• Thu. Mar 28th, 2024

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How to make the most of your learning space

Whether you need it for university work or as a home office, making sure your working space is set up to achieve the best results is crucial. Did you know, for example, that procrastination costs businesses around £76 billion every year? It’s the main reason we don’t achieve as much as we could.

You might be refining old skills or trying to learn new ones, but without a great space to learn, you’ll struggle to focus. In this article, we’re exploring how to make the best learning space.

Consider some green companions

Plants in the workplace have long been touted to bring benefits, and you can bring this to your home office too. Flowering plants are great ways to increase our concentration levels and lower the sensation of stress. The likes of ferns clean our air space, while the snake plant also cleans up toxins. Succulents such as a cactus are also a useful addition to your space for decoration purposes as they don’t take a lot of looking after.

Let it shine

Sick of screen lights? Natural light is an amazing way to counteract any effects of sitting in front of an artificially-lit computer screen. It is also known to enhance our mood by increasing our happiness. This is because natural sunlight is a great source of vitamin D. Without this, some people experience seasonal affective disorder. By being exposed to natural sunlight, you will also have a sense of contentment thanks to the production of vitamin D.  It is suggested that a brightly lit room can encourage a critical and analytical thought process.

The soundtrack to your work-life

This one with vary depending on your musical tastes. While some people work best in silence, others prefer a bit of background noise. Everyone benefits in their own way. Either way, a good set of headphones could be the ideal solution as they can either block out the tones around you or provide the tunes/podcasts best suited to keeping you productive. Other low-level noise could distract you from your studying or work and have a negative effect.

Classical music is a good shout. Italian researchers found that this genre can significantly enhance your working memory performance, while research in the Journal of Consumer Research also found that a moderate level of ambient noise can benefit our creative senses.

Keep it organised

If your desk is a state, it’s not going to help you get things done. It’s not a coincidence that a clear desk can represent a clear mind. By ensuring that your workspace is free of unnecessary distractions, you are more likely to remain focused on the task at hand. You can do this by having a bin within reach, setting up a physical inbox for your papers, and scheduling regular cleaning times. Making personalised name badges to organise your work into different sections can also be very useful when wanting to keep things organised.

Bring in a little colour

Using colours in your workspace can alter your mood. Red has been linked to boost how alert we are. It’s looked upon as the ‘colour of passion’. Elsewhere, blue can help us generate ideas and keeps us focused on the task at hand, while green helps avoid eye fatigue and stay efficient.  If you were looking to keep stress levels to a minimum, you should look to include white or beige as this can have a calming effect.

Add a little something that’s just ‘you’

We feel much more comfortable in our own space. It may sound obvious, but a few home comforts and personal touches can go a long way to increasing your productivity levels. Family photos and postcards of your favourite quotes are both great visuals that can help get your creative juices flowing, you could make a stunning wall mural out of these.

There’s no right or wrong answer to this. In the end, each of us learns in a different way, but by following the above steps, you will set yourself up nicely to succeed in your end goal and boost your productivity levels.