‘Wiggle room’

Every assignment is a creative process, during which you learn and develop your skills. You need to build in time and breathing space for your work to flourish. Assignments involve many stages: understanding the task; researching, reading and note taking; planning your submission; writing; reviewing and editing; and final polishing. When you start an assignment, you don’t know all the problems you’re going to encounter. If you did, there would be little point in doing the assignment; after all, it is supposed to stretch you. So build in ‘wiggle room’ – extra time you don’t think you need – for those unforeseen difficulties. Start early, pace yourself and build in at least 25 per cent wiggle room. After completing an assignment, reflect on how it went. To produce high-quality work you might need to start even earlier and build in more wiggle room. It can make all the difference between an average grade and a high one.
Trevor Day
6 June 2018
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