Procrastination: the problem rippling through students of all ages

Here are a few solutions to preventing procrastination from overtaking your life

Kaylee Murphy, Staff Writer

Procrastination: The action of delaying or postponing something. We all have procrastinated at one point in our life, and many of us continue to do it daily. Students will often wait until the very last minute to complete projects or homework, and once they get into the bad habit it’s extremely hard to break.

I personally struggle with procrastination. Instead of doing my homework right when I get home, I’ll get a snack, watch a show, or go on my phone. I even waited to write this article; I’m writing this in my DLT the day of its deadline. However, I know that this isn’t going to work in college and I’m going to have a hard time going forward if I continue to do this. So I’m gonna give you some suggestions on how to break the habit and hopefully it will help me too.

Give yourself a planned break

Instead of randomly taking a break in your homework, try planning out when your going todo your homework and when would be a good time to take a break. Set a timer and give yourself a 10-15 minute break from whatever you’re doing, then sit down and continue your homework.

Set a goal

Say you have practice after school, but you have a little time before you have to go — that’s a good time to do some homework. Give yourself a goal to finish homework from one of your classes before practice. Estimate how long each assignment will take then try to finish in that amount of time. If you don’t finish it in your time limit, move on to the next assignment because chances are you’ve spent a lot of time on it and need to do something else.

Prioritize your assignments

Not all of your homework is due the next day; sometimes it’s due in maybe two or three days. Finish the things that are due first. Maybe you have a DLT early the next day and you don’t need to finish everything the night before. Complete the stuff that’s due sooner first, and save the stuff that isn’t due right away.

Establish a routine

Try doing the same thing when you get home from school everyday. Maybe you get a snack then start your homework and take a break everyday at the same time. Try to do your assignments in the same order too. However, I know that doing the same thing everyday gets boring, so maybe make a different routine for each day, and do the same thing the next week on that day.

Limit your distractions

Try to find a quiet place to do your homework and find what works best for you. Maybe your phone is distracting you, try putting it in another room until you’re done with your homework. I know it sounds impossible but your phone can wait, it’s not going to die from lack of use. If you work better with music then grab a speaker, or maybe just headphones and use your music to drown out everything else and just focus on your homework.

Procrastination can be a real problem, but applying these easy strategies throughout your day could go a long way in keeping you in control of what you need to accomplish.