All-nighters & procrastination!

[circusmind]

I went back and reread some more all-nighter stories. Thought I'd share my worst ones:

-Staying up till 4:30 to work on a poetry project.

-Staying up till 4:50 something for another poetry project...then staying home that day to finish it.

-2 am in 9th grade for a bio project.

-3 am for an English essay.

-3-ish for a bio packet.

And I always bash myself before I go to bed....but I think the procrastination must be chronic...and probably terminal.

I will worship the genius who creates a cure for procrastination.

[Ruan Chun Xian]

I have to repost this, Crystal . I think I have one coming later this week...have a million things due end of this week and next week and absolutely no time in the day between work and volunteering. Sigh.

12 Useful Tips for Pulling an All-Nighter

Source: http://ibyears.coffoo.com/archives/12-usef...ng-all-nighters

Your palms are sweaty. Your eyes refuse to stay open. Your brain seems dead and unresponsive. Then you ask yourself, “Why oh WHY did I leave this assignment to the last minute?!” Most of us have been there - in the wee morning hours - in front of the computer typing away the essay that’s due in about three and a half hours, one that’s usually worth 20% of the term.

IB and normal high school students are no stranger to all-nighters. In fact, some of us boasts about them. “I pulled two in one week.” “Oh yea? I had eight hours of sleep in the last three days!” All-nighters are a mental, physical as well as emotional battle. I’m not here to chastise you for going on Facebook while you knew perfectly well that you have a due date coming up. The truth is, once you’ve finally settled yourself in front of that cursed blank Word Document, the internal war starts. I’m just the trusty steed that leads you into battle but I will bring you out alive and grateful, hopefully.

There are three things that you absolutely do not want to happen during your burning of the midnight oil

1. Doze off, wake up, and curse as you seen the sun poking its head above the horizon

2. Not finish all the work when morning comes

3. Give up

The following methods will help you avoid that. Ready? Put your game face on and let the agony … er… work begin.

Mentally prepare yourself during the day time. I can’t stress how important this is. Knowing you’ll probably have to pull an all-nighter puts you in the right mindset and avoids the “I’m just going to take a 5 minute nap” mentality. Knowing what you’ll have to face and tackle is like heading into something with a map. You’ll know how much you have to cover and how quickly you have to do it. Writing a time table helps as well. Mental preparation also gives you the option of choosing nap times, mentioned below.

Designate a wake-up buddy. If you’re like us mainstream students, chances are you’re not alone in pulling this all-nighter. Exchanging cellphone numbers is probably the best bet as it doesn’t wake up the whole household. A simple “Hi, you awake? Okay!” every hour will do. With the two of you in it together, you will get motivation to catch up if you fall behind, and a good warm and fuzzy feeling inside if you’re ahead of your unlucky buddy.

Take short breaks. Regular breaks spare you from the tenseness and the monotony of long hours of typing and reading. If you’re finding yourself reading the same passage over and over again with out absorbing anything, then go for a walk, stretch a little, take a 2-3 minute break.

Turn your worst enemy into your best friend: naps. Yes, I admit, I did once experience that horrible gut wrenching feeling inside when I woke up with the sunrise, stared at my unfinished project and began to panic. Maybe it’s your third all-nighter this week. Maybe you just had a tough day. But sometimes you just KNOW you won’t last till morning. This method almost guarantees a successful, and sometimes even HYPER, all-nighter experience. When you get home from school, get as much done as you possibly could. I usually get drowsy at around seven. That’s when I take a nap, positioning myself in the room with the most commotion and setting an (or several) alarm(s). I get up two to three hours later, refreshed and energized, and start working. Why does this work? One, you’re not napping RIGHT after school when you’re quite awake after walking home. If you get up at five or six in the afternoon, that’s another fourteen hours you have to stay awake! Secondly, naps at midnight or two in the morning usually don’t turn out to be the half hour naps you promised yourself.

The second type of napping are those little fifteen minute snoozes on the keyboard. THESE AREN’T FOR EVERYONE. They do a great job of refreshing your mind, but if you don’t set/hear the alarms, you’ll sleep till dawn!

