Summary of Multitasking
Stephen Covey once said, “The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” Multitasking was once thought to be a person being able to do two things at once. Research has shown that it is simply switching attention from one task to another, taking a person away from accomplishing the important and urgent tasks that need attention. Multitasking simply switches attention between two tasks, resulting in poor concentration on both tasks. Rather than trying to accomplish so many things at once, using time management techniques will help in the solution of what is thought to be multitasking.
Sarah D. Sparks, who is a reporter for Education Week, has written an article discussing the affect that technology has on student’s test scores. Technology has been proven to be very beneficial in our day to day lives, though through research, it has been proven that some technology used by students has decreased their test scores. For example, texting while taking a test causes lower scores, due to not fully being able to concentrate on the test being taken. Multitasking has been proven to lower student performance on tests, also causing them to perform poorly on memory and attention tests. Students ranging from the ages of 13 to 18 are said to be on more than six kinds of media simultaneously, while outside of school hours. In the multitasking article Sparks writes about the tendency “to pay continuous partial attention,” resulting in a person being unable to completely concentrate on anything. It takes a person longer to multitask than it does for the person to complete two separate tasks, one after the other. Having to make a choice while multitasking will end up delaying the other tasks you need to accomplish. A person who multitasks performs worse on memory and attention tests than those who do not multitask. The effect on a reader’s attention when he or she is distracted by a phone call, email, or text message while reading is that when they return to what they were originally reading, they have to stop and remember what they had already read before they are able to continue. This is taking away their time for completing the reading and other tasks they may have to accomplish in their day. The famous marshmallow test, to test a child’s self-control when there are sweets involved, was performed on preschoolers by a group of researchers in 1970. The results from the marshmallow test showed that less than one-third of the preschoolers had the self-discipline to not eat the marshmallow, and instead, to wait for 15 minutes; whereas, they were rewarded with two sweets. Similar results were shown between the marshmallow test performed and the texting test performed on students. Our brains are not able to be in more than one place at a given time, therefore no person can actually multitask successfully (Sparks).
I have always said how great I am at multitasking. I am a mom of three, therefore, I multitask, right? And with having three children, comes having more rooms in the house to clean. My children are all old enough to clean their rooms now; however, when they were young, it was mostly me, the mom. I would always begin in one room in the house and work my way around to each and every room. Or at least that was my intention. I began in Jocelyn’s room and would come across something that needed to be taken to one of the boys’ rooms or the bathroom. So, of course, I would take it to that said room, see that the room I walked into needed some major cleaning, and it went on and on from there. I would call it bouncing from room to room, miraculously accomplishing the whole house cleaning, by what I would say was a great day full of multitasking- being able to clean in several different rooms all at the same time. Instead of feeling like we need to be doing several things at once, like getting all the rooms in the house clean right away, it is wise to make a list of the important things to get cleaned and which rooms would be considered more urgent.
Eisenhower quoted Dr. J. Roscoe Miller when he said, “The urgent and the important: The urgent are not important, and the important are never urgent.” What he means by this quote is that in life there are activities that are categorized by being important or urgent. Important activities help us to achieve our own personal and professional goals we have set for ourselves, whereas urgent activities are demanding and require our immediate attention. Urgent activities are typically associated with helping someone else to achieve their goals. There are two types of important activities to mention, the ones you could not have foreseen and the ones you put off until the last minute. You can eliminate these last minute things and avoid procrastination by planning and scheduling. When you make a schedule, remember to leave adequate time for last minute, unexpected, or unplanned things. Eisenhower talks about activities that can be important but not urgent, which should be taken care of before they become urgent. Another would be the activities that are not important but urgent; however, these generally prevent a person from reaching their goals, ultimately helping someone else reach theirs’. There is also the group of not important and not urgent activities, also known as distractions. Distractions are all around us in our day to day lives, and yes, it is okay to say “no” when we need to (“Eisenhower’s Urgent/Important Principle”).
