How to Create an Effective Student Mom Schedule

Tips to help student moms manage their schedule so they can boost their productivity

As a student mom, you are probably wondering how to manage your schedule. How do you plan your life as a student and a mom? First, I want you to know that this problem isn’t unique to you. One of the biggest challenges moms in college face is how to manage their schedules.

The reason why this is such a big challenge for a lot of college moms is that it’s so hard to get everything done when you have so many responsibilities and so little time to do them all.

While I can’t say that I have figured out a way to do everything perfectly, I have learned a few tricks along the way that’s made my life more manageable and also made me more productive.

If you are having a tough time coming up with a schedule that works for a student mom, then you will find some useful tips in this post that will help you create an effective schedule.

Ready to take control of your time and schedule? Let’s get right into it!

THIS POST MAY CONTAIN AFFILIATE LINKS. OUR FULL DISCLOSURE POLICY CAN BE FOUND HERE

1. MAKE A LIST OF EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO GET DONE

First, write down everything you need to get done daily, weekly, or monthly. Don’t worry if your list isn’t neat or organized since this is a brain dump. Don’t think about it too much, just let your thoughts flow and jot everything down.

Spend thirty minutes to an hour doing this exercise. Don’t worry if you forget anything. You can always come back to add to your list throughout the day. If you remember something during the course of the day, write it down somewhere and add it to your to-do list when you have a chance.

No task is too small or insignificant to include in your list, so go ahead and put it all down.

If you work and go to school, you will probably have a longer to-do list than a stay at home mom, so don’t worry if your list is too long or too short.

2. CREATING A STUDENT MOM SCHEDULE IS ALL ABOUT SORTING AND ORGANIZING YOUR LIST

After you finish jotting down everything you can remember, the next thing you have to do is sort and organize your to-do list into categories.

Grab a sheet of paper and start organizing your list into different categories. Some activities can be broken down into subcategories but don’t worry about that just yet. You can always come back to it if you need more time. For now, focus on the main categories.

As a student mom, your main categories and subcategories will probably look like this:

Schoolwork (subcategories including attending classes whether online or in-person, doing assignments, studying, taking tests and exams, clinicals or fieldwork).
Work
Family and kids (appointments, spending time with kids and husband, helping kids with school work, bath times, kids sports practice, etc.).
Home management (meals, shopping, cleaning, laundry, and whatever else you do to keep your home running smoothly).
Self-care and activities (sleep, bed-times, personal time, kids activities, library, exercise, breaks, etc.).

If you have a baby you are breastfeeding, potty training, or sleep training, you can put those activities under the “family and kids” category. If you homeschool your kids, that goes under “family and kids” as well.

It’s very important to create separate categories because keeping your categories separate means things don’t get lost among other categories or reminders.

I have probably forgotten a few things, but feel free to add to the categories or remove any category that doesn’t apply to you.

3. HOW TO BALANCE COLLEGE AND BEING A MOM: ESTIMATE HOW MUCH TIME TO SPEND ON EACH CATEGORY

One of the most important steps when creating a student mom schedule is to estimate how much time you have to spend on each category or tasks in each category. One of the main problems lots of college moms face is spending too much time on one task or activity, then running out of time to do some more important tasks.

The problem with doing this over a long (or even short) period of time is that you will end up falling behind on your assignments or not having enough time to study. Well, you know what happens when you start falling behind on your schoolwork.

So the best way to prevent that from happening, and to balance it all, is to allocate set times for your tasks and try as much as possible to work within those set times.

Now, if you can’t complete a task when you are supposed to (well, not an assignment that’s due or something that must be completed), just move on to the next thing, and move the task to another day or time, or assign it to someone else, if possible. A timer is a great way to stay on track.

Time management is a big deal for college moms, so it’s really important to be realistic with how much time you have throughout the day, week, or month, and how much time you can realistically allocate to a particular category (or a task in that category).

4. PRIORITIZE YOUR TASKS

So you have made a list of everything you need to get done, organized them into categories, and estimated how much time you can afford to spend on each task or category. The next step is to prioritize your tasks.

The easiest way to do this is to assign a degree of urgency or importance to each task. So for each category, start by rewriting your list from most important to least important. Here’s how to think of what tasks are “most important,” and the ones that are “least important.”

The most important tasks are the things that must be done. They are not optional and can’t be delegated to someone else. You are the only person who can complete those tasks. While the least important ones can be assigned to someone else or won’t have a negative impact on your life (at least in the short term).

For example, your job (if you work) and studying are some of the most urgent tasks while cleaning and shopping can be considered as “least urgent.” At the end of the day, you are the only person who can determine what’s most or least urgent because you know what you need to function well.

For some moms, a clean and tidy home is pretty important, so these moms will go out of their way to ensure their homes are kept clean even if it means cutting down on some other tasks or activities. Your student mom schedule is personal and should fit your lifestyle and needs, and not what other moms are doing. So, always bear that in mind.

