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Singapore, 22 November 2002
Time management for e-learners |
In the last part of managing stress in learning, we highlight a few pointers on time management. It's a critical area for distance education students. In the attempt to juggle many responsibilities, we can over-burden ourselves.
Technology compounds the problem by giving the illusion that it "saves" us time. It can, but often it does not. Email is sent instantaneously, but the messages take time to compose or respond to. Unlike a classroom situation where we can have short conversations with other students to clarify an instructors' comments, consider how long it takes and how much energy we need to devote to getting a question answered by email.
Using the WWW for research purposes is not always very time efficient either. Consider the time spent going through search engines to find needed information then culling out the inappropriate materials. While believing we are saving the time it takes to make the trip to the library, we often don't realize how much time we have actually spent on online research (until the ISP hours run out!).
As distance education students, we need to budget the time we spend on studying and not get caught up in thinking we must answer every email message or conference comment, and endlessly follow up every link on the WWW just because technology makes it possible. Learn to budget the time spent on a course. Get help by asking your online facilitators. At PurpleTrain.com, they are on hand to answer your questions within a day they are asked, be it on a bulletin board or through private email.
Goal setting
Setting goals involves knowing what it is that we want to learn in a particular course, or what the objectives of the course entail and concentrating on reaching those objectives rather than all the other opportunities that present themselves along the way.
An online course with endless links of possibilities to explore quickly becomes overwhelming! No one can be an expert at everything and no course or instructor should assume we can. We need to pick the areas that interest us the most, or where we can make the greatest contribution, and concentrate our efforts there. Stop short of information overload.
Add humor
Finding humor in a situation can be a powerful tool against technostress. The degree to which we experience technostress is not dependent only on the external event, but depends largely on our perception of the event. Some people experience feelings of stress sooner and more deeply than others. Personality plays a key role in how we react to technology.
Humor can give us a different perspective on our problems. Learning to laugh at our situation can give us a sense of self-protection and control over our environment.
Humor ties into the idea of cultivating a positive attitude. We cannot control technology, but we can learn to control the emotional response we have to it.
Unfortunately, when we are immersed in a problem, we rarely find any humor in it. Other people may however, and in hindsight we may see the humor too, so share your experience with others so that they may share their frustrations with you.
We hope that you have benefited from this concluding segment of the three part series on handling stress in learning. Do look forward to more articles in the near future!
About Informatics Group
The Informatics Group, established in 1983, is a multinational corporation providing training and educational services in information technology and business management. Through its international franchising program and strategic acquisitions, Informatics presently has a global network of more than 548 centres spanning 44 countries.
The company presently offers five franchise products: Informatics Computer School, Thames Business School, CAL Computer Training Centre, Cambridge Child Development Centre and RACC. For more information, please visit http://www.informaticsgroup.com.
About PurpleTrain.com
PurpleTrain.com is the e-learning service provider which offers a one-stop service for business and IT education programs, corporate training courses and education-related services.
By combining innovative technology with world-class training content, PurpleTrain.com offers companies and individuals a high value, quality and effective on-line training solution. Over 1000 online courses are available, offering masters, degrees, diplomas and certificates in business and IT programs. Our online learning community now stands at over 67,000 users.
PurpleTrain.com is a 100%-owned venture of Informatics Holdings Limited, a leading training and education provider listed on the Singapore Stock Exchange. Informatics Holdings Limited is the only IT-based education provider in Singapore that made the ranking among Forbes Global's 200 Best Small Companies in the world.
For more information, please contact :
Andrew Yap
Communications & PR Manager
PurpleTrain.com
Email : pr@purpletrain.com
Website : www.purpletrain.com
www.informaticsgroup.com
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