Nursing can be very time consuming, if you are ill prepared for the amount of work you might have to do. While you are preparing to become a nurse, you may find that you are struggling with managing your time and never seem to be doing as well as you thought you would. 

Today, I will be giving you the top 3 time management tips that I feel have been most helpful to me:

  1. PLAN. Right as the semester approaches you and you receive every syllabi, you should immediately get a planner or calendar to mark each important date. Things such as, exams, tests, midterms, and finals. Another important thing I mark down, which seems a bit tedious but is very important in nursing, is the weekly assignments. If you are preparing yourself for the upcoming semester by writing down every important thing you will be doing during that semester, you are giving yourself a head start. 
  2. PRIORITIZE. There are going to be certain days when you have 3 assignments due and a quiz the next day, or 2 tests in one day but an assignment due the next. You need to figure out which one is due first and which one can wait the extra 2 hours until you have finished studying, or finished the assignment. One thing that I do, is I will look for everything due in just one week. I make a notecard of all of the assignments, exams, etc. and I decide which of these are my top, middle, and last priorities. This tool is not only useful for managing your time, but it is also a superb life skill that you will need to keep with you in the future. 
  3. ORGANIZE. If you are struggling with a load of work, each from different classes, this is inducting you to become an organized person. 2 main tools that I use are sticky notes and highlighters. Sticky notes can be used for about anything; marking a book where you left off or even where you need to read too, for ordering assignments from first to last or most prioritized to least prioritized, and even as reminders for the day. Highlighters can be used for many things as well; if you type out your study guides and need to separate the answers from the questions, if you are reading and need to keep important information together you can use the same color, and even for prioritizing your assignments by highlighting which one comes first. 

Assuming that people like to stick to their guns when it comes to these 3 tools, I understand if you do not like my techniques. One thing I do know, is that if you are anything like me; horrific with time management and are too indolent to keep yourself in line.. then these techniques will absolutely help you. I hope you take at least one of these techniques, if not 3, and really push yourself daily to be a more well ordered human being when it comes to time management.