My clients are equally split between the number that use electronic calendars and those that use paper calendars. The electronic device allows you to have instant access to your schedule 5 years out or five years back without the weight of 5 books. They also allow you to flip things around with the touch of a role ball, touch screen or mouse. No need for those messy erasers and rewriting the re/re/rescheduled appointment in question.
For many people, no matter how easy the electronic device may seem, managing time does not work for them on a small device, small screen and fiddly tool. A month at a glance is easier on an 8 in X 11 in paper than a 1.5 in screen. Those with kinetic learning preferences may find the act of writing in appointments helps to secure the appointments existence into their mind – more so than typing an appointment once then hitting the recurrence function for the balance of the year’s appointments.
I seem to be one of these people and I am in the process of trying out a paper calendar again. I’ll keep you posted on how it goes. Meanwhile – what has been your experience?
Archive for calendars
Here is a quick follow up post from two days ago, after I received several questions from clients.
Yes, I really did mean for everyone in the family to pick a colour to be their colour for family organizing. You’d be surprised how successful this can be. Use everyone’s favourite colour to help pick out all kinds of household items from toothbrushes to tote sacks to calendering.
My husband grew up in a family of 10: M&D, 6 children, one maid and her son. His colour was green. There was green thread on his socks so they could be identified in the wash. Naturally, when we picked colours for ourselves and the children for our family calendar – his colour was green!
Colour can be a quick and easy way to organize anything from toys to files. When we organize we sort (small, medium, large widgets) pattern (like things together) and decide (keep, sell, toss). The same is true for storage and retrieval activity; looking for a spice (sort by alphabet?), filing paper (sort and pattern this year, last year, food, rent, utilities etc) and making decisions at every step.
Coloured boxes, baskets, labels or other storage tools provide an easy first sorting mechanism. Each child could be assigned a colour for their toys (John gets the blue toy bucket) sports gear (Jane’s labels, bag and towel are blue) or items on the calendar.
It is helpful to limit the number of colours to a minimum of choices. Use colour for high level choices. For example, if you run a home based business, try using one colour to sort between business and personal files (business is blue, personal is green). Too many colour choices can increase organizing challenges especially for individuals who are easily distracted and have difficulty focussing.
When it comes to time management, there is nothing more valuable than the ability to anticipate an event or events. Isn’t that what our organizers, calendars, day timers, and PDA’s are all about. The multi million dollar industry of calendars is based on the notion that we like to anticipate what is coming in our lives. With anticipation comes the ability to schedule both our time and our resources – like the car for example. When you look to next Tuesday and see that you have four family members going in four different directions at the same time by 4:30 in the afternoon, having a whole week to work on those back up resources like a car pool is very, very helpful.
Children learn to anticipate at a very young age – does birthday party excitement for a whole week sound familiar to you? Young students are now learning in school to use their school issue “agenda” to record their homework.
By the time the kids hit their teens, they have learned to anticipate excitement, record their homework and use their lockers. Unfortunately as adults, we don’t teach them the time planning that goes along with being able to anticipate events. Even as a professional organizer, I have been slow to teach my own teenager how to use her time wisely. Here’s the process that I went through with her to get her back on track with time. It’s a relatively easy organizing task and they will thank you for the time management skill later in life.
1. Find a calendar that works for you: electronic, PDA, puppy dogs, whatever. The size, style and platform are really only relevant in terms of what works and what looks good.
2. Enter in all the fixed dates over which you have no control: music lessons, swim practice, band practice, year book committee etc. Put them in for the whole term or year until the known completion date.
3. Enter in all the regularly scheduled flexible time such as piano/instrumental/voice practicing time. If it is scheduled, the intention moves from a 1 (would like to do) to an 8 (really intend to do) and has half a chance to get to 10 (will absolutely make sure this happens) at which point after 28 days it becomes a habit.
4. Enter into the calendar the activities that lead to what you would like to accomplish by year’s, month’s, week’s, day’s end e.g. On Saturday afternoons I will go to the library so that I have books for my English class on Monday.
Have fun anticipating your wonderful life!
It’s one week into November. Is your family calendar up to date? Is it posted where everyone can see it? After four days away at the Professional Organizers in Canada national conference last week, I have only just got ours up to date today. For our family, it’s a four month white board posted in the kitchen. Each family member is a different colour white board marker with black for family events. We can all see it and any one of us can refer to it while trying to book an event.
What does your families’ look like? Does it work?
Back to schoool time has come and gone but organization for the students, be they primary, elementary or high school, is an ongoing challenge. As the Wellrich Organizers website is undergoing a redesign, and the tips pages are being archived, I though I would republish some of the favourite tips from this fall.
Keep the Family Calendar Public
To help keep the family organized with schedules, a posted, public calendar is helpful. There are several wall/refrigerator calendars available from special Family Organizing ones to white boards. Whichever style suits your families needs, make sure it is posted where everyone can see it. Schedules are best not kept as a secret. Try using an alligator clip on a hook to keep all time sensitive information i.e. Birthday party invitations, curriculum night close at hand. If necessary, use binder dividers to separate the information by family member.
Label, Label, Label
Children are most likely to lose items that they don’t recognize as their own – like all those new back to school clothes, binders and lunch bags. Label everything possible that doesn’t normally stay attached to your child. Label lunch bags on the outside so that they can see their name clearly. Try to have the children wear their new clothes several times before school so that the items are very familiar to them. If you don’t have access to iron on labels, a pen or laundry marker on the tag will serve the purpose.
