HOW TO SCHEDULE YOUR DAY

Keeping a schedule for your day will help you manage your time more efficiently. You can get more done and are less likely to forget tasks or become sidetracked.

Although it may seem simpler to take things on as they come, you may find yourself overwhelmed, disorganized, and forgetting things. Making and keeping a schedule can take a little getting used to, but soon you'll be glad you did--it will help you decrease your stress and make you feel more in control of your life. Scheduling your day allows you to self-regulate and track your own behavior by keeping records of what you need to do and have done.

Making a Schedule

1.    Obtain a calendar or planner.Make sure the calendar has appropriate space for you to list your tasks. Some calendars offer weekly, daily, or hourly planners. A notebook can also be used. Choose whatever best suits your wants and needs. Whatever you choose, commit to your choice. Do not try to have one planner for work, one for school, etc. Everything should be in one place.

• There are also many digital calendars for your phone or laptop that can synch to all of your electronic devices so that you always have ready access to your calendar wherever you are. There are also a number of apps that can help you schedule your day with reminders and timers.
• You might want to choose a digital or paper calendar that has some extra space so you can add notes to your schedule. This can help you keep track of not only what you've done but how you did it and/or how it made you feel. For example, maybe below the section "Go to the gym" on your calendar, you want to not only check it off but also note that you "Ran an extra mile today and felt great!" Adding notes can help you keep better track of your behavior.
• If you are making the switch from a paper to digital calendar, you may find things a bit hectic for a day or two as you get used to the new system. Keep both with you for the first few days and check to make sure nothing has been left out or double-booked.

1.    Organize your tasks. Electronic calendars allow you to color coordinate different tasks. For example, you can color work-related things red, school-related things blue, housework green, vacations orange, and exercise pink. You can also do this easily if you're using a paper calendar or notebook; simply use colored pens or pencils or highlighters. Once you’ve differentiated the different types of tasks you need to schedule, you can work to prioritize them.

• Organizing and color-coding your tasks will also help you visualize and understand where a lot of your time is going. You might see, for example, that there is a ton of red (work) and green (housework) on your schedule, but very little pink (exercise). Noticing the dearth of exercise might help you get motivated to try to schedule more time for it.

1.    Prioritize your tasks. It's important you determine which tasks are most important and should be done first and which can wait. Let’s use an example to understand prioritization. Let’s say you have two tests, a lab report, an essay, and presentation all in the same week. Yikes!

• Ask yourself some questions in order to figure out what should be done first and for how long: Which task is due first? Which tasks will take the longest time to complete? Which tasks are most important, relative to their value? For example, how much are the tests, lab report, essay, and presentation worth in terms of your final grade? Which task will be the most challenging?
• Ultimately, you will need to decide whether the deadline, length of time needed or relative value of your scheduled tasks is your priority. You know yourself and your abilities best. Choose a priority system that fits you

1.    Mark your prioritized tasks. Once you've decided how to prioritize your tasks, mark them down on your schedule. You can go through your daily schedule and write "A" next to important items that must be done first, "B" next to items that must be done before tomorrow, "C" next to items that must be done by Friday, and so on.

2.    Schedule a time for each task. Write how long you expect to spend on each task. For example, you may have scheduled time in a given day to study (2 hours), workout (1 hour), write two emails (30 minutes), and walk the dog (30 minutes). It's key to allow you the necessary amount of time to complete each task; you'll only stress yourself out if you schedule yourself too tightly and aren't realistic about the amount of time things take.

• Remember to incorporate travel time into your scheduling. For example, do you need to drive from the library where you are studying to the gym?

1.    Add time cushions to your schedule. Most people generally underestimate the amount of time tasks take. Considering all of the time that goes into even preparing to do certain tasks and winding down from them afterwards will help you schedule your day with better accuracy.

• Always try to overestimate how long something will take by a few minutes. Try adding 25% to the time you allot for tasks in your schedule. For instance, schedule something that technically takes 4 minutes for 5 minutes, and tasks that technically take 8 minutes for 10 minutes, and so on. These extra minutes will add up and provide a cushion which can help you avoid being late or falling behind.
• Ask yourself whether there are any additional small tasks surrounding the bigger tasks that need to be factored into your schedule? For example, do you need to shower after the gym? Do you usually end up chatting with a friend for 15 minutes in the change room? Most people find that their scheduled one-hour workout is actually more like two hours.

1.    Leave space in your schedule. Keep some free space at the bottom of your schedule for low priority items or things coming up later in the week. If you have time today or at any other point during your week, you can begin working on those items to get ahead. These additional tasks might include going through your closet or organizing your tax filing system at home. These are low priority tasks that you'd eventually like to get done but are not pressing or tied to a specific deadline.