In an article written by Steve Mueller he discusses Steve Covey’s four quadrants of time management. The first of these quadrants are tasks that are important and urgent. The second quadrant are important tasks that are not urgent. The third quadrant he lists displays tasks that are not important, but are urgent to oneself, these are distractions. Finally, the fourth quadrant are where a person places not important, nor urgent tasks. When I look over my 4-quadrants outline of how I spend my time each week, I look for ways to omit distractions out of my day to be able to focus on the more important and urgent tasks. Distractions, such as house training a puppy and constant phone calls and texts, are a part of my day, and are currently located in quadrant 3 of Steve Covey’s box of priorities. I strive to get past these distractions and have taken advice from reading the Study Guides website article on organizing my priorities (Study Guide-Managing stress and organizing tasks.) With time and consistency I will be able to plan my day around these distractions. I have made some changes in my home by delegating some of my responsibilities to my very capable three children. I have an hourly/weekly schedule that I look over at the beginning of each week. Even though I have my daily schedule, things do not always go according to my plans, which causes me to begin to have minor panic attacks and stress over the more urgent tasks. I tend to feel, as though, more of my tasks move quickly to quadrant 1 instead of where I’d like them to be, in quadrant 2. By reading through the problem solving/decision making tab on the Study Guide website, I have read about how to better manage my stress to set realistic goals for myself (Study Guide:Problem Solving/Desicion Making-Managing Stress). By following the guidelines in the Learning Toolbox I will be trying my hardest to not stress over the small things, take one task at a time and not overwhelm myself when things do not go the way I had originally planned (Learning Toolbox: Tap-D). I have a really hard time remembering what I have studies, when it is time to take a test. The Learning Toolbox has given me some great strategies to use to help me overcome this issue. One thing I can do to help is to try to visualize the information as I read it in the book. I need to be sure to organize the study guides in my mind that I used to help me study. Another great strategy is to write down some information in the margins of my test paper. Then I will be able to go back and look at this information when a question comes that pertains to that information (The Learning Toolbox:SPORT). When I first began college classes, I decided that I wanted to do my schoolwork Monday through Friday and leave my Saturdays and Sundays for my family and my housework. However, this is not what is beginning to happen, and I have had to include part of Saturday in my scheduling for homework. I allow myself two-fifteen minute breaks in my days to check out what’s happening in the world of Facebook. One way I plan to stay ahead on my household chores is to delegate certain tasks to each one of my children. My top priorities, which I place in quadrant 2 are my family, college, and, of course, the new addition to our family, Bella Rose, the puppy! I could stay up after I get home from class each day to work on more school work, but instead, I will spend that time to communicate with my husband and enjoy our time together. I may have added Saturday for school work, but my Sundays will remain devoted to God and my family. Over time, my days won’t seem quite so crazy, as soon as I get past the house training stage with Bella, sure hope this hurries quickly! I have taken several steps towards moving what I feel are important and urgent tasks. In making my planning and scheduling a huge part of my weeks and days I have been able to move almost all of my activities from quadrant 1 into quadrant 2. I continue each day to remove unwanted distractions from my life and feel much more relieved after doing so. I know what is important to me and my success in life.
The important thing to remember is that multitasking is just not possible and will result in poor concentration. The most successful people we know didn’t get where they are by trying to do too much at once; they knew what they wanted and knew what needed to be done. To accomplish a successful life I need to remove unwanted distractions from my life, because they will only stand in the way of the things that are important and urgent to my success!
Works Cited
"Eisenhower's Urgent/Important Principle: Using Time Effectively, Not Just Efficiently." Eisenhower's Urgent/Important Principle. N.D. Web. 1 Mar. 2016.
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"Managing Stress." Study Guides and Strategies. N.D. Web. 07 Apr.2016
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"Managing Stress and Organizing Tasks." Study Guides and Strategies. N.D. Web. 07 Apr. 2016.
<http://www.studygs.net/schedule/stressb.htm>.
Mueller, Steve. "Stephen Covey's Time Management Matrix Explained." Planet of Success. 09 Oct. 2015. Web. 17 Mar. 2016.
<http://www.planetofsuccess.com/blog/2015/stephen-coveys-time-management-matrix-explained/>.
"Organization." The Learning Toolbox - Organization. N.D. Web. 07 Apr. 2016.
<http://coe.jmu.edu/learningtoolbox/organization.html>.
Sparks, Sarah D. "Studies on Multitasking Highlight Value of Self-Control." Education Week. 15 May 2012. Web. 1 Mar. 2016.
"SPORT." The Learning Toolbox - SPORT. N.D. Web. 07 Apr. 2016
<http://coe.jmu.edu/learningtoolbox/sport.html>.