One of the hardest things to learn about university is that reading week does not equal half term. Whilst you spent your high school half terms happily swigging Lambrini in the park with your mates or sitting grumpily in the corner texting furiously to block out the family holiday you’ve been forced to go on, at university things are a bit different. During reading week you should probably get your head down and do some actual work (booo, hissss). I mean not like loads, just like enough so you don’t look like a total bozo when you get back to your first seminar.
The trouble is though, there’s just so much darn distraction. If it’s not your friends constantly texting you it’s the Reddit rabbit hole on ghost stories that you’ve spent the past two hours scouring. Either way, reading A Tale Of Two Cities during reading week is pretty much going to be the hardest thing you’ve ever done.
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Luckily, while technology taketh away, it also giveth. Here’s a few apps that are hell bent on getting your concentration levels up. Also applicable to anyone who finds being sent a GIF of a cat at work enough to distract them for the rest of the afternoon...
Focal Filter
Not the jazziest looking of websites, but Focal Filter does nonetheless perform an invaluable task by blocking your very favourite websites for a period of pre-determined time. Because, let’s face it, the number one thing standing between you and a 2:1 is reading The Debrief. Sorry about that. Sort of. So while we don’t want you to bugger off forever, we will let you take a self-sanctioned break for half an hour while you do you work every now and again.
FocusWriter
Even with* The Debrief* blocked from your computer (sob) there’s still plenty of distractions to keep you from writing that essay on post-modernism. Like, changing your desktop background for instance, or finally installing that update that’s been threatening to restart your computer for nigh on two years now. FocusWriter turns you computer into a stripped back, full screen word processor that runs all other applications in the background so there’s nothing to do but write.
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Deep Calm
Your computer’s full screen, The Debrief’s blocked, but what’s that sound in the background? GOD IT’S ONLY THE KITCHEN TAP AGAIN ISN’T IT? It is this precise revelation that is how you come to find yourself (with no prior plumbing experience) lying under the sink with what you imagine to be a wrench in hand, bashing at the pipes in an attempt to stop the sound that’s preventing you from working. The Deep Calm iPhone app blocks out all that background noise with things like waves and rain noises, and will likely saved you a flooded kitchen too.
FocusBooster
If none of the above is working perhaps you need to try a different tack; like setting yourself achievable goals of working for short bursts. Focus Booster is based on the Pomodoro Technique which gets you to focus on a task for 25 minutes before giving yourself a 5 minute break. A couple of those a day and you’ll be sorted. Plan stuff to do in those five minutes too (like eating food) so you’ve got something to look forward too.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.