The Conundrum of Being Connected
Posted by Erin Lewis at 12:17 pm
The other day I was talking with a friend whose son just started college this fall. He is finding college to be even better than he’d imagined. He has one major challenge with respect to his studies: focus. The major reason: the Internet. Specifically, he is spending more time surfing and connecting with friends via e-mail and social networking sites than he is studying.
It’s a conundrum. The Internet has become an important part of connecting with the world, with friends, even with family. However, as important as connecting to these resources has become, it is also critical that students of all ages monitor the amount of time they spend online in leisure activity. What makes this difficult is that the line is often blurred between work and leisure. Is reading this blog post work or leisure?
My advice to readers is to first determine a specific amount of time you will dedicate to your studies each day. Wall off that time and protect it. For a typical student, the high school transcript is evidence of several years of hard and consistent work. Let this ground you and the choices you make regarding how you spend your time studying.
Outside of this time, monitor your habits on the Internet. There are a few websites dedicated to helping you determine how much time you spend on it. For Firefox users, read about 6 Firefox tools that monitor your time online. Do you have strategies for making sure that the Internet doesn’t become a timesink? Do you already monitor your time on the internet? How do you spend your time online?
Categories: Uncategorized
Tags: habits