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New beginnings often inspire a renewed sense of commitment and hope. With the beginning of a new school year, it’s good to think about how the decisions you make everyday will influence how the end of the year will present itself to you. Three areas of key decisions you are making right now, as you start the year, revolve around time, friends and resources? Be intentional in thinking through the decisions you face each day to answer the dilemma – will this take me closer to my goal or lead me further away from it. The first thing to consider is how you spend your time.
One area that will increase your chances for success in the future is time management. High school is the time to learn these skills. Learn how to keep track of your responsibilities and commitments in a planner, on your cell phone calendar or some other time management system. Be intentional about planning out your assignments in classes and stick to that schedule. Enlist the help of a friend who will learn these skills with you and who can help hold you accountable. When you are not motivated to do your homework, your friend can challenge you to get back to the books. If you both struggle with procrastination, set a schedule with intermittent goals and check up on each other in your progress toward the goals. Friends can be a crucial influence on your success.
Surround yourself with positive people, people with similar goals as yours. Find friends who will encourage you and will push you to strive to give your best instead of taking the easy way out. Healthy competition is good – seeing who can get better grades or who can make a more creative PowerPoint presentation. A true test of friendship is when your friends ask you to go and hang out with them, but you have a major project due the next day that you need to finish. True friends won’t try to convince you or pressure you to go with them. Instead they may even offer to come over to your place and use it as a study time for their own homework, or if you prefer to study alone they will honor that. Another key decision is to make the most of the resources available to you.
Resources can be both people and materials. Advocate (ask for help) for yourself with your teachers. Begin by approaching your teachers with higher level thinking questions related to the content in class. Get as much out of your teachers as possible. They love their material and would enjoy engaging with you in conversation about it. Ask to sit by people in class who are serious learners and who focus on the task at hand instead of distracting others. Look for experts in your chosen career field and read about them, interview them, job shadow with them. Talk to your school counselors; they have lots of materials to help you. Get in touch with your tibrary technologists and learn from them the best ways for researching topics covered in your classes. You will be surprised to see how many new things have sprung up in the last six months. Make the most of the resources at your disposal.
Think back over the decisions you made today. Did those decisions bring you one step closer to your goals or further away? Your decisions about your time, friends, and resources will play key roles in the spring when you look back and see if you’ve met your goals for this year. Make the most of everyday and