Focusing on my homework

[Duos Greanleef]

Doo doo dooooo.....
{ignores 4 page paper}
Hey, teh interwebz!!1!
{ignores math homework}
I wonder if the new OotS is up?
{ignores study guide for psychology}
Aww man... Noo OotS!
{StumbleUpon}
That's cool!
{3 hours later}
Man I love StumbleUpon!

So I'm pretty bad at procrastinating, especially with school related stuff, and need some positive reinforcement.
A friend of mine has a Mac applet that shuts down all of his recreational internet and programs (essentially allowing only iTunes, Word, and the school website).
I'm a PC guy. Is there a similar program for me? I've looked myself, but my Google Fu is weak.
Help me Playground, you're my only hope!

[NineThePuma]

I have this trick I call "unplug the ethernet cable" that works fairly well. It's probably not as useful, but having someone who works with you to keep you on task is helpful.

*shrugs* Beyond that, I got nothing.

[Haruki-kun]

I have this trick I call "unplug the ethernet cable" that works fairly well. It's probably not as useful, but having someone who works with you to keep you on task is helpful.

*shrugs* Beyond that, I got nothing.

Problem is most assignments these days require Internet connection....

[Duos Greanleef]

Problem is most assignments these days require Internet connection....

This, sadly.
However, Dyth, I like your forward style.

[Gullara]

I'd help you, but by making this post I'm doing exactly what you're describing. :smallsigh:

[RS14]

I'd help you, but by making this post I'm doing exactly what you're describing. :smallsigh:

I posted just to say the same thing. :smallbiggrin:


Math homework probably doesn't require an internet connection, so there's that.

I generally find the "just deal with it" method most effective, at least for papers. Write an hour at a time *without any interuption*, take a non-internet break (for food, water, books, whatever of at most 10 minutes, and repeat until end of day, or a suitably large number of pages are complete (I generally set 5/day as my limit).

[factotum]

So I'm pretty bad at procrastinating

Actually it sounds like you're really, really good at procrastinating. :smallwink:

Does it work if you define some period each day when you're sitting down and working rather than browsing the Interwebz or what-have-you? If you know that, say, you're always working between 8 and 10 or whatever it might be easier to get into the mindset.

[Eldan]

Hey, a thread about postponing homework!

*puts aside papers he has to read before tomorrow*

[Duos Greanleef]

I would like to forthrightly apologize to everyone that I have caused to stumble in this area.
I will now go hang my head in shame (instead of doing my homework).

[rakkoon]

Turn off the PC. Put a sticker on it: "Not till 5.30PM"
Do your homework.

Or we will find you .... WOOHAHAHAHAhhhaaaa *coughing fit*

[Eldan]

I have to read six doctoral theses and about a dozen or so papers this week. All available online. Shutting of my computer or internet won't help :smalltongue:

[Haruki-kun]

I have to read six doctoral theses and about a dozen or so papers this week. All available online. Shutting of my computer or internet won't help :smalltongue:

Out of my 6 courses:

Two require submitting assignments and researching on the Internet.

One requires researching and sometimes submitting assignments on the Internet.

One requires research only, but from the school database. So, Internet.

One requires a school computer whose internet I cannot shut down.

One is photography, so it involves going out. Can't get lost with that one.

tl; dr: What did we do before we had Internet? :smallconfused: I can't remember.....

[truemane]

tl; dr: What did we do before we had Internet? :smallconfused: I can't remember.....

Libraries. And pron that didn't move.

It was horribe.

[Form]

I'm afraid self-discipline is the only solution. I know, I'm not happy about that either. :smallfrown:

[Dusk Eclipse]

I actually am worse at this.... I am actually a my philosophy class:smalltongue:.

But yeah I need more self-discipline

[drakir_nosslin]

I'm afraid self-discipline is the only solution. I know, I'm not happy about that either. :smallfrown:

Not true. You can also wait until the very last moment (often the day before the homework/paper/work assignment should be handed in) and then do it. It works for me, but only because I'm satisfied with getting ok grades instead of top ones. With exams it three days before instead of one. Works like a charm.

