No Stress, Better Grades

With only about two more months left of the school year, students are finding it difficult to complete their school work on time, focus in class, study for finals etc. The weather’s getting warmer, and we’re fortunate enough to go to school so close to the beach. On nice days, being kept inside a school building all day vs skipping and going to the beach with your friends can be very tempting. All grade levels feel the pressure and stress toward the end of the school year with finals coming up and making sure you have everything completed in a short amount of time. 

Senioritis is a very real thing for many seniors. Students who are reaching their final point in high school lack much motivation, seem to not care much about their school work, skipping class and turning in late work etc.

With finals coming up in about one month, the school work is starting to get heavier and more serious on students. This might cause students to have bad stress/anxiety, lack attendance and become very overwhelmed. Teachers and students try to avoid these cases as much as possible. 

According to Coursera.org, there are ways to better the situation or resolve it all together: 

1. Find a good place to study; finding a good location is one of the most important parts of studying. 
2. Minimize distractions, such as powering off your phone, working in a quiet place, and spending less time talking to friends and more focusing on studying.
3. Taking breaks during studying; intentional breaks has been linked to better control, increased attention, and boosts in energy. Research shows that working for around 50 minutes, then giving yourself a 15- to 20-minute break, can lead to optimum productivity. Take a short walk, listen to a mood-boosting song, relax with a friend, stretch, meditate and more. 

Junior Sofia Morant shares, “I tend to turn my phone on do not disturb and turn on some good music to lock in and stay focused while studying.”

Late work is something most kids struggle with. They might put off the work until the last minute, thinking they have plenty of time to do it, or sit on their phone in class instead of doing it then. One way that would be a good way to prevent late work is as soon as the student is assigned a task to immediately go ahead and knock it out and finish it first. This way they won’t have missing or late grades. They will have time to ask questions or fix any mistakes and it’s so less stressful knowing you already have the assignment completed and turned it in. All students’ minds work differently. Some students need complete silence to study and focus on work; others need to listen to music to help them study. 

According to Music Gateway, “Research has shown that music can help you focus, concentrate, relax, feel motivated, improve memory and make the process much more enjoyable.” 

Teachers hate seeing late work. Some teachers will remind students everyday to turn in our work; other teachers will remind them once and expect them to turn it in on time. 

Teacher Kristin Dutka, “To help motivate students to turn assignments in on time, I ground them when they have low grades. For digital photos, that means they can’t go around the campus to take photos.”

Hopefully, these tips help take the weight of stress off students and encourage them to do absolutely amazing on their final exams to have a great end to the school year. Make sure to try different things to help you. Everyone is different so you might find something that helps you that doesn’t help your friends.

Picture by Google.