Have a reward system. Divide your work into little chunks and work through them while sticking strictly to the time table you set for yourself earlier. Every time you accomplish one of these mini-goals, give yourself a small reward, such as playing your favourite song, watching a SHORT video on Youtube, or eating some ice cream.

Find a variety of mental stimulants. Coffee and Red Bull are always good choices. Personally, for some reason coffee put me to sleep (I drink it anyway because I love the smell).

Choose exercises that help (see a more extensive list in the mini article). Massage your brain, either with your fingers or simply brush your hair girls (this method was scientifically proven to be stimulating). Turn your head in a circle. Stretch. Pray. Yes pray, you need divine intervention. Screw up your face and scream silently.

Take a shower. Always effective, unless you fall asleep in the shower. Make sure it’s a quick! Don’t be scared to turn the tap to a colder water temperature. I usually take showers at one a.m. because that’s the make or break point.

Figure out the right working environment. Get some fresh air and circulation. If you haven’t realized by now, warm temperature makes you drowsy. Open the window a little so you can feel the breeze. Don’t have the fluorescent lights glaring in your eye but don’t work with a dying bulb either. Clean the table of all clutter save the work-related material.

Eat the right food. Having messy-free munchies nearby is great! I’ve lost count of all the brilliant inspirations I’ve gotten while chewing on licorice. Eat a small dinner and don’t try to fit in a whole meal in the middle of the all-nighter for a full stomach makes you sleepy. Whole grains is one of your best bets. If you’re really craving sleep, drink some water and pop an Excel mint or some Listerine. Gum is all personal preferences.

Talk things out, to yourself. This one might feel a little silly, but it nevertheless is very effective. When something doesn’t make sense, read it out loud in a comical voice. When you want to give up, say to yourself something like, “You’ve came this far, just give it a few more hours and you’ll have a fabulous paper!” or “Think of all your peers currently working on this. Wait till I show them my perfect work tomorrow!”

Play the right music. Ah, the great music debate. I won’t argue each of your individual cases because yes, I know, some people need music to work while others absolutely demand peace and quiet. Personally I usually have a few good songs with non-distracting lyrics but lively tempos playing all night. I also adjust the volume periodically just to have a little change. For those of you working on foreign language assignments, playing songs in that language tend to subconsciously make your work better. Give it a try! I still hum Isabelle Boulay every time I think about my French Journals.

So there you are, twelve useful tips to effectively get you through all-nighters. I’m sure there are many more obscure family remedies out there that will help you. Feel free to share. When the birds start singing and the sky lights up, you’ll say to yourself, “I’m NEVER going to do this again”. Of course you won’t… for half a week maybe. Okay okay you’re not all as bad as I am! But at least, you can feel like you’re part of a community (of procrastinators), of something large, something beyond the daily monotony, something that binds millions of young and old people together around the world. Your final reward is holding the neat, freshly printed, long-ass paper in your hands, and having that smile of satisfaction spread across your face.

[moneyfaery]

Turn your worst enemy into your best friend: naps. Yes, I admit, I did once experience that horrible gut wrenching feeling inside when I woke up with the sunrise, stared at my unfinished project and began to panic.

Ahhh, I've done that a few times. I did finish in time though.

What I usually do is either stay up until 5-6am-ish then grab a quick nap or sleep from 12 to 2am-ish then work until morning. Either way, I did get SOME sleep so I don't look like I died in the morning. I also tend to get really hungry halfway through the night...

[zYvy]

Anyone have interesting ways to pull off all-nighters that don't involve coffee?

There has to be another way to stay awake.

[Haney]

Anyone have interesting ways to pull off all-nighters that don't involve coffee?

There has to be another way to stay awake.

if you stress, then it works. (btw- this is only for people who work better under pressure- don't try it if you end up in a mental breakdown)

[cereja]

I learned I can't wake up in the morning - not even with a "good" nap. So I just stay awake until 2...3....even later before AP exams (the IB exams last year were not that bad). I just got used to it.

