Summary of the article

The clock-time paradox by Ida H. J. Sabelis

Clock time has enabled organizations in our modern society in the First place, but there is a paradox. Clock time also creates problems that become visible only when we manage to switch focus from the smooth ideals of control, planning, and organization to the everyday experience of people trying to cope with reality of this in practice. If you have a lot of time for an assignment, it is tempting to postpone the task because there is enough time left. So the paradox is that we underestimate the power of time.

Clock time:
The spruce docket is all about avoiding problems to manage the time of the individual user. During the researches a lot of students were talking about time struggles. The gap between searching for information and starting is too big. If the user could fill in tasks and let the application send the user a reminder, the user has the capability to forget about the assignment and focus on something different. In this way the user can manage their time. Time could also be seen as an object because the amount of time left is the deadline.


Cultural times:
Cultural times doesn’t play a big part in our project. Only if you would call students a culture itself. The only difference that might come up are the different kind of assignments and tasks. The only bullet point of cultural times that might be involved is Time-scales. When the user has set the assignments into the three categories, the user has a time-scale of when the assignments should be finished. In this way the user can plan the tasks in order to manage their time.


Holistic views:
Students work on different times. Student A might do all the work on the day and get up early, while student B works through the night and wakes up late. The condition of life plays a part here. The reason why students work on different times is what they prefer themselves. When these rhythms change, there is an error in the flow. The application helps students to keep their own flow in order to get the deadlines.


Page 256-257 “Questioning people directly about their time use often produces rather shallow answers concerning time-schedule problems… ICT’s have presented both more opportunities for cooperation and an increase of bureaucratic intrusion into the daily work of academics.

During the researches and interviews we asked a lot about time managing. How do student manage their time? The answers we got in the first place were very shallow. It was like there was no problem, but when we asked more questions the participants talked more about their problems with time managing. The most important thing we have learned during the researches is that students have problems with managing their time because they also have a lot of other things to do. Most of them do not own an agenda. They just write everything down on a piece of paper or set the alarm on the mobile phone. Students want to forget what they have to do and focus on one specific thing. If students could fill in an assignment somewhere, they have less stress.

Secondly, the students from now use modern technology to start working on their assignments. There is email communication between students and the computerization plays a big part in the life of a student. So we have learned that students didn’t want a product, or something not digital. They want something with technology. The spruce docket could help students with managing their time and send reminders on specific moments in order to let the student forget about all the assignments.