How To Stop Procrastinating Assignments

To stop procrastinating assignments one needs to identify the reason why they are procrastinating and then take action to stop it. This could be by creating daily goals, by putting an assignment notification in a place that they pass often, by eliminating distraction in a study space, by breaking down assignments into manageable subtasks and by creating rewards for completing an assignment.

Why do we procrastinate?

There are many reasons why we procrastinate and contrary to popular belief it is not always caused by a lack of wanting to succeed or a lack of motivation or even self control. Procrastination stems from negative feelings associated to or surrounding a task. Many people procrastinate because they are scared of failing at tasks such as school assignments that they need to complete.

Here are the four main types of procrastinators:

#1 Perfectionists

A perfectionist is often a procrastinator out of fear that they will not do something right (fear of failure). This can lead to not starting an assignment until the very last minute, putting off tasks because of the belief that they cannot achieve their high standards. Perfectionists can also get fixated on the small details of their assignments and be hyper critical of their work as they progress. This can also lead to procrastination. 

#2 People with poor time management skills 

Another type of procrastinator is a person with poor work habits and time management skills. This type of person might think that leaving stuff to the last minute will make them work better because of the pressure. Or they just always do assignments last minute because they have forgotten about it or don’t know how to properly schedule their time. 

#3 People who just want to do something else

Not all assignments for school are going to be fun and most people will want to do something else with their time. These people want the assignment to be over and done with before even starting and thus will keep on procrastinating the task.

#4 People who are feeling stressed or overwhelmed

These people procrastinate because of the ever growing pile of schoolwork and assignments that have to be done. These people probably don’t know where to start or how to start and end up procrastinating everything. 

How to stop procrastinating assignments

#1 Figure out why you procrastinate

If you read the section above ‘why we procrastinate’ you have probably identified what type of procrastinator you are. This is an important step in combating procrastination as through understanding your behaviour you will be able to take steps towards stopping it. 

Once you have identified what type of procrastinator you are I suggest writing down long term goals on a piece of paper to help you overcome the reason why you procrastinate. This will be beneficial to you in the long run as it will stop the broader reason why you procrastinate and help you do your assignments in the future. 

#2 Create daily goals for your assignment

Setting daily goals is a great way to motivate and push yourself to complete an aspect of an assignment. It can also reduce feelings of overwhelm as it will break your task down into more manageable tasks. 

I suggest to firstly start making broader goals for the assignment by following the SMART goals framework. This goal setting acronym stands for:

• Specific 
• Measurable
• Attainable 
• Relevant 
• Time Bound

Then each day I recommend making smaller goals between 1 and 3 related to your assignment. To help you out with this process you could make your daily goals using my printable daily planner template. 

If you want to learn more about how to plan your ultimate day using a daily planner I suggest you read this article here. 

#3 Put your assignment notification in a place you often see it 

The next step to stop procrastinating assignments is to put your assessment notification in a place you often see. This could be above your desk, on your fridge or on a wall that you walk past in your house everyday. This may seem silly but by doing this you will be constantly reminded that you have an assignment to do. It might even get annoying which will motivate you to complete your task so you can get rid of the notification. 

#4 Break down the task into subtasks and schedule dates to complete each task

In my Digital student time management planner and printable student time management planner there is a page dedicated to breaking down your assignments into more manageable tasks and then scheduling them. It is called the assessment action plan page. 

At the top of the page you can write the subject, the assignment’s criteria and the due date. Below that there are two tables. One is like a ‘brain dump’ where you write down every single sub task that you can think of that you have to do to finish the assignment. These tasks should be able to be completed in about 15-20 minutes each. By making very short tasks it will motivate you much more to complete them. In the next column there are 5 dots in each row that you can use to rate the importance of each subtask. Once you have completed that you can make a prioritised list based on the importance of each subtask. Make the list and then schedule each subtask by putting a date in the adjacent column. As you complete the sub tasks you can tick them off :).  

As you schedule dates you can put them onto a calendar like my printable monthly planner so you get a clear overview of what you need to do each day. 

#5 Eliminate distractions

The most obvious distraction is your phone. If you want to have full focus while doing a task I suggest putting it in another room so you won’t be tempted to use it. We all know how 5 minutes of TikTok leads to a few hours or watching one netflix episode leads to watching nearly the whole season!

Another distraction is a messy desk, especially one that has work for other subjects on it. It may not seem relevant to put all of this away, but with no other work your mind will be able to fully focus on the task at hand and not wander or get reminded about other things that you need to do. 

#6 Set yourself a reward for completing the assignment

If you have a lack of motivation to complete an assignment a good way to motivate yourself to start it is to make a reward. A reward could be anything from watching an episode of your favourite tv drama to eating some junk food or going out with your friends!

You could make a large reward for completing the whole assignment or smaller ones for completing sub tasks of the assignment!

#7 Work when you are most alert

My final piece of advice to help you stop procrastinating your assignments is to work when you are most alert to be more efficient. For me that is in the morning as I feel fresh and ready to work. Sometimes we procrastinate tasks because we feel tired or lazy so this is a great way to overcome that.