New semester? Heavier workload? Stress? It’s so easy to get caught up in your everyday life and let things fall through the cracks. We’ve all been there. Don’t worry. Here are a few tips to make school life just a little bit easier this semester.

1. Color-code your notebooks. Color-coding your notebooks definitely helps when you’re on the go and you don’t actually have time to look at what you’re grabbing. Code whichever way will be easiest for you to remember: by day, by major, by time of day, etc.

Color-coding is especially efficient because instead of looking at five individual notebooks, you’re only focusing and worrying about one color. Don’t forget to pick colors that you’ll enjoy looking at. It might just brighten your day looking at your favorite color; it will also encourage you to actually use your notebook.

2. Use your planner. Write everything down. Always carry a pen, a pencil and a notebook. You’ve just been sitting in class for over an hour. As you’re packing up your things wanting to get out of class, you might not remember or not hear what your teacher says.

3. Take notes during class. Even if you don’t think what the teacher is saying is important, write it down. If your teacher repeats a phrase or a word, highlight it or underline it. If it’s being repeated, it’s important. Focus on what things your teacher emphasizes because you’ll probably see it on an upcoming test. By writing what you’re seeing on the board and hearing what the teacher is saying, you’re reinforcing the information in your brain. It will be easier to remember when you go back to study for a test.

4. “Grades” is an app that allows you to enter your semester, your classes for that semester, assignments and their weights within each class, gives you a target grade and tells you what you need to reach on each assignment in order to reach that target grade. In addition to all of that, it also calculates your GPA based on the classes and information that you put in as well as your previous GPA. It’s a lot to process but it’s definitely a good way to stay on top of your assignments.

5. “StudyBlue” is another great study app. It’s also a website (StudyBlue.com). After making an account, you can access all of your information on both your computer and your phone.

StudyBlue allows you to make folders for your information so you never have to search through to find a class. You can make note cards, take notes and quiz yourself with multiple formats. StudyBlue keeps an archive on your progress so you can see if you’ve improved or not and lets you know what topics are more problematic for you than others.

6. “30/30” is a task manager that keeps you focused even when you have to multitask. It might be a bit confusing at first so play around with it to get the hang of it. The app offers folders and subfolders for each task. In addition, the app allots a time limit (which you may change) for each task and notifies you when the time is up. The task lists are fully customizable where you can add a label, how much time you want to spend on each task, give it an icon and give it a color.