Managing time effectively is crucial for succeeding in school and the professional world. However, effective time management requires more from students than simply keeping track of their running to-do list. For students with ADHD and learning differences, it is often particularly challenging to develop routines that allow them to complete assignments and projects in a timely manner. That said, there are concrete, actionable ways you can support your student as they develop time management skills. In this post, we outline the most common reasons why students struggle with time management and what you can do to help your student develop constructive habits.
Cognitive Overload
When you break it down, there are many components to learning and completing assignments. Consider an average class lecture. Your student has to pay attention, track information that might be relevant for assignments, take notes, consider what questions they have over the material, and ask their teacher those questions, all while keeping their other classes, assignments, and personal responsibilities in the back of their mind. For anyone, that can put a significant strain on short-term memory (or the thoughts and information you have to mentally hold onto temporarily). Importantly, what anyone can keep in this working memory differs from person to person and can fluctuate from day to day based on a variety of different variables like how much you’ve eaten, slept, or what your general emotional and mental states are.
What You Can Do
- Help your student prioritize information. Does their teacher indicate what is going to be on the test? If not, ask your student what they believe are the most essential things they learned during each of their classes.
- Have your student consider what kind of notetaking works best for them. Some benefit from the Cornell note system, but there are many other ways to track what happens during a lesson.
Multitasking
Multitasking is a major contributor to cognitive overload as it pulls our attention away from whatever we’re working on and adds another item to the running lists of things we have on our mind. It’s also something we’re all guilty of—especially when so many digital notifications can take our attention away from the task at hand. That shifting from one task to another also consumes greater cognitive energy, prolongs how long it takes for us to complete a task, and increases the number of errors there are in a task.
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What You Can Do
- Encourage your student to set timers where they work on a single task before taking a short break similar to the Pomodoro Technique.
- Create a comfortable, distraction-free environment that limits the amount of sensory input your student receives. Some noise can be helpful, but it shouldn’t be anything so engaging that it also shifts their attention away from a task.
- Counterintuitively, you might consider giving your student a productive way to channel their energy through movement that isn’t distracting—like fidget toys, a walking pad, or doodling.
Perfectionism
Perfectionism is one of the more common (and pernicious) forms of procrastination. While striving to do as well as possible on an assignment is an admirable quality, it often turns into a lack of forward progress for students. Getting hung up on small details can keep your student from completing their assignment on time and can create a domino effect where they don’t leave themselves enough time to complete their other assignments to their standards.
What You Can Do
- The most important thing you can do for a student is ask why they feel like they have to do something perfectly. Often, these high standards are born out of falling short of someone’s expectations—whether that’s their dream school, a teacher’s, or yours.
- Help your student identify the strengths, skills, and qualities they’ve demonstrated through their work regardless of what the final grade is. Often, we only use a letter grade to determine how well a student did on an assignment. If your student is struggling in geometry and got a C on their last test, it is a significant improvement if they got a B on a quiz even if it isn’t the A+ they wanted.
- Remind your student that it’s okay to turn in their work as it is. Some points are better than none. As the saying goes, “the perfect is the enemy of the good.” (And much of adulthood is sharing work in progress with your supervisor, so this is a skill worth cultivating now.)
Time Anxiety
For many students, keeping track of time is a major stressor, and that anxiety can lead to them making mistakes, taking longer to start, or simply pulling their attention away from their work. It can turn into a really challenging cycle where worrying about the time they have leads to them having less time to complete something, which only makes them worry more. This is often a cause of many student’s testing anxiety and is something your student might need testing accommodations to address.
What You Can Do
- Rather than having your student consider the entire assignment or project, help them break it down into the smallest possible steps. Help them start and finish the first few steps to help them build momentum and confidence.
- Help your student explore healthy outlets for stress like going on a walk, journaling, or doing some mindful breathing exercises.
Final Thoughts
For many students, managing their time can be challenging, but there are many small and large habits you can help them develop to make it easier. However, finding the right time management strategy for your student requires that you truly understand how and why they are struggling to manage their time effectively. It will often take a bit of trial and error to arrive at a solution that works best for them. This process takes time, and there is rarely a simple fix.
If you believe your student would benefit from additional support with developing their time management skills, contact The Enrichery today to learn more about our executive functioning coaching.