[Form]

Not true. You can also wait until the very last moment (often the day before the homework/paper/work assignment should be handed in) and then do it. It works for me, but only because I'm satisfied with getting ok grades instead of top ones. With exams it three days before instead of one. Works like a charm.

Or you could indeed let an ever approaching deadline prod you into action. This'll probably result in a lot of stress though.

And waiting for the last possible moment doesn't leave much room for proof-reading/error correction.

[valadil]

I have to read six doctoral theses and about a dozen or so papers this week. All available online. Shutting of my computer or internet won't help :smalltongue:

Have you considered printing? I know it's bad for the environment, but sometimes it's the only way I can get through those papers. Hard copies are easier to annotate.

To the OP, here's how I got through grad school:

Alternate work time and break time. I like to work for 45 then break for 45. That's usually how long it takes for Facebook to get some decent updates anyway. The way I alternate these times is with music. I play a CD while I work. When it's done I put on another CD and slack. Wash, rinse, repeat.

I too found a computer could be too distracting. Couldn't get away from it though, as I'm a programmer. What I did was use my desktop for fooling around and my laptop for work. This somehow taught me that laptop time was working mode and I was less likely to get distracted. I know that not everyone has two computers though, so if you don't have a laptop try a library or other computer cluster.

Finally, consider a distraction free writing environment. Back in high school I used a DOS machine with no internet connection or even multitasking. I'd write in a plain text editor and then copy the paper to a disk and bring it to a computer with MS Word so I could deal with formatting. Again, I wouldn't suggest getting a whole new computer just for writing. But consider a full screen application. Not being able to see how many emails you have waiting for you will do wonders to keep you on task. Googling for "full screen word processor" and "distraction free writing" gave me a ton of apps. Here's a decent looking freebie for windows: q10 (http://www.baara.com/q10/).

[Eon]

Homework...

Hmm...

I like to take the last minute approach. It's very motivating...

[drakir_nosslin]

Or you could indeed let an ever approaching deadline prod you into action. This'll probably result in a lot of stress though.

And waiting for the last possible moment doesn't leave much room for proof-reading/error correction.

Stress, yea. That's a problem, though I've learned to live with it. Actually, I've been getting better at handling stress in all kinds of situations since I started with doing things at the last possible moment, but it's not healthy, no. Many late nights...

As for proof reading, that's why I have to be satisfied with ok grades. :smallsmile:

[Haruki-kun]

Stress, yea. That's a problem, though I've learned to live with it. Actually, I've been getting better at handling stress in all kinds of situations since I started with doing things at the last possible moment, but it's not healthy, no. Many late nights...

I actually agree with this. But I mean... I've learned to work under pressure, and in the end my grades are actually pretty good.

[Duos Greanleef]

...Alternate work time and break time...


This is a wonderful Idea.
Actually, almost all of the ideas posted here so far are good ideas.
thank you, Playground!

[The Commander]

Simply remind yourself that the Internet will still be there and any social networking sites/game sites/whatever you browse will still be there and CAN wait for you, at least for a day or two.

Try and push yourself to do the work ASAP. Even if you don't complete it, you've still put some work towards it, which means you have less to do over the rest of the week/whatever time period you have to finish it.

Mind you, I too am guilty of working many long hours into the night before the deadline of an assignment...

[Erloas]

I know Win7 has parental controls where you can limit what time certain activities can be done. I haven't really used it, but I know it is there. If it will limit what web pages you can visit, I have no idea.

[TFT]

Hmmm, procrastination. I am doing that right now. :smallbiggrin:

Well, I often have trouble focusing on something until the amount of time I think I can do the assignment in is the amount of time left until it is due + half a night to a whole night of sleep. It's not too bad unless there is something fun happening at that time period, or I think the assignment will take less time then it does.

