tech 10

Paul Laohapiengsak

Task Management

I cannot believe that second semester is almost coming to an end.  I have learned so much from my CLS 105 class how to manage time, take notes affectively, and reading right.  One of the strategies that are extremely beneficial to me that I learn from CLS 105 class is how to manage my time and homework assignment.  The task management that I learn and apply are the target planner and ranking priorities.

Ranking priorities is task management strategy created for students who need help with organization.  The ranking priorities put each type of tasks in different categories in rank from A-C in order the order of importance.  By separating each task in different categories, one can prioritize which task is more important and give those task immediate attentions.  The ranking priorities are a perfect problem solving strategy for college students because the environment distracts them easily.  Furthermore, with over six classes per semester and different styles of assignments and workloads from each course, college student should be able to identify tasks that are more important to become successful.

Ranking	Class	To do	Due Date
A1	CLS 105	Career Experiment project	April 25th
A2	MAT 284	Exam 3	April 25th
B1	ENL 213	Final project presentation	April 25th
B2	CLS 105	Tech: Blog 10	April 24th
B3	PSY 205	Complete survey	May 3rd

Shown above is my ranking priority.  I have been using this task management strategy since the beginning of the semester and it proves to be extremely beneficial.  I was able to identify which task I need to give most attention to.  For example, I have both CLS’s career experiment project, MAT 284 exam, and ENL 213 final project that are all due on the same day.  I was able to recognize that ahead of time and have more time to prepare for each assignment. 

Target planner is designed for course with many steps required to pursue and achieve goals.  The bull eye’s design makes it easy for users to see the due dates from the first to the last step.  The target planner notifies users ahead of time of each step and the due date, which would allow them to maximize their ability to complete assignments as they have an efficient amount of time.  The ideal classes that will work well with the Target Planner are classes with many steps toward a certain goal.  I use the target planner to study for my PSY 205 exam.  This is because; in one exam it is consisted of four chapters.  For this reason, I have to take step by step to successfully study for an exam.  Shown below is my Target planner.  I am using a table instead of a bull eyes format as I find it easier to follow and more organized to organize the target planner this way.

Task	Due Date
Study for Chapter 9	28th April
Study for Chapter 10	30th April
Study for Chapter 11	1st May
Study for Chapter 12	3rd May
Exam 3	4th May

I am satisfied from using Ranking strategies as it inform me which assignments is more important and when it is due.  I suggest this strategy for every college students who have difficulty concentrating and identifying the most important tasks.  Ranking priorities and task management are the two task management strategies that I find extremely helpful. 

Viola’s Task Management Strategies

This is the end of the semester and all of us college students are facing overwhelming tasks. So using task management strategies is very important here to help us out.

I have a read/write learning preference, but I find reading too much at a time or finishing all the reading assignment at one time is too overwhelming and low-efficient as I will get bored and tired. So I have tried one strategy about attention span. The core is to let your attention span be your guide to divide assignments into smaller parts. I have been using this strategy when I read for AST, the only course that requires a lot of reading I take this semester. AST is lecture based class, but reading is kind of a dispensable step before class as that is often the case that either the professor covers the material quickly or the slides are too brief.

The steps of this strategy are quite simple. I time myself and find out how long it takes me to read before my attention span wanes. I use this as a guide to chunk my assignments into manageable parts. This is an optimization as it allows me to capitalize on my attention span and keep an efficient level of concentration.

For me, my attention span for reading is about an hour and I can read about 10 pages. Usually there are about 30 pages to read for a week so I need three hours to read these pages. Because of my schedule, I only have one or two classes on Tuesday and Thursday, I assign one hour reading on Tuesday and one hour on Thursday and another hour’s reading will be left for weekend. I find this plan quite feasible. As I have chunked the task according to my attention span, I can finish the assigned reading materials before I get really bored and read with low-efficiency. So this strategy really helps me to read with relatively high efficiency.

I have used a strategy called Divide by Four in my ENL class to write essays during this semester. This strategy means to divide a task into manageable parts, so one can accomplish it efficiently, thus preventing procrastination. I am a procrastinator and I find this really works for me to stop procrastinating as the task is chunked and I do not need to finish a whole task at a time.

Most tasks can be divided into four sections: (1) prepare (2) start (3) continue (4) finish. When I write an essay for ENL class, I will always brainstorm first. Then I write an outline of the essay, identifying the topic sentence in each paragraph. Next I will write a draft with additional information as support. The last step is rereading and revising. Here is my schedule of writing an essay. I have also labeled the time as due dates next to the tasks as a reminder.

