Struggling Student

Guide on How to Catch Up in Your Classes

I often see master posts and tips about how to become organized and have better study habits but not about what to do when you have essentially messed up. I just wanted to share some of the things I do when I fall behind and how I recover. Unfortunately, this is an experience I am very familiar with but I am actively working on changing.

Please do NOT use this guide as a justification to fall behind. This is a guide for those who for whatever reason are already in this predicament and need help ASAP!

1) List everything you have to get done. Absolutely everything, down to the smallest detail.

For example, do not write down “readings for class X” but rather list out every chapter, and if you want every subsection of that chapter. This makes it easier to gauge how much time you need for every assignment and will motivate you when you check them off!

I like using apps like OneNote and Momentum to make my to do lists or just standard sheets of paper.

2) Calm down.

If you are anything like me, after you have made your long to do list you will start to panic. (I do, every single time!) Do your best to calm down, a calm mind is a sharper and smarter mind!

Personally, I like taking a moment outside to just concentrate on taking deep breaths of fresh air. This helps bring my heart rate down. (It’s something a bit similar to meditating)

For meditation, stretching, yoga, exercise, and power-naps you can use the app Fabulous (I use it often during the day for these purposes.)

Do not use this time to procrastinate! Try to find a relaxing activity that is not time consuming (i.e, DO NOT watch an episode on Netflix, play a video game, or anything that can easily feed into your procrastination) Although, these can all be relaxing activities, you will unconsciously negatively reinforce your habit of procrastinating to relieve anxiety and, thus, will consistently want to procrastinate when you are distressed or overwhelmed by your classes. Essentially, creating a cycle of procrastination. 

Ex: I am behind and am experience a lot of distress and anxiety. Watching Netflix (i.e. procrastinating) gives me temporary relief by distracting me from my responsibilities. Once my episode finishes, however, I feel the anxiety from my workload again and will decide to watch another episode etc. etc. It’s an endless cycle.

3) Plan out your week and dedicate each day predominantly to one class.

Now we have all the assignments and studying you have to do for every class and you are calm. Make sure to pay extra attention to due dates and plan which days you will be dedicating to each class. Plan a whole week and remember to plan wisely!

Prioritize by amount of weekly workload and proximity of due dates.

Does a class have assignments due every week? That class is most important since small assignments can eventually add up to a big portion of your grade. These assignments are due the soonest and, therefore, need to be done ASAP. Dedicate the whole day to just that class.

For example, for my Life Science course I have weekly quizzes and clicker points during class. If I am behind, I will dedicate a whole day to doing readings for that class first.

Have two different assignments for different classes due on the same day? Plan in advance so that you will still dedicate a whole day to each class rather than working on both assignments the same day (which would most likely be the day before, am i rite? ;) -> No, seriously don’t do this.)

If it is utterly necessary to do both assignments on the same day, then do split up your day.

4) Plan out your day. Every single hour. Seriously.

I literally will make a list of available times for each day and will schedule in assignments, meals, breaks, interviews, everything.

Try to be realistic! (I struggle with this a lot.)

Estimate the amount of time for an activity and then add a few more minutes to that.

Do not forget to schedule in essential personal care time. You need to eat, you need to take breaks, you need to shower, and you need to sleep. By doing this, you will be able to curve fatigue and to overall be in a better mental and physical health which is important for productivity.

Interweave your studies/assignments for a class.

What I mean by this is that you are behind and need to not only do the assignments but most likely need to learn it QUICKLY for the upcoming exam.

So an example of interweaving would be actively going back and forth b/w reading a chapter and your lecture notes. When I am behind I will take notes on the chapter I am currently reading and add those notes to what was said in lecture. Therefore, I am catching up but also making sure I am understanding the readings in terms of what is being taught in class. This saves time and you are learning!

Re-plan.

Some assignments will take longer than expected or a day will simply not be as productive as you thought it would be. It’s okay. Do not get discouraged. Simply, re-plan, adjust your days and continue moving forward! In order for this to work, you need to be flexible and learn what are the most important assignments you should be spending your time on.

5) Do not procrastinate!

I know this is easier said than done, but you (and I) are behind so we really have to stick to this one. Procrastinating may feel good at the moment but you will feel terrible about it later.

Here are some tools to help: Self-control (for macs), and Forest (for phones and computers.)

6) Go to the library or a quite isolated space.

Go. Go now.

Studying in your dorm room or at home gives you too many opportunities to be distracted and you simply do not have the time to take the risk. Food and people are my main distractions!

Also, being in a space where others are working will motivate you to do the same.

Get hungry while on campus? Pack your lunch AND dinner when you go to class and just spend the rest of your day in the library.

If you are starting to feel mentally fatigued, go somewhere else, take a small break, and continue. Go to a cafe, a computer lab, a grass field, anywhere. A change of scenery while studying can help you feel refreshed!