[Ruan Chun Xian]

I usually stay up if I have really early class (well, my earliest now would be 9am but still) because I'm really not a morning person and if I sleep, I sleep for hours. If I'm going to be up late studying I might as well stay up for the class because if I go to sleep for 3 hours I'd end up sleeping through the class because the temptation to skip classes is oh so much more now that I'm in university. So I just stay up and the have a nap after all my classes are finished. So I kind of have all-nighters regularly. Or you could just say I go to sleep at weird hours.

[starry-night]

my worst all-nights have ALWAYS been b/c of computers -

1) stayed up till 6 in the morning to finish my culminating project ( a java program)

2) stayed up 48 hrs straight finishing up another programming project

made worse by the fact that i hate coffee or any other caffeine drink so had to splash myself with cold water just to stay awake and finish the assign.

horrible

[Cami]

Im procrastinating right now!

I should've read some 50 pages in a book today, which i kinda skipped, so I have to read double the amount tomorrow.

[KLSmash]

I've never needed to pull an all-nighter, the worst was probably Gr 9, day before we needed to hand in our ISP essay outline, I stayed up til 2:30am, and woke up at 5:00am to finish it. I ended up getting perfect on the essay, hahaha.

[TerioN.]

I've never needed to pull an all-nighter, the worst was probably Gr 9, day before we needed to hand in our ISP essay outline, I stayed up til 2:30am, and woke up at 5:00am to finish it. I ended up getting perfect on the essay, hahaha.

Wow. That's crazy

So just one question: is an all-nighter or almost like a certain thing in IB? I enjoy my sleep

I procrastinate alot Sleepy 4 years I guess

[moneyfaery]

Wow. That's crazy

So just one question: is an all-nighter or almost like a certain thing in IB? I enjoy my sleep

Yes, only because procrastination is so common.

[Solaris]

Here are some methods on how to stay awake, i came across:

* http://www.mahalo.com/How_to_Stay_Awake

* http://artificiallyawake.com/2008/07/10-wa...awake-at-night/

* http://sitestechandtips.blogspot.com/2007/...self-awake.html

Here is one of the interesting ways:

"hold a spoon in your fingertips. you should be holding it in a way that - when you loose consciousness (sleep) you drop it... the Clatter (put a big plate on the floor under your hand) will wake you.... and you get woken JUST as you enter the best "dreamy" bit of your sleep. Alternatively, hold a bunch of keys: same effect."

Edited September 24, 2008 by Solaris

[Vicdashit]

hehe never been guilty of this.. the latest i stayed up till was 1pm

[Leen]

I'll confess that I've never pulled an all nighter in my life. Honestly. I just don't believe in all nighters, for once I can't work (for me night = relaxation) and second of all I think sleep is pretty important when it comes to a test.

As for procrastination, I try to avoid it. I also don't believe in leaving your homework at the last minute. But it has happened a couple of times in my life, hated it but I learnt my lesson.

[017631]

Hey all, I'm a new IB student currently struggling to survive.

Already so many people are dropping out at my school, and it's only been the first month!

I have to say...procrastination is killing me. For the past week I've slept around 3-5 AM doing homework...tonight's going to be worse...lab report and some French + English assignments..

These tips are gold to me. Just this morning I fell asleep doing my Chemistry Lab Report...in front of my computer...

[rubii]

when i seriously stay up - i DO work because I procrastinated during the day

but ive never been up for an all-nighter, i HAVE to sleep...

my latest stay up was prolly my EE first draft...slept at 4:30, i literally wrote 3000 words in 8 hours pretty much

i think it was the most concentrated moment of my life

[crayzee-dreamer]

I've got trial exams this whole week and just joined this forum..

and this is only one type of procrastination for the night ... im totally screwed!!

[017631]

Ha just today...I pulled off an all-nighter for my first Bio Lab...if this is only the first then....uh oh...

36 Hours of Being Awake then my body shut down...just woke up from my 15 minute nape...cramming for Chemistry now...

[babakren]

one thing i knew,

its always better to NOT SLEEP AT ALL rather than staying up until 4 am then sleep for an hour or two.

i dunno, when i dunt sleep at all i go hyper! but when i only sleep 1/2 hours, i feel like my head had been opened by Sylar...