5. PUTTING YOUR STUDENT MOM SCHEDULE TO WORK: DECIDE WHEN TO COMPLETE EACH TASK

After prioritizing each task on your list, it’s now time for you to decide when or what days you are going to complete the tasks in each category. Of course, the most important tasks are going to get scheduled first before everything else.

The easiest way to do this is to create a weekly schedule based on your current life schedule. If you have a fixed schedule every week, this should be pretty straightforward for you. Here’s what I mean.

Let’s say you work on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and go to school Tuesdays and Thursdays, your schedule is pretty fixed (at least for the current semester). Even if you take online classes or attend an online college, you should have a fixed schedule each semester.

So, for a student mom with the above schedule, you can decide to break down your weekly schedule like this:

Mondays: Work, study, complete one assignment, do laundry, help kids with homework

Tuesdays: Attend classes, study, complete assignments, pick up kids, meal prep, shop, spend time with family, clean a portion of the house, do more laundry, vacuum

Wednesdays: Work, study/complete assignment, do some light cleaning, spend time with kids

Thursdays: Attend classes, study/work on assignments, do some deep cleaning, prepare dinner, spend time with family, exercise

Fridays: Work, study, complete one assignment, do laundry, help kids with homework

Saturdays/Sundays: Spend more time with family, play with kids, go to the park, study/work on an assignment, clean, do laundry, meal prep for the next week, shop, get in some extra rest, complete any unfinished tasks

The sample weekly schedule above is just an idea of how you could choose to structure your week. You can choose to do things differently, and how much you can get done each day depends on how much time you have between work and school.

Of course, you can always delegate or assign some of these tasks like cleaning, shopping, meal prepping, and preparing dinner to other people (like a spouse, child, family member, or even paid help).

So like I keep saying, your schedule depends on your priorities, how much time you have each day, and how much help and support you have. With these tips, you should be able to come up with a schedule that works for you and your family.

6. CHOOSE YOUR SCHEDULING TOOL OR METHOD

You have a list of all your important and unimportant tasks and you have decided when you want to work on or complete them. The next step is to actually create a schedule. And, to do that, you have to choose a scheduling tool or method to manage your schedule.

There are different tools or ways to manage your student mom schedule. Below are some of the most common scheduling tools and some that are pretty popular with student moms.

A planner
Calendar
To-do lists
Apps
Blank notebook

As you can see, there are quite a few options and a few ways for you to create an effective schedule. So pick whichever one you prefer and go from there. Planners are pretty helpful and convenient because they help you put everything together in one place, serve as reminders, as also useful for holding you accountable.

It’s not so easy to ignore things you have written down, so a planner can be a very good investment if you are looking for the best way to create and stick to a schedule.

If you need an easy to use weekly planner, check out The Weekly Planner for Moms in College below.

7. TIPS TO MAKE YOUR SCHEDULE EVEN MORE EFFECTIVE

There are a few tips that can make your schedule even more productive. If you have tried using a schedule in the past and failed, I hope some of these tips will help you become more effective at scheduling.

Remove time-wasters from your life and schedule. Take a good hard look at how you spend your time and some of the tasks you spend your time on, what can you eliminate?
Delegate or assign some tasks. Don’t try to do everything on your own especially if you have the option of not doing them. Assign age-appropriate chores to your kids, ask your husband or partner for help, engage family members or friends who are willing to help.
Make time for sleep. Yes, I know how hard it’s to get enough sleep as a mom in college, but if you schedule your time well, you should be able to manage it.
Create as many family or daily routines as you can. Have a bedtime routine for your kids, create a morning routine, nap time routine, bath time routine, dinner time routine, or any other routine that helps.
You need self-care to avoid burnout. Don’t wait until you are at your wit’s end before you do something about it. Your self-care is important too.
Don’t jam-pack your schedule. Leave some breathing room. You don’t have to fill every minute of every day with an activity.
Make your school work and job the priority not cooking or cleaning. You can cook simple meals or eat takeouts, or frozen meals if you have to, but not prioritizing your schoolwork means you won’t do well in school.
There’s nothing like a perfect schedule. Keep tweaking it until you like how it works.

Final thoughts on how to create an effective student mom schedule

If you are thinking, I don’t have time to create a schedule, then you are thinking about things the wrong way. While a schedule won’t solve all of your problems, a schedule can help you stay focused, serve as a reminder for the important things you need to do, and also help you improve how you manage your time.

Time management for moms in college is a big issue, but having a schedule can boost your productivity and make you feel more in control of your time.

So, does this mean you will never deviate from your schedule? No, of course not! You probably will because a schedule is just a guide. It’s a way for you to try to manage all your responsibilities, so feel free to tweak or ignore anything that isn’t relevant to you.

Finally, remember that creating a schedule or buying a planner is just the beginning, you must remember to look at your schedule and your planner for it to be effective. So don’t just fill out your planner, then forget to look at it.

It doesn’t matter how thorough or detailed your planner or schedule is, you won’t do any of it unless you remember to use the schedule you’ve made.

If you enjoyed this post and would like some more tips, you can grab a free copy of 5 Strategies for Success as a Mom and Student. You can get a copy below.