Managing Your Time??!!

This week's class session on time managment and procrastination seemed to garner a great deal of interest. Most of you, since the first time we met as a class, as well as in your previous blog entries, have mentioned that your biggest challenge or obstacle to finding academic success is an inability to manage your time effectively or that you simply procrastinate TOO much.

Hopefully, since we met on Tuesday, many of you have begun to reflect on our class discussion and are being more mindful of how exactly you do spend your time on a daily basis. Additionally, an aspect of this week's homework requires that you chart where you spend your time...

So...where are you spending your time...and do you feel good about how much time you are allocating to everything you need to do on a daily/weekly basis?

For this week's blog entry, please respond/comment on the following:

1. Are you spending the most time during the week on things that are important to you? What is most important to you? Why is it important to spend time on this?

2. Does where you spend the majority of your time help you to accomplish your goals? Both your short term and long term?

3. Are there things that you can cut out of your schedule that you would consider time wasters? What are some things you have already "wasted" time on this week?

4. What are THREE practical things you can do differently to better manage your time this semester?

SMART GOALS

This past class session we discussed and reviewed motivation and I asked you all to recall a moment during the past week in which you were pressed to get something done and had to find the motivation to move forward with task completion...thank you to those of you who shared your insights!

The topic of the week was goal setting and we specifically discussed the idea of SMART GOALS. If you recall, I share that in order for a goal to be more likely to be accomplished the following should be true about the goals you set for yourself:

S = Specific: The goal outlines the what, where, why, who, when, etc...of what you want to accomplish

M = Measurable: If you can't measure the goal, how will you know that you have accomplished the goal?

A = Achievable: It is important to only set goals for yourself of which you have the capacity and control to accomplish at this point in your life

R = Relevant: If the goal has no meaning for you at this time in your life, then you are not likely to stick with it.

T = Timebound: All SMART goals must have a specificed timeframe in which you plan to reach your goal.

For this week's blog entry I ask that you do the following and write it as a comment in response to this blog entry:

   §  Write out three academically focused SMART Goals that you wish to accomplish this semester.

§  Why did you choose these goals and why are they important to you?

§  What are some obstacles you can anticipate encountering this semester that might stand in the way of achieving these goals?  

Your blog entry response is due by 11:59PM on Sunday, February 19, 2012.

What is Motivation?!

I thought this week's class was great! For the most part, everyone was participatory and engaged in the conversation and activities! Everyone brought their unique ideas and perspectives to the dialogue and that made the class a quality experience. I hope we can continue to remain committed to engaging in such quality class sessions every week!

For this week's blog entry response, I want you all to continue reflect on motivation...and why it is you came to AAU and what has kept you motivated (and what has stood in your way to maintaining motivation) to this point...

Blog Entry # 2 - What Motivates Me?

Write a blog entry that encompasses a response to all of the following:

·         Before coming to the Academy of Art University, what motivated you to pursue your career in art/design? What were the factors that motivated you to enroll at AAU and pursue your college education? What does possessing passion for your art/design have to do with staying motivated?  

·         What are things right NOW that continue to keep you from completing tasks or meeting deadlines?

·         What is a strategy or strategies you plan to implement to help you maintain better motivation this semester?  How will you implement these strategies?         

·         What did you think of the Motivational DNA exercise? (please provide honest, yet appropriate responses to this question)

Your blog entry response is due by 11:59PM on Sunday, February 12, 2012.