Making a Study Schedule - Study Planning

Good planning is a key to success in every walk of life, but it becomes even more important when it comes to academics. Success in your studies depends on how well you plan your tasks. The secret of successful students lies in properly planning about their academics. They plan their academic activities such as attending class-lectures on daily basis, doing self-study, making study-notes, and preparing themselves for exams. Their work is never hap-hazard. They know what to do, when do and how to do. This helps them follow a study time-table based on adequate study planning. For instance, they know that some subjects require more time and attention than others. Therefore, such subjects are given more priority while scheduling the courses.

Planning makes it easier to get the desired success in an exam because a good plan keeps students on right track for the achievement of their academic goals. Every student must properly plan his studies to become a successful student. It helps in saving time and completing the courses before exam; and not to get stressed during the exam. Those students, who do not plan properly, are usually stressed during the days of exam because they have to cover a lot of courses in a short time; and sometimes end up getting less marks in their exams.

The study plan should be based on the calculation of how much work is required during the academic session to complete studies before the exam. For making a good plan, you should think that how many class-lectures will you attend in an academic session, and how many books (or courses) will you need to study. Similarly, if you need to study other study-materials, you also take that into account while planning about your studies. For instance, you want to make some good study-notes so that you can easily revise them for preparing yourself for an exam. Then, you should think about the time that is available to you for carrying out your study. Similarly, also consider other activities of your life such as some hobbies and games, etc. Once you consider all these aspects of planning, write down your all points on a page. Think about it how to schedule all the activities to make a productive and workable plan for yourself. It will serve as a roadmap reflecting on the number of chapters, lessons, and topics according to a schedule.

Now, as you have learnt the importance of planning for academics, you should make a good schedule for your studies. A good schedule makes you punctual and helps you do every task at its correct time. It helps you understand how much part of your course you should complete daily, weekly and monthly so complete your preparation for the exam in time. Therefore, you should make a clear schedule and stick to it.

Study schedule can be made for a week, month or more time. Making a schedule depends on the student, nature of his studies, subjects and other routine activities. This can be done by calculating the available time (e.g. months, days and weeks) in an academic session and the number of courses to be studied in that academic session.

Let me explain to you how to make a simple schedule for your studies. It is a simple schedule just to give you an idea of how to make a study schedule for yourself. Your schedule may slightly vary according to you the nature of your courses, however, this will give you a basic idea of how to make a schedule.

1. Determine the total number of subjects (or books), chapters, topics, exercises for lessons, and other study-units which you musy study to prepare for an exam at the end of your academic session.
2. Calculate the total time available to you during your academic session or period till your exam. Determine how many days, weeks and months are available for preparation.
3. Divide the total number of study-units (e.g., subjects, chapters, lessons or topics) on the total time units (e.g. days, weeks, months) available for your study. It would give you an idea about how much study you should do each day, each week or each month to complete your courses within the available time.
4. For instance, if you divide the total number of topics on the total number of days, you will get an idea about how many topics should you study each day to complete your course within time. For these topics (to be studied each day), you can also choose specific times (e.g. 10 AM, 12 AM, 3 PM, etc.) of the day to study them according to these times.
5. Once you complete this calculation, draw a two columns table. Write the dates in one column and the study unit (e.g. topics, lessons, or chapter) in the other column.

Suppose a student of O-Level has four subjects and five months for preparation. He may make a schedule for himself by calculating total study-units of his courses and total time available for them, as follows:

1st Subject has 170 topics
2nd Subject has 205 topics
3rd Subject has 175 topics
4th Subject has 200 topics

Total Topics : (170+205+175+200) = 750 Topics
Total days : (30 days x 5 months) = 150 Days

Divide total topics on total available days: 750 topics ÷ 150 days = 5 topics per day

It gives the student an idea that if he studies 5 topics each day, he can easily complete has all courses in the available time.