...But either way, I probably should be getting to that reading. I don't want to have to read(The kind of dry history book) for a couple of hours right before I go to bed. Though it might help me sleep...(Did I mention my mind tries to justify saving it for the night before? Yea. Not helpful) :smalltongue:

[The Commander]

I suppose you could also get members of the Playground to help you with your homework... I'm not saying you should ask what the answer is, but maybe by putting the homework up you'd be more inclined to work at it, since work and browsing the forum would be the same thing almost... Might also help with your understanding too, which is a double bonus.

[Skeppio]

The Commander has a point. I've seen people do that here before and we have a few member who're particularly knowledgeable, depending on your subject. Worth a shot at the very least.

[Mr. Moon]

I'm procrastinating right now, too, but I've put my procrastination on a timer: I've still got another ten minutes to go, and then I'm going to go track down more research.

The best way to avoid distraction is to avoid temptation. If you need to use the internet, then close any tabs that aren't related to whatever it is you're doing. When I'm reading articles, I only have the tab with the article open, with a Youtube video of the audio from a rainstorm to help me focus (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwIyHkS_JPg), and a timer counting down from 60 to 45 minutes, depending upon how focused I am, and that's it. MSN is turned off or set to Busy, and I turn my back on the TV. Thing is, I have a short attention span and I know it, so as soon as I feel that I can't focus any longer or I finish an article, I allow myself a short break to check my deviantArt, Giant and my email.

So that's the key, I suppose: variety.

[Savannah]

For me, alternating the order in which I worked and took breaks was the only way to go. I have a timer on my watch that I can set for any length of time, so I used that to measure equal work and goofing off time. For me, 30 minutes at a time was about right. I also found that I did much better if I picked a specific day (usually Friday or Saturday) and didn't do any homework at all that day. Doing homework every single day tended to wear me out, and I'd start to lose focus and procrastinate.

I also varied how I'd keep track of what I had to do. Sometimes I'd make myself a checklist, and other times I used a whiteboard so that I could erase the things I was done with. Color coding things by class and date I should work on them helped, too (I always tried to schedule when I should work on things so that I didn't have a ton of one thing, such as writing, that I had to do on the same day for multiple classes). I hate organizing, but I found that if I switched between methods of organizing I didn't get bored and stop doing it entirely. And if I have a nice list, there's no way for me to think 'oh, I don't have much to do, I'll just do something fun instead'.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

I have a separate user account on my computer that has nothing interesting linked on it, only academic websites and such. No comics, no forums, etc. It takes away a lot of distractions, by simply making it that much harder to get to GitP.

[Eldan]

Have you considered printing? I know it's bad for the environment, but sometimes it's the only way I can get through those papers. Hard copies are easier to annotate.

Sometimes work, when I have books. Usually, however, I need to check unknown terms; check the functional type of a plant, body weight and diet of an animal, characteristics of a soil type or other random factoid; open other papers that describe something in more detail or cross-link and annotate something in EndNote every two minutes, so I couldn't really work offline.

Which means that at any time, the forum is two clicks away. Which is horrible.


Edit: And I'm not allowed to discuss my work online, as it's unpublished data which represents at least five years of field work.

The problem is that it's not homework in the actual sense... it's that for my semester project, my professor gave me an enormous mountain of data and told me "Take that home with you and do some statistics with it in the next two weeks". Which is vague enough that I have trouble getting motivated, even though I know what to do.

[Level8Mudcrab]

Homework, isn't that the thing that I'm meant to be doing now?

I find with homework that i'm more of a leave it to the last night person.

[Amiel]

I was going to write a post, but my procras...


I have three more assignments to do!

[Cleverdan22]

Ugh, I'm horrible with procrastination. I recently took a day of school in order to catch up with the many assignments that had piled up on me. What did I do? Watched TV and played TF2. Uggggh.

[Haruki-kun]

I was going to write a post, but my procras...


I have three more assignments to do!

