Scaling homework mountain

With the holiday season now in full swing, students are looking forward to the winter break but not forgetting about the dreaded semester finals that we must survive first.

Finals can be intimidating. With two hours allotted for each one, not only do students fear spending 14 hours testing over the last three days of school before break, but they worry about the fact that the finals make up 10 percent of their grade.

Along with finals there is also the mountain of homework that we, the students, are trying to climb. Even as I write this I'm thinking about all the homework I have yet to do: that book report for L.A., that chapter outline for history, that math worksheet, that project for art. The list goes on and on and can at times seem a bit overwhelming.

It seems to me that procrastination is the disease that affects most sophomores, well most high school students for that matter.

The side effects of this disease include lack of studying, increased amount of time spent watching TV, and "I'll do it later" as a first response to questions relating to homework. Putting homework off until later is easy to do, but when later comes it can be a big stresser.

Combating procrastination can be difficult, but something I've tried is to just do my homework as soon as I get home. Just get it done and out of my way, then I get the rest of the night to do whatever I want.

Another thing that I've tried is looking over my notes for just a few minutes each night. It doesn't take much time but can really help out come test time. I've also found that one of the easiest ways to study is flash cards, especially with vocabulary. Just going thorough them a couple times can really help me remember the words and definitions.

Though the mountain of homework may be intimidating, and we may want to put it off until later, if we try just a little bit at a time it doesn't seem so bad. And maybe by the end of the semester we'll reach the top.

Carlie Cattron is a sophomore trying to find her way through the halls of Jackson High School and documenting it in a monthly column.