Spring Cleaning for Students

Flowers are blooming, days are longer, pollen is swirling through the air, and for students, the end of the school year is in sight! But don’t start slipping in your study habits yet! If anything, now is a great time to tidy up your study and school routine so you can finish the semester strong. Below are tips for spring cleaning up your school habits:

Clean out your backpack:

Okay I get it. If you’re on spring break, the last thing you want to do is touch or even look at your backpack! It’s probably been stuffed out of sight under your bed or in a corner not to be thought about until Monday morning after break.

But may I gently suggest– perhaps Sunday night, as you sadly set your alarm to wake up early for school the next day– take your backpack and clear everything out of it. All those papers, food wrappers, books, anything else that you’ve left in there. I recommend setting a timer for 15 minutes to just clear everything out.

Set aside the books, binders, notebooks, and anything else you’ll need for the next day of classes. Throw away trash or anything you don’t need. Set aside past assignments that you think you might need for finals studying.

This physical act of cleaning serves a couple purposes. First, it might help you feel productive and slightly more organized for the start of classes. Additionally, you can start to think about what you need to finish the semester on a good note. Do you see an assignment you didn’t do well on? Instead of throwing it away, hold onto it so you can discuss the assignment with your teacher.

Check your grades:

Perhaps you avoided thinking about your grades for the last couple of weeks. However, now is the time to really take a look at where you are in your classes and what it will take to improve your grades, if that’s something you need to do. Are there any large assignments coming up at the end of the term? Perhaps your last graded exam will be the final, which you need to ace. Start planning and preparing for what you need to do to get the best grades you can. Set a S.M.A.R.T Goal, hire a tutor, or prepare to use the study skills described in this blog series.

Use a planner:

If you have a planner that you’ve diligently been using to track assignments and due dates all school year, keep it up! If you haven’t or if you’ve fallen off of using your planner, now is the perfect time to start or get back into it. Start tracking your assignments and activities. Block out study times and plan which days you’ll be doing your work. Now is the time to stay on top of your assignments and it’s certainly not the time to fall behind on due dates because there are limited opportunities to make up that work.

Evaluate your habits:

Finally, take a bit of time to reflect on your study and work habits from the past semester. Were there things you were doing that didn’t really help you or made things more difficult? If so, think about how you can take action to change those habits. Perhaps you were regularly going to bed way too late, which made you consistently late to school and tired in your classes. Commit to going to bed earlier during these last few months of school. Did you only study the night before a test? Set a study schedule for yourself, or talk to a teacher or tutor about how to best study before your next exam.

Schedule a session with one of our tutors today!

Check out our tips for staying productive over Spring Break!