How To Get Your Email to Sort Itself

Learning objective: Teachers will be able to (TWBAT) utilize the key features of Gmail Priority Inbox in order to free up their time.

Everyone knows that having a clean environment helps clear the mind, but here is something you may not have thought of clearing out--your inbox. Now, before you say, "Forget it! Do you know how many emails I get each day, let alone each hour?!" Hear me out; I once knew your pain. Every day I spent checking emails I would say to myself, "Darn, there went my entire prep period!" Well, fear not! Gmail Priority Inbox is the solution to getting your email to sort itself, giving you that precious prep time to enjoy a snack or an un-rushed trip to the bathroom :)

Gmail Priority Inbox is like having a personal assistant for your email. If you are more of a visual learner, here is a quick video of what Gmail Priority Inbox does. Otherwise, to put it simply, it organizes your inbox into multiple categories and automatically sifts through your email to put those of high priority on top. Imagine, the reality of clearing out your inbox at the end of each day--soooo gratifying.

Not only that, Gmail Priority Inbox can also help you not check your email as often. As teachers, we get bombarded with emails all day, yet we constantly need to check our emails. Heaven forbid we miss the email informing us of a free paper organizer a teacher is giving away, or the announcement of bagels in the snack room during break! Gmail Priority Inbox allows you to only get notifications for emails that really matter. This frees up your time a little and allows you to peruse through when your schedule permits.

Here's how you do it: 1. In your Gmail settings, set your inbox to "Priority Inbox."

I like to put my important and unread emails at the top, followed by my important emails. The emails I manually star, are the ones I know I need to respond back to. Then, there is everything else. 2. Next, do what you normally do.

Priority Inbox learns a lot just by watching how you go about reading emails. If you constantly read emails from a specific person, it learns to mark those as important. The same goes if you delete emails without reading them; Priority Inbox learns those messages are not as important. Kinda creepy how technology can pick up your patterns, but hey, it saves a ton of time. 3. Use the filters and desktop notifications.

In Gmail Settings, click "Filters." Say you want to mark emails from your principal and co workers as important and only get notified when you receive one of those emails--Simply create a Gmail filter that matches from:mvwsd.org (or your school's domain) and check the box that says "Always Mark As Important." To receive desktop notifications for these emails, go to Desktop notifications under Settings and select "Important Mail Notifications On."

Lastly, don't get discouraged. As we all know, learning takes time, but after a few email checks you'll rarely have to manually mark messages and you can go to bed with a clear inbox and a clear mind. Of course, if you decide you don't like it, just turn it off.

I hope this entry motivates you to do what you can to clear out your mind, if not your inbox as well. Remember, if you want to be able to focus on things that matter, you need to make the brain space for those more important thoughts. Delegating this mundane task of sorting emails can really change your mental clarity and productivity. So here is your weekly quote:

“Keep your head clear! It doesn’t matter how bright the path is if your head is always cloudy.”