Being a visual learner, I printed out it and attached on the board. The reason why I chose this is that I liked the concept that it has four steps to manage my tasks. It also looked easy to apply my assignments. The effectiveness of Post-it reminders is that it helps keep me organized about the tasks. Being a visual learner, I used the three colors to divide my assignments into importance. The reason why I chose this is that I thought it would be helpful since it required me to use colors for each task, and it really helped me as a visual learner. As a visual learner, the two strategies worked for me!

For my pre-calculus class, MAT 194, I could accomplish my tasks successfully by applying the two strategies, Divide by four and Post-it Reminders. These strategies help keep me organize and prevent procrastination!


(http://www.tuaw.com/2009/09/01/potion-factory-seeking-beta-testers-for-the-hit-list-iphone/)