Online classes can be so draining that they leave you barely in the mood to do anything else when the school day finally ends. While there’s nothing wrong with wanting to cap off your day with some R&R, you might grow resentful of how this routine can keep you from joining online hangouts and enjoying hobbies.
Whether you’re already living this nightmare or think that you’re about to, we’re here to hook you up with online tools that will help you reclaim your baddie energy that gets burned out during class hours.
Leave it to productivity apps to save you from mindless scrolling
Shoutout to everyone with short attention spans, we see you. Now that we can easily turn off our webcams and sneakily switch tabs during classes, the temptation to mindlessly scroll through social media is stronger than ever.
Combat this urge with productivity apps like Moment and Flipd that force you off your phone by locking you out or alerting you with annoying notifications if you extend your screen time. You can also install browser extensions like StayFocusd that sets a limit on the amount of time you spend on a website. Aside from using it to focus on your virtual lecturers, you can also rely on these tools to stop you from wasting time on random sites even outside of school hours.
Once your time stalking your crush’s Instagram profile is up or when you’re *this* close to maxing out your debit card on online stores, these productivity apps can make these websites inaccessible for the rest of the day. “Out of sight, out of mind,” right?
Pull yourself together with project management apps
Before you panic over the number of deliverables and modules you have to finish, breathe. The best way to get stuff done is to face them one at a time and take breaks in between.
Time blocking can help you with this by organizing your tasks according to your deadlines. You can easily do so with the help of apps like Plan and Todoist. Jot down personal time outside of class hours on these apps to manage your day more efficiently and make it worthwhile. To help you map out your breaks strategically, try online timers like Tomato Timer and Pomofocus that use the Pomodoro technique of taking five-minute breaks after every 25 minutes of work.
If you’re working with a team, apps like Google Keep and Trello can sync your reminders across all your devices and with your teammates. Put together all the notes, photos and voice memos you need with your to-do lists to easily collaborate for upcoming projects.
Remember, if you want to stay on top of things like a baddie, you need to rest and save your energy for things outside of school, too. Take it easy on yourself.
You don’t need to be a master in design to create visual guides
Infographics can help you understand and present complex concepts in class, but these can sometimes be difficult or too time-consuming to make. Not confident in your creative skills? Programs like Canva can be your best friend when it comes to making visual aids. Containing a wide selection of templates and designs, it’s just what every beginner needs to get started on creating infographics for school, extracurricular activities and other side hustles.
If you’re a visual learner, apps like Tinycards, Quizlet and StudyBlue lets you customize your own study guides or grab those that other students already made. These apps can help you memorize information through different study modes that loop your flashcards and track your progress on a subject.
With ready-to-edit templates, baddies like you won’t need to worry about coming up with an aesthetic from scratch to ace your tests and presentations.
Craft your study (and non-work related) playlists based on your mood
In this day and age, making a playlist is almost every student’s key to setting their minds in and out of work mode. With browser apps like Noisli, you can easily put on playlists of white noise or ambient music with a built-in Pomodoro timer to help you focus.
If you have your own “*insert your preferred genre here* beats to relax/study to” playlist on music apps like Spotify, make more for the other things that you do—your hobbies, solo dance parties or even for when you just want to stare at a blank wall. Sitting through hours of classes and working on homework can become draining especially when we’re staying within the same four walls. Switch it up a bit and put on a happy (or sad) playlist to catch the vibe.
Get in on extracurricular learning with crash courses and masterclasses
Brush up on your skills and discover fresh ideas with fun crash courses online. Aside from binging random music videos or vlogs from your favorite YouTubers, you can tune in to YouTube’s learning channel that features educational content about almost anything. With different topics that range from science to languages, going through these crash courses will help you slay your classes by saving you the time of going through your reviewers and readings again and again. Think of it like online tutoring, but with fancy video editing.
Another option is signing up for live stream workshops like Globe’s GoTok masterclasses with creatives like Khalil Ramos who recently shared his expertise on mobile photography. You can watch out for more events like this coming up live on Globe’s TikTok account. Nothing exudes baddie energy like feeding your curiosity and learning something new along the way.
If you’re worried about your internet connection not being able to catch up with all of these tools, Globe Prepaid’s GCash exclusive Go Promo for Students includes the GoLEARN&Work freebie which provides 1GB access to online learning essentials like YouTube Learning, Wikipedia, Zoom, Viber and WhatsApp.
You can use their Go90 promo for all your online learning needs with 8GB of open data for three days, unlimited texts to all networks and 1GB of GoWiFi aside from its GoLEARN&Work freebie. They also have Go50 and Go70 promo packages if you’re looking for more options.
Online learning can easily drain you out, but with the right tools, you can keep your baddie energy up all day. From strategically plotting your breaks to using design apps that make reviewing (and frankly, your life) easier, ace the school year and regain that inspiring confidence as the gal who works hard efficiently and plays hard.
Art by Dana Calvo
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