Disorgazied!

Devon Rex, ADN, BSN · Dec 31, 2012

One thing that helped me a lot that I never did before nursing school is to get calendar... the kind that shows the entire month on two pages. Then, every time I started a class, I would look at the syllabus and write down all due dates for homework, quizzes, exams, mid-term, final exam, clinicals or labs, etc. If you get an email about an event in the future, write it down, even if it's 2, 3, or 4 months ahead of time.

Read your student email at least DAILY!

Keep your personal agenda open for changes according to your school. They will never change something because of you (or any one student for that matter).

Be proactive. Always anticipate your needs or responsibilities. Do not expect professors to spoon feed you information nor take you by the hand throughout the program.

Stay away from drama and join/form a small study group (4 or less students).

Do not procrastinate EVER! Information will keep piling up. Ask your professor for help or assistance if you feel you are falling behind. They should give you ideas on how to tackle information you might be having a hard time retaining.

Hope these tips help. Good luck !! :)

Stephalump · Dec 31, 2012

Hi!

I do agree that organization is super important, but at the end of the day we also have to accept who we are and set our expectations accordingly. There are people who were organizing their body parts in the womb and there are free birds and all both have managed to survive nursing school. So don't beat yourself up if your binder looks like a tornado by the end of the semester :)

That being said, here's a few of my tips

1)Make a huge point to create a designated home for EVERYTHING throughout your courses. Things start to get crazy when don't know know where to put something, so you just put it "somewhere."

2)Use a planner. Set reminders on your phone telling you to LOOK at your planner. I'm a very kinesthetic person, so I actually love filling mine out. I use different hi-lighter colors to distinguish work for different classes. If you have a lot on your plate, I recommend an Uncalendar. Lots of room to write and organize things your way. And if you bail on the planner and then realize you need to get back to it, it's undated so you can pick right up where you left off instead of wasting pages and pages.

3)Regroup at the end of the week. Getting disorganized isn't the end of the world. But they longer it goes, the worse off you are. So make a point to clean out your bags and refile your papers and fill in your planner on Friday (or Sa or Sun...whenever) so you aren't caught in a downward spiral.

4)Reverse engineer your time. Your planner should be full of due dates so you can see the entire span of time between each of them and today. So plan when you're going to do them. Pretend you may be called upon by the President to saver the lives of babies in Bolivia with your awesome new nursing skills the night before the due date - give yourself more time than you need. If you can block out time for class, you can block out time for class work.

rnunley · Dec 31, 2012

One thing that helped me a lot that I never did before nursing school is to get calendar... the kind that shows the entire month on two pages. Then, every time I started a class, I would look at the syllabus and write down all due dates for homework, quizzes, exams, mid-term, final exam, clinicals or labs, etc. If you get an email about an event in the future, write it down, even if it's 2, 3, or 4 months ahead of time.
Read your student email at least DAILY!
Keep your personal agenda open for changes according to your school. They will never change something because of you (or any one student for that matter).
Be proactive. Always anticipate your needs or responsibilities. Do not expect professors to spoon feed you information nor take you by the hand throughout the program.
Stay away from drama and join/form a small study group (4 or less students).
Do not procrastinate EVER! Information will keep piling up. Ask your professor for help or assistance if you feel you are falling behind. They should give you ideas on how to tackle information you might be having a hard time retaining.
Hope these tips help. Good luck !! :)

Hi All,

This is my first post, so I hope it's helpful :)

On the topic of being organized, I have come to be a lot like Devon in that I have a detailed calendar, I keep up with all communications, and I panic internally if I feel like I am getting behind on this as a trigger to spend time getting it caught back up.

What worked for me is having it handy, so my calendar with all assignments is on my phone, and so is my communication access (emails, texts, etc.). It takes trial and error to figure out what works for each individual, so don't beat yourself up if something isn't working. Instead, ask yourself why it's not working and what would make it better. Maybe you need visual reminders, so lots of alarms on your calendar as a heads up; or maybe you are better with paper and pencil versus electronic; or you haven't found the right tools to fit your personality and need to try new ones. Whatever it is, don't give up until you master your organization methods for yourself - it's a small journey so get started!

