Stretch The Time Horizon

As you know from the End of Semester Push article, struggling students tend to come back to life during this last stretch of the year.

Are they asking about summer plans? Maybe asking how long until school is over, or talking about how they will be in the next grade soon? As our struggling students come back into focus, one of the first signs is the return of future thinking.

Though our struggling students may be coming back into focus, the time-blindness will still be there. This means they still struggle to mentally “see” (plan and organize) into the future. However, now, they actually WANT to. So let’s jump on this opportunity to show them the benefits of making time visual.

S-T-R-E-T-C-H

Display two calendar months side-by-side.

This creates a visual representation of the relative time distance from today to the last day of school. Cut, tape, and rig those calendars to show the last two months of the school year. Be sure to show the narrowing of the time gap by crossing off each day as time goes by.

Start talking more about summer plans.

This helps bring their mind's eye to the things they have to look forward to. There’s something magically motivating about looking ahead to something desirable at the finish line. It’s energizing!

The monthly family calendar is just one part of a helpful time management system. Check out this article (It’s Time To Manage Time) to see tips for the monthly calendar, as well as the other two parts of the system that I found to work my family and my clients.

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