Time Management While Distance Learning

Staying Productive in Quarantine: Products and Suggestions Words cannot describe the number of times I have wanted to study and do my work in a coffee shop or in my university's library just for a change of scenery. Working from home in my room at my desk for the last year has been far from ideal, and I have tried my best to make it comfortable and designated for work so that my room that once was only meant for relaxation and sleep. Because I miss the comradery of working with other students and around other people, I have made some more changes to encourage myself to feel motivated and productive while working from home. What Have I Done to Boost Productivity? I have struggled to stay motivated working from home. My at-home workspace was far from ideal, so I often would go to a local coffee shop or go to my university's library before the pandemic hit. When I was in those environments, I felt like I had a designated work area and very little distraction, which is what I did n...

 I have talked about a few productivity and focus apps on this blog and I have found that although I did enjoy using each of them, none of them really worked for me. Flora is fun for those that have the money to donate and enjoy the incentives of keeping your tree alive, but I am a broke college student and can't use the app in a way that I would like. I enjoy Study Bunny, but I found I am not completely focused on my tasks when using it because of everything going on, it is a bit distracting for me. So, I went on a search for bare-bones productivity/Pomodoro/focus apps that would be nice to look at and are user-friendly.

Hello everyone, my name is Celia! I am a Study Bunny and my job is to motivate you to stay on task for a chosen period of time. Let me tell you all about my app.

In my previous post, I wrote about the Pomodoro Technique and the ways that it can be helpful for those that have issues staying on task. The premise of the technique is that you work on a designated task for 25 minutes, take a 5-minute break, then repeat 4 times to allow yourself a 20-minute break. The technique definitely piqued my interest, especially when I found that there were apps made for the technique, many with thousands of positive reviews (on the Apple App Store). So, I decided it would be fun to try all the apps I could find that was related to timers and/or the Pomodoro Technique and relay what I found interesting about each app here. Since we are focused on Time Management here, I hope that these various time management and focus apps will be helpful to you. So to begin my review, let's start with Flora.

Too Many Suggestions I know that I have given a lot of suggestions for productivity and time management aids, but using all the suggestions I have given may be overwhelming. For me, the combination of things I use work, and because I am not a creative person, I have had trouble using other forms that I have read and heard are very helpful for students and working professionals. Let me introduce you to Notion.

  Not Enough Time In my last post, I talked about getting a timer and using that as a means of keeping a goal to work on a selected task. When thinking of that technique and that people often use goals to complete tasks, I realize that it can be difficult for some people to focus for a long period of time. I have found that working in my own classes sometimes, especially when the class times are longer, I have trouble staying focused for the whole class period. So, I did some research for those of us that may have trouble staying focused for a long period of time.