7) Give yourself rewards for accomplishments

I prefer to keep my rewards small. They tend to be having a small talk with my roommate, experimenting while making coffee, making myself a really nice dinner, or pressing flowers.

Do not over extend or continually take breaks. Again, do not reward yourself with something that you associate with procrastination or could procrastinate with!

8) SLEEP!

Last one! I know everyone and their moms say this, but sleep is very important for learning and (if your cramming) retention. After a certain point your brain will be too fatigued and will not retain anything you try to cram into it, so why not spend that time doing something better? Like sleeping!

Before I even start studying, I give myself a cut-off time. This is a time when I will stop, no matter how much work I have gotten done, and will prepare to go to sleep.

I wake up at 8am, so mine tends to be around 12:00am.

Your cut-off time should be strict and should give you at least 6-8 hours of sleep, so plan wisely!

Consistency is the key to success.

Studies have shown that inconsistent sleep affects your learning retention and academic abilities the next day. So, really try to stick to this one, if anything!

Again, the Fabulous app can help you stick to your cut-off time and maintain a regular sleep pattern.

I could go on and on about this but this post has already become more lengthy than I had anticipated!

Remember these are the things I do when I am behind (usually severely), this does not consist of my daily study habits when I am caught up. Therefore, some of these tips aren’t efficient for long-term learning but are definitely better than cramming (in my opinion and experience.) Catching up is by no means fun, therefore, once you are caught up, please try to implement better time management and daily study habits. (If anyone is interested in tips for those, let me know and I can make a post about it!)

Lastly, you can do this! I mean it. I do not know you personally but I have seen people do the most astonishing things in the face of adversity. So please trust me when I say, I believe in you wholeheartedly!

Good luck!

Jessica

it took being so broken that i didn’t care how people saw me before i acted the way i’d wanted to for years. i spoke up in class. i said the comeback that was on my tongue. i didn’t let others walk over me. i stood up. it was a strange experience, watching people react to that. my sharp words were agreed with, laughed about, seconded. the impatience with chaos was understood as leadership. the selfishness was not as bad as i thought it was, but rather just occasionally providing for myself first. 

it is very strange and backwards and half-awful that what i was running from for so long was what it took to make me whole. that being genuine also gave me back the good things again: i was funny and quick and talented. and it gave me honesty. it gave me people being calm around me. in my lack of fear, in the fact i didn’t mind being the first to be wrong, to be a mess, to be who i was (and terribly unperfect) - people relaxed their own masks around me. so many were wearing such thick ones, such well-polished versions of who they needed to be.

and underneath was the same things that i had been hiding. bravery. wit. cunning. kindness. vulnerability. 

it is amazing who people are when they are not trying. it is amazing how hard not trying really is. it is amazing how long it took me before i was okay with it. sometimes i still do, even though i sort of resent it. there are many bad things about me still. but there are many better qualities that i forgot to admit to. 

NOTE TAKING

if you’re like me, you buy dozens of “cute” notebooks, promising yourself that you’ll use them diligently and take “pretty notes”, only to find out halfway into the school year that you’ve maybe written ten pages of actual notes, doodled on the last three pages and left the rest of it blank, effectively screwing yourself in the final exams.

now, if your school is pretty tech-savvy and allows laptops / iPads in class, i advise you to stop take handwritten notes during class. i’ll explain it a bit more down below.

1. turn off your wifi. wifi is a huge distraction and will lead you to spend important lecture hours geeking out over something on tumblr when you’re supposed to be listening to your teacher. you have been warned.

2. download OneNote. you can create new “notebooks” for each subject and use the tabs in your notebooks to organize your notes based on lecture topic, book chapter, date, etc. you can even sync your notebooks across all devices and develop complex tagging / color coding systems to make your notes easily accessible. typing digital notes is much easier than handwriting them (your hands won’t cramp up as much now) which removes the burden of note taking.

3. if your teacher uploads his slides on the student portal, STOP COPYING THE PPT. instead concentrate on taking down the stuff that your teacher is actually saying - the little tidbits of information that won’t be on the slides, but will definitely be in the test. you can just integrate slides from your ppt and your class notes together in OneNote once you get home, so you’ll have more comprehensive notes.

4. print your notes out. here’s where you can still get creative. go ahead and annotate your notes, doodle mnemonics and funny illustrations in the margins to help you remember stuff. use arrows to connect one thought process to another. just go crazy with them and show your fun side!

5. since your notes have already been digitized and printed out, it’ll be much easier to compile them all into a ‘book’ at the end of the semester :))

for those who still have to persist in taking handwritten notes, here are some tips:

1. get rid of that notion that your notes have to be “pretty” it doesn’t matter if they’re not instagram-worthy, as long as you fully understand them.

2. if you aren’t doing it yet, label all your notebooks with your subject / course name. one time, i didn’t do this and ended up taking math notes in three different notebooks (which all looked similar, thus the mix-up).

3. focus on your task. this is really the greatest tip i can give you. if you won’t give the subject proper focus, you will not end up taking any notes.