I'm absolutely with you, Scoobster! Keeping up the motivation is one/the biggest challenge during the ATP studies. And I know how frustrating it can be I you find yourself, once again, being behind schedule! As a consequence I've frequently thought about my studying system and how to make it more (time) efficient. Unfortunately there is no general rule that can be applied, since each individual learns/studies differently, a thing that worked well for someone doesn't necessarily work well for somebody else.
But here is what I noticed while looking at your "system" and by the way, when I started with my studies I did it exactly the same way like you're doing it, but I came to the conclusion that it's too time consuming.
1) Read through each chapter and make 'pen' notes - for example Chapter on Atmospheric Pressure - totalled 22 pages.
2) Attempt the workbooks
3) Repeat process for next chapter.
4) Type up notes (this is where the double effort comes in)
5) Attempt question bank on chapter(s) just studied.
6) Review score and get shocked at how low I scored on Met/M&B in the QB due to the wording of questions, yet scored 90% above on the school online question bank.
Steps 1 through 4, are quite time consuming and at some point (down the road) you'll notice that your notes are probably too detailed (too extensive) and not that beneficial when hitting the question bank (QDB), since the QDB puts the emphasis on different areas which aren't always adequately covered in the textbooks, meaning textbooks and question database are two different pair of shoes.
Here's what I did, but as I mentioned before, I don't know if it'll work for you. I mainly focused on working with the QDB and made my notes accordingly (don't get lost in details)! What helped me a lot during my studies and I found being some kind of "time saver" as well, was the Oxford DVDs (ATP).
ATPL
the following link might be useful as well:
http://www.pprune.org/professional-p...ml#post8992735
good luck!