You're... using homework to procrastinate posting? Dude, your priorities are wrong. :smalleek:

[KenderWizard]

I'm procrastitastic! I even procrastinate when there's something I chose to do, even sometimes with things I enjoy. I can procrastinate on or off line. I'll tidy to procrastinate homework, and I'll sculpt to procrastinate tidying and right now I'm online to procrastinate sculpting. And I like sculpting! So I'm currently days away from getting any homework done.

For me, I think procrastinating is a type of control issue. If I feel I'm somehow being compelled to do something, I'll put it off out of stubbornness! So I used to literally do my homework for school between the class it was for and the preceding class, but I would also often independently work on something for school that we didn't have to do.

So my advice is to make the assignments yours some way. Challenge yourself to find a slightly different take on whatever it is you're doing. Do your maths problems in patterns. Write your essays from the viewpoint of someone else. Or insert secret messages into your work (http://gizmodo.com/5669317/student-hides-rick-astleys-song-in-college-paper)!

[drakir_nosslin]

Exam on Tuesday on everything so far this term. Haven't even bought the books yet. I'm almost ready to start though, tomorrow's going to be a 12 hrs+ day at school. Nice :smalltongue:

[Dallas-Dakota]

I too found a computer could be too distracting. Couldn't get away from it though, as I'm a programmer. What I did was use my desktop for fooling around and my laptop for work. This somehow taught me that laptop time was working mode and I was less likely to get distracted. I know that not everyone has two computers though, so if you don't have a laptop try a library or other computer cluster.


I'm a designer, with a laptop ment for desigining.
This means it's also a good gaming laptop. >.>

But yeah, hi, master procrastinator here. :smallsigh:

[SurlySeraph]

OK, first off Leechblock. (http://www.proginosko.com/leechblock.html) It's great.

Second, make it inconvenient for you to waste time.
Get to the site you need to be on, then shut down your connection so you can't impulse-navigate to other pages. This is easiest if you don't have Wifi, but even if it is it works well if you take multiple steps to make it annoying to go back online; disable the connection on your computer, flip off the radio on your computer so it can't access the network even after you re-enable it, then turn off the router so you have to walk from your computer to it and wait for it to warm up again to go online.
Delete your favorites and bookmarks, except for academic websites.
Do offline work first, so you can't get sucked into something online. I find it works well to do a lot of other homework before going online, since I'll be in a working mood and not get distracted. In general, if I start the day working I'll keep working, and if I start the day wasting time I'll waste the whole day.

Try to stay around people. Work with your door open, or in a library with people around, or somewhere else that people will notice if you aren't working. Not embarrassing yourself (i.e., by browsing through pages and pages of fantasy art or character sheets when everyone around you is studying) is an excellent motivator.

Finally, try to fill up time so that you spend the day on schedule, rather than having long stretches with nothing planned where you'll start wasting time. I find that giving myself lots of free time just means that I waste more time, while having a dense schedule means I'll go "Well, I have to finish my math by five to get to this meeting, and it always take at least two hours, so I have to start it right now."

I have plenty of trouble with procrastination, like everybody else who has choices other than working, but these are strategies that I've found very helpful.

[Lioness]

OK, first off Leechblock. (http://www.proginosko.com/leechblock.html) It's great.


That's an awesome idea.

Unfortunately, it'd mean installing FF, which I don't yet have (Opera love). Which would make more procrastination as I customised stuff, and yeah.

So I'll setting for just closing my browser and then disabling my interweb connection. I have a music assignment that needs to be done in 1 1/2 hours.

[AshDesert]

Well, my problem has never been getting distracted while doing an assignment (I HAVE to finish an assignment I start, or at least get to the goal I set for myself on a project), but actually getting started, so I doubt any of my tips would actually help. My suggestion for if you need to do something on the internet is to get another browser with only academic bookmarks on it. I actually use two copies of Chrome to keep myself from getting tempted by GitP/Cracked/TvTropes because I know I'll spend all day doing that instead of working.

I find that the few times I do get distracted that music helps me focus. Be warned though, if you use Pandora instead of iTunes or a CD/MP3 player that clicking back to that tab every song to like/dislike can be even more distracting:smallbiggrin:.