How soon is too soon to get started on assessment?

If you are a law student, I wouldn't be surprised if your approach to assessment is dissimilar from mine: I have a tendency to get super-motivated and start an assignment the second I receive a topic. That motivation lasts about an hour, often less, as I realise the topic is boring/difficult/easy/stupid. At some point (often a week or so before it is due, although sometimes in the days before) I become super motivated yet again. This all ends up with me handing in an assignment that I am totally sick of and, a week later, would not be able to tell a person the topic.

We all know it isn't the best way to go about getting a lousy few marks down before our big exams, but we all do it anyway. We all wonder if it was the adrenaline, Red Bull, coffee or lollies that kept us going and vow to ourselves that it will not happen again as we drift off to sleep, still standing in front of the submission box. Other students behind us growing impatient, we promptly forget the promise we made to ourselves and carry on, destined to forever forget to start the next assignment early.

When I start an assignment, or even studying for that matter, early enough, I have a tendency to assume it is too early and 'no one could possibly be starting now'. WRONG! Someone else always will have started before you and law school is WAR. Well, not really, but you get the idea! Do you really want to be the last person to start? Even factoring the stress of starting an assignment with so little time remaining, neglecting to start in a timely fashion means you run the risk of losing valuable resources, if you are like me and like using library books.

So starting early is a given, right? But what do you do when you are in a situation like I am now, with 3 assignments and 1 exam in a short period of time? Someone told me in high school that when you get an exam timetable you should always plan to start studying for the last exam first.  It sounds counter-intuitive, but it makes plenty of sense. I'm planning on taking this idea and using it for my assignments. While I won't completely finish the one due last now, I plan to have a great draft done in the next week or so which will enable me to spend the time I need to spend on my other pieces of assessment.

What is your take? Do you start super early or are you like me, a perpetual procrastinator?

Here we go again....

So the moment I have been dreading has finally come. Life got hectic! 


After a super busy week of uni and trying to catch up on readings (a result of my decision to do my readings after classes... still fine tuning the system) I decided to take a look at the assigned topics for assessment. Did I mention I was so busy I didn't notice essay topics for one of my subjects were released for almost a week? On top of that I almost forgot about my external subject yet again. It seems my rather strict study schedule is not strict enough... or maybe too strict.