Flying Airbus, but the concept is quite similar. I always try to keep it simple and use an easy reference to get distance. This could be the direct distance to the rwy thr (on Airbus you can put this on the Prog Page ie LIMC35R) if you are arriving straight. If coming from 90°I tend to use the ND and range rings to estimate the distance to go to the point where I expect to be cleared at a certain point (generally I take the IF or even the FAP(F) ). Or if I expect a sort of cut downwind I may use the ND or again the distance to the rwy adding the expect track miles for downwind, base.
With time you’ll be able to compute this distance quite quickly and then its only a matter of energy management using your 3x rule plus allowance to decelerate. This is normally the minimum distance you can expect to fly, if the airport is busy you can keep a bit high (I suggest initially being conservative) and in case recover using s/brakes.
generally I tend to use open descent (the equivalent of level change), when I see I’m drifting low I revert to V/S to get a lower ROD.
basically I use LVL chg, If I need to reduce my ROD I use V/S. I also use V/S when approaching platform altitude to achieve a smooth continuos descent. Just try but at the beginning be conservative. One good captain take your time, take your distance and don’t be afraid to have good margins (obviously within reason
cheers