Preparing Boys for Life: Laptop File Organisation

This might not rank in the same level of excitement as rock wall climbing, camping or self- catering at Moray as character and skill preparation for life, however when you go looking for a file document with a deadline looming toward you, having a logical file naming and saving routine can be at the very least a great stress preventer if not life saver.

In Middle School we insist that a boy maintains a filing system. It can be his choice and his design, but we advocate the following model:

The Desktop Filing Cabinet

• Go to the Desktop and set up 11 Folders: a file for 2014 or for previous years, a separate file for each curriculum area, one for Outdoor Education and one file marked Personal.
• Inside each of these folders sub-folders can be created to help separate different units of work.
• Naming a document is time well spent. Give everything you do a name that helps differentiate it from other documents. e.g. The Power of One English Essay rather than English Essay.

Similarly do the same for emails. Set up folders with logical names that can store correspondence for easy reference. It takes a few extra seconds to file each email but it can save time and frustration and the despairing task of pulling out hair whilst scrolling through hundreds of emails in a hurry. Folder set up, file naming and saving is a discipline and a habit we hope to have instilled before our boys leave for Senior School.

Does your son have a filing system that makes sense to you? A one page document outlining our file naming and saving system can be found on Parent Connect in the Middle School Portal.

Mr Richard Ledger

Head of Middle School