I find this strategy helpful in this writing class. I chunk the task before doing it and the task itself does not look that intimidating. I follow the four steps and I can finish each part smoothly. So this strategy can especially helpful in finishing a big assignment. You chunk it and always do one step at one time. The work does not seem too much and it will help relieve some stress.

    These two strategies I have discussed above all more or less focus on chucking the task. Chunking a task means finishing a task in several steps so one will not be overwhelmed by the huge amount of work and starts to procrastinate. These strategies have helped me a lot and I will continue using them in the following semesters.

 

Task Management

To a certain degree, this picture presents how messy the astronomy is, so I usually work on it first.

This is one of my math assignments waiting to be completed. Thirty two questions in total. I will finish this first before it results in procrastination.

This is an example shows how I use the target planner.

This week the topic is Task Management. There are many different task strategies in the textbook, and some of them are very useful for me. This time I will discuss two strategies which I have used a lot but have never talked about in the blog. They are First, Work on your hardest course or do your hardest assignments first ,and Second, Target planner.

Work on your hardest course or do your hardest assignments firsr, actually, these are two different strategies from Top-Five Stragegies to Manage Assignments. However, because they both have the same principle, so I think I should combine them together. Basically, we can find three reasons to use this strategies. First, as the textbook says, the hardest course needs the most concertration and the longest attention span. So if you work on your hardest course first, usually it will be easier to concentrate on your task. Second, unlike a manchine, human will get tired. When you are tired, it can be extremely difficult to focus on your task, especially the hardest one. So you should do your hardest assignments first, at least before you feel tired. The third reason is that I realized that the tough tasks are more likely to result in procrastination. So completing the hardest one first can really prevent procrastination.

For me, the hardest course is Astronomy, but the hardest assignments usually come from my Calculus class. So I will arrange to finish my exam or lab preparation for Astronomy first, and then complete my Calculus assignments.

Another strategy is the Target Planner. I used this strategy almost everywhere, and I found that this strategy is very multifunctional. Generally speaking, you will use a bull's eye target to represent the crucial steps to finish a task, either academic event or nonacademic event. And this task can almost be any event, as long as it is a multi-steps task. For example, after I recommend this strategy to one of my friend, he used this to help himself achieve his first driver's license. As we all know, this process can be very complicated, from five hours lesson to learner permit to road test, this bull's eye target really helped increase the efficiency. And for me, I used this strategy in almost all five courses I enrolled in this semester. And it really works for me.

All in all, there are still some very good task management strategies I cannot cover in this one blog. But these two strategies above, work on your hardest task first and target planner, are really good.

Task Management

For our blog this week the topic is to choose a Task management routine that you continue to use but have not discussed in a previous blog. Throughout the semester we have been learning about skills to help us with studying, note-taking, stress, and time. We've learned strategies such as SU/Cornell note-taking, the 20 minute test prep, the 10 minute technique, sources of stress technique, and so many more maybe even to many to name them all. However there are two task management techniques that I have used at various time throughout this year but have never written about in my blog. These are: 1) The post-exam review and 2) Jeopardy Note-Taking technique (although I have talked about it in a previous blog I feel it was such a crucial note-taking tool for me I must talk about it again).

The Post-Exam review strategy is a technique that has been very useful to me throughout the semester in a number of courses. All this strategy does is help you figure out if the strategy you used to study for your previous exam was effective or not. The first thing you do in this strategy is ask yourself a list of questions. These questions are:

This strategy is very useful when it is done right away after you take the test and when your memory is fresh. Once you get your test back you should look over your responses to these questions. 

The Jeopardy Note-Taking technique is a strategy that allows you to take your notes and go back and write questions to test yourself following the notes you've taken in class. Here is an example of the Jeopardy Note-Taking Strategy:

While this is not an incredible example of Jeopardy note-taking strategy it shows that this strategy helps you because; it can help you with the notes and info learned from class/lectures and studying those notes learned by writing questions about the notes on those. 

Zane's Stress Management Entry

Stress is something that everyone has to deal with. It is something that I can personally identify with. Since arriving at college, I feel that it has been somewhat difficult to properly adjust. At times, it is easy to feel stressed out or overwhelmed. It is in these moments of helplessness that we tend to give up and fall back in to our unhealthy habits (in my case, procrastination). For today’s Blog, I will briefly review some strategies that will help you manage your stress more effectively.

The first strategy is called the 10 minute vacation. One of the most difficult parts about completing assignments is staying focused and on track. If you are finishing an important paper, or studying for an exam, it may be difficult to keep clear, positive mindset. For this strategy, simply study or do your work for a designated amount of time, and then take a 10 minute break. Use the 10 minutes for something you find particularly rewarding: watch tv, grab a snack or just take a moment to breathe and collect yourself. Having rewarded yourself, you can continue with your work until the next vacation.

I tried this strategy when studying for Anthropology. As mentioned before, I always found it challenging to stay on task when studying or completing assignments; especially if the deadline is near. The strategy was helpful because it essentially allows you to chunk the task . You can set up your own personal study schedule, or outline for your paper/assignment. It is also helpful for students who don’t have a lot of free time to relax. The only “problem” I had with the strategy was self-regulation. At times it was difficult to return work after the 10 minutes

Another strategy I tried was the stress diagram. Essentially you create a pie chart and consider all of the stressful factors in your life and the severity of them. The following is my stress diagram:

If you are honest with yourself, this strategy can be very beneficial. If you know what stresses you out, you can customize and develop strategies to effectively deal with them.

Gabi Pontell's Stress Management

College is very stressful for students because it is difficult to manage tests, projects, papers, and other school related assignments. Especially during mid-terms or final weeks, many assignments are due around the same date and often more than one test will be on the same day. I know that I personally stress about mid-terms and finals because it is an overwhelming amount of information that I need to know, and the test is a large portion of my grade. Frequently, the work is a lot to handle, and definitely causes me to stress. Fortunately, there are stress management strategies that all students can use to help reduce their stress. The strategy I tried first was the stress diagram.

Stress Diagram:

For this strategy, you make a list of five or more sources that are the source of your stress. On your pie chart, make five sections for each of your stresses. The size of each section of the chart is relevant to how much stress it causes you out of your five sources.

My Stress Diagram:

I listed my sources of stress as:

1. Exams/papers/projects due at same time

2. Family

3. Major

4. Classes

5. GPA

6. Not enough sleep

Now, the pie chart enables you to prioritize what is causing you the most stress, and addressing those first.

The second strategy I used was the 10-Minute Vacation.

The 10-Minute Vacation:

For this strategy, you get away from your work and can spend 10 minutes exploring on Google Maps, or on fun game sites, just two of many possibilities to use the time.

For the 10-Minute Vacation, I spent my time either on youtube.com listening to music, or playing a game online. It is definitely a good break from work because it takes my mind off the stress of the assignment and allows me to escape for 10 minutes. I often find that after the 10-Minute Vacation, I return to my work and I am able to focus better and get more work done. This is definitely a strategy I will use more often.

stress

Paul Laohapiengsak

Stress Management

Stress is truly inevitable.  It is an unstoppable and continuously occurrence which human beings must face.  Stress can leads to many undesirable outcome such as disease or tragedy.  Believe it or not, stress is one of the leading causes of cancer.  Therefore, being able to reduce stress is very important.  From CLS 105 class, there are many stress management, which I learn about which includes stress diagram and stress reduction plan. 

For the stress diagram, I was able to lists all my stress and identify which bothers me the most.  In addition, I was able to identify to root cause of my stress, which is very helpful.  In addition, from this stress management method I was able to prioritize my stress.  Therefore, I was able to address it first. To create a stress diagram, one must list one’s stress into a list of 5 and order them from low to high.  Then, draw a pie chart where each section of the pie would represent the relative amount of stress in one’s life.  Shown below is my stress diagram.  From the stress diagram I was able to identify what causes me the most stress and eliminate them affectively because I could tract it’s root cause.  For example, knowing that not getting into Whitman is the main cause of my stress, I tried my best my studying hard to make sure that this stress would not bothers me.

1.   Not getting into Whitman School of management

2.  Family related stress

3.  Friends related stress

4.  School works

5.  Exams and quizzes

            The stress reduction plan is another helpful stress management that works really well with me. The stress reduction plan is the activity that I can engage in so that it would help myself forget and reduce the stress while I enjoy doing them.  For myself, the best way to reduce my stress is to engage in physical activity, which are playing tennis, working out, take a walk, and play soccer.  I believe that this method somewhat help me in getting my mind off the stress that I currently have.  By giving myself more time, I was able to think clearly and recognize the root cause of my stress.  I normally workout every other day which is why I think I am not stressful all the time.  Because my body release endorphin when I exercise I believe it helps make me feel happy and forget about whatever stress I am having.

            Stress is what stops us from reaching out objective.  It is normal for everyone to be stressful; nonetheless one should know how to control them.  If one allows stress to build up, it can be very dangerous.  In college life, students mainly become stressful from classes, friends, and family and it is important to deal with them healthily.  I would recommend, everyone to use the stress diagram and stress reduction plan to help relieve stress.