Viola’s Anti-Procrastination Strategies

     Procrastination is a big enemy for college students and, unfortunately, many students are procrastinators, including me.

      I like to make excuses to justify my procrastinating behaviors. When this happens, I just want find some excuses or rationalization so that I can put the tasks off. As a result, I often experience the pressure when the last minute comes. The “Excuse Busting” strategy is intended to help me to understand the excuses that I make for legitimizing my procrastination behavior.

      A chart is needed while I use this strategy. In the left-hand column, I list the excuses I am using to procrastinate. Then I read my excuses. Next I list the real reason for my procrastination for each excuse.

 

Excuse	Translation
I have a whole week to finish the essay, so I don’t really need to do it right now. I will start doing the assignment after reading 10 chapters of the novel. I’ve got too much else to do right now.	I do not want to do this, but I will eventually get enough motivation to do it. I do not want to start at all. I do not want to stat doing the “much else” either.

      From the chart, I find that I am likely to procrastinate on relatively lone-term assignments or assignments whose due dates are not very near. I also want to some distraction when I need to finish an assignment. This chart forces me to face the “truth” and help me stop lying to myself.

      To stop my procrastinating behavior, I start using the Schedule A Day At A Time strategy. This strategy gets me to look at the task completion in terms of scheduling chunks of the task in order of priority.

      First, I write a to-do list one day at a time. Then I identify a few tasks that would be realistic to accomplish. Also, I add a few tasks that would be optional to do for that day. After I accomplish one task, I cross it off so I gain a sense of progress and accomplishments. When I finish the tasks that are required for the day, I will either give myself a break or start to do my optional tasks. I create the to-list from 4/4-4/8.

	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday
Must do	Read AST textbook	ECN homework ENL homework	ENL essay 5 Review for math quizz	ENL homework Math homework	Math homework
Optional	Math assignments AST assignments	Math homework ENL essay 5	Math homework AST homework	ECN homework	CLS blog#8

       This format is more or less like a mini D’s Due & Do Organizer. But this is one is more flexible as I can create the list at the beginning of the day so I can identify the tasks that would be realistic to accomplish and I have optional tasks that would be helpful to get me ahead of work.

         The strategies above are not specific to one or two courses. Procrastination is like a “lifestyle”. If you procrastinate on one course, it is almost certain that you procrastinate on other courses. So using these strategies are like developing new learning habit that anyone who procrastinate can benefit from.