These will become habits after awhile, and therefore easier. So be kind and supportive to yourself during the investigative period, then be motivating and firm to make these steps new habits and they will save your rear in the future.

Persevere!

Alisonisayoshi, LVN · Dec 31, 2012

I'm about the most disorganized person on the planet... So I go with a real hard non digital organizer. I just upgraded to a kindle fire for my digital organization. I love it because , with an office suite app, I can do EVERYTHING on it and my books are there too! I sync it to my computer. I'm a tablet junkie! I like the ease of use. So, I have a hard copy of my schedule on my fridge, a digital copy with my books (on tablet) reminders on my phone, and my other biggie is a designated work space. Not my bed, or the couch, but a real desk! I have blocks in the day where I study, TV off, kids in other rooms (I'm a mom), no Facebook, no Pinterest, no Reddit! Also my study "mess" stays on the desk so i dont lose things! I had a 3.75 last semester (I barely passed stupid public speaking with a stupid C).

ImDaMan11 · Jan 1, 2013

ok i just got the joke nevermind lol..but you will be ok

zoe92 · Jan 1, 2013

Planner! For sure. It will help a lot. And also, I love to declutter during breaks. So beginning of summer, end of summer, thanksgiving, christmas, and easter I do huge clean outs. It feels great to get rid of junk. As for actual school work, have specific folders for each class. Take that one folder to class & only keep current material in there (like the power point that the professor is going over that day). After each exam, I move my work to a big binder, which I keep at home for the final. This helps me stay focused & organized in class.

NightNerd, MSN, RN · Jan 1, 2013

Everyone here has shared some great tips! My two cents would be to just determine what has worked best for you in the past as far as study habits, and only implementing those. For example, I used to try to record every word the professor said in a notebook, but that drove me bananas and did not help me very much when it came time to study. Whenever professors make their slideshows available, I print them out and keep them in a binder, then highlight and take additional notes as needed. It eliminates the extra papers that won't help and instead puts my focus on what the professor is actually saying. Recording the lecture also helps.

For the papers you do pick up, keep a binder section or folder specifically for each class. Keep the syllabus, reading list, whatever else in front, then add pages in chronological order. You can even keep yourself a table of contents as you add just so you'll know where you put certain things. Containing the mess, as someone above stated, on a desk or another designated work area is important too.

Good luck!

jonesel · Jan 2, 2013

Thanks so much you guys!!

strawberryluv, BSN, RN · Jan 2, 2013

All I do is get a piece of printer paper, draw lines horizontal and vertical (so their squares) then draw a big square in the perimeter of those lines to make a CALENDER. Then I record all dates (exams, clinicals, meetings, etc) on the squares. Then I tape that thing on top of the ledge on my work desk so that it hangs over my personal computer. Done.

I also keep a planner but I hardly ever look at it...

All my nursing books are stacked neatly at the edge of my computer desk so that while I study I

can easily whip them out.

kailynnsmom · Jan 3, 2013

I print emails and post them in the area where I do my studying. I also save the everthing in my phone. I even post pictures of the body(skeletal structure, pathophysiology).

tinks599 · Jan 3, 2013

I can be very organized and disorganized.

What works for me is to have a binder for each course. I bought good quality ones that I can reuse each semester. It has three rings, pockets and places to put things. I shove anything without holes into a pocket and try to organize it every week or in preparation for the test. It may not be organized, but it is always there. By the end of the semester I had several people in classes compliment me on how organized I was. LOL! I don't feel that way but when I needed something I could put my hands on it. That was a step ahead, whether I felt that way or not.

Another thing is that I have learned over the years (been in school at least 1/2 time since 2008) is that I need to make time for homework. That means I have had to tell my kids (several times)...I am doing MY homework, can this wait? Pretty much, if the house isn't burning down and nobody is bleeding out...then it can wait until I'm done or at least until I can get to a stopping point. Same for my husband. I'm grateful, my family is very supportive of me but it is just a process and you have to carve out time to do this. It will pay off.