In last week's post, I talked about why task understanding is, in my opinion, the number one skill grad students need to focus on in grad school.
One of the main reasons why I think this is the case is that when you understand what it is you have to do, it makes it easier to get it done.
Here are three ways to increase your task understanding and stop procrastinating in grad school:
Don't make task assumptions
How do we make assumptions about tasks? Think about the last time you went to the grocery store. How much time did you spend thinking about what you were going to wear there, how you were going to get there, what items you were going to buy, how you were going to pay for them, and what you would do with them when you got home?
If you're like me, I usually spend the most time planning what I'm going to buy, but I don't even think about any of those other things because I go to the grocery store all the time so it's just automatic.
However, whenever I go into a different grocery store, whether in my city or in a different country, I often have to think about those things because the task has shifted from a familiar one to a not-so-familiar one.
In grad school, there are plenty of similarities to undergraduate or even workplace requirements which can lead us to make incorrect assumptions, but understanding the specific tasks in grad school is vital to success.
This is because motivation comes from understanding and when you make assumptions about tasks, that can lead to confusion and be demotivating, which can lead to procrastination. This is where making sure you're asking the right questions comes in.
Ask the right questions about tasks
When you get a task in grad school, whether that be a paper for a course or your dissertation, this is when you want to start asking questions about what it is exactly you need to do.
There are two main areas of task understanding (listen to episode 3 of the How to Grad School podcast for more on this): explicit and implicit.
Explicit aspects of a task are the things that are written or available as resources, such as handbooks, course descriptions, guidelines, deadlines, rubrics, etc.
Implicit aspects of a task are the things that are between the lines, such as expectations in your department, what your advisor wants to see, domain expectations, etc. These things can be a bit trickier to determine, so asking someone these questions is vital.
A good place to start with the types of questions to ask about a task are the 5 Ws and 1 H, which you can read more about in my blog on self-regulating your learning in grad school.
But, in general, the questions you ask about the tasks should be of both static (e.g., online) and dynamic (e.g., a person) sources, you may need to do this for longer than you thought you needed to to avoid making assumptions, and checking your understanding often is the other key aspect.
Revisit tasks often to avoid procrastinating
I'm currently teaching an undergraduate educational psychology course that is asynchronous online. So I've created mini videos that explain each assignment in depth and posted them to our course site.
I checked to see which students had watched my collection of videos and sent reminders to those who hadn't watched the videos as they are crucial to understanding the assignments and expectations.
I received a response from a student who I had emailed that caught me off guard. They explained they hadn't watched a video of an upcoming assignment that was due in two days because they hadn't started the assignment yet!
I had made the assumption that students would watch the videos early and often. However, because I never made that explicit, some students were likely just watching the videos a couple of days before the deadline.
In grad school, make sure that you are revisiting the tasks you are working on often. This is because as you work through a task, doubling back to verify that you are still on track to complete the original task is important.
I had to do this several times where I was writing a paper, planned the outline, started doing readings and then ended up in a couple of rabbit holes because I had forgotten the topic of the paper. By revisiting my outline, I was able to choose the readings more selectively and get back on track.
So now what?
I hope reading this has given you a few ideas as to why spending time understanding tasks can help motivate you and reduce procrastination.
If you'd like to learn more, check out our podcast and also The Club, an affordable online membership program to help you learn about self-regulated learning and apply it to your own grad school experience in meaningful ways. We'd love for you to join us in September 2023!
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