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How to Manage Your Time in Nursing School

There is always one thing on a nursing student’s mind- how am I going to get everything done with so little time to do it in? Well, this blog hopefully will help you to know how to better manage your time.

How to Overcome Procrastination?

What is procrastination? It is where you decide to fulfill a goal and you postpone doing the things that are needed to fulfill that goal. Most people procrastinate because of fear, and it’s fear of multiple things; fear or failure, fear of rejection, fear of commitment, fear or success, ect. Many find procrastination to be rewarding at first, but eventually the procrastination will reach higher levels then it had before. To overcome procrastination, you need to not only make specific, realistic goals to achieve, but you need to find balance in your life.

There are 3 areas of your life that need to be balanced: school, work and leisure. If you have a feeling of accomplishment or satisfaction in these 3 areas, then you are probably balancing them pretty well. If you have any negative feelings, or feeling like you do not have enough time for even one of these subjects, then you will need to re-examine how much time is spent on each subject, and then re-balance each subject. This blog post will give you suggestions and hopefully help you feel calmer in your every day life.

Pie Graph – Balancing Your Time

Linda Wong, a former professor at Lane Community College, suggests that you design a pie graph and identify how much time you spend on each subject. Now, each individuals diagram will look different, but generally if you are balancing your time equally, it should look something like this:

Pie Graph - Balanced areas of life

If your pie graph does not look like this, then you need to re-evaluate where you are spending too much or too little time at, and then adjust your schedule accordingly. This is known as the “Increase-Decrease method” If the pie graph does not work for you, try to write a list of all the activities you are needing to do that day and how much time you should spend on each activity.

Suggestion: Aim for half and hour increments at a time for each project you write down. Listing them out this way will make it seem more achievable. Also, keep a planner or a schedule on your phone or computer, this is a good way to make a list of all your activities for each day.

Goals of Time Management

There are 4 goals of time management that you should

always aim for, they are:

  1. Strive for balance: As stated above, make time for study, work and social time. Balance in these areas will keep the stress levels down a notch and bring you a feeling of gratification.
  2. Create Patterns: Study for a class the same day that you have that class, so you can better focus on one subject rather then on 5 or 6. Also, try to plan your studying time when you have the most energy during the

    day. And, whenever possible, try to manage all of your activities around the same time every day so you know exactly how your day is going to be planned out.

  3. Include time for your personal goals: Make a list of all of your personal goals that you want to achieve while planning out studying and work time. Accomplishing your goals will help you to feel a sense of relief. When it comes to your personal goals, make them realistic. If it’s a big project that you want to get done, break it down into smaller tasks

    until the entire project is completed.

  4. Establish good health habits: Eat healthy, nutritious meals. drink plenty of water, and shoot for between 7-9 hours of sleep a night. Sleep deprivation will slow the thinking process and will minimize how much you retain from your studies.

These are just a few suggestions to help you better manage your time. If you’d like more information on time management, visit Study Guides and Strategies.

In our next blog, we will be interviewing a

few students to get their intake on how they balance life between school and personal life. Hopefully, this will help you to find out what works best for your schedule.

Happy Planning!

Reference: Wong, L. (2000). Essential Study Skills (Third Edition). Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

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