Advice For Students: Managing Time Online

It’s easy to lose track of how much time you’re spending online. Lots of online games, apps and platforms are designed to keep you engaged for as long as possible. To help counter this, set up a schedule of how much time you want to be spending online. Setting up alarms can help you keep track of time and encourage you to take a break.

Some social media platforms have tools to help you keep track of time online and allow you to set up an alarm to notify you after a certain period of time. On the Facebook app, this is under “Settings & Privacy” and then select “Your time on Facebook”. For Instagram, go to “Settings” and then select “Your activity”.

The devices and apps that you use have been created to be as engaging as possible. Even when you have put your phone down, alerts and notifications encourage you to pick it back up and keep scrolling. Thankfully many of these settings can be changed.

Turning off push notifications, changing your screen to greyscale mode, taking distracting apps off the front page of your home screen and downloading a screen time monitoring app are changes that encourage you to unplug.

Are you feeling pressured to constantly respond to private messages or comments you’re tagged in? Busy group chats especially can start to seem like a part time job to keep up with!

Responding in your own time is okay and a few “what did I miss” messages in the group chat aren’t going to hurt. You could also change your settings temporarily, so people can’t see when you’ve been active on an app. Try changing the “show activity status” in your Instagram settings under “Privacy” and then “Activity Status”, or turn off “Active Status” in Facebook Messenger settings by clicking on your icon in the top left of the screen.

It can be hard to cut down on how much time you’re spending on your device on your own. Try talking to a friend and see whether they’d be keen to cut down with you. It’s always easier to make a change when you’re not the only one doing it!

Have you ever lost sleep because you’ve been sitting up until late checking your phone? One of the easiest ways to cut this habit is to buy an alarm clock and leave your phone outside your room when you’re sleeping at night.

Spending time online can be a great way to connect with people and develop new skills, but sometimes it can be nice to take a break and try out something new that doesn’t require you to be online. It could be teaching yourself a new skill such as drawing or playing an instrument, joining a sports team or even getting a new book out from your local library – anything that gives you a bit of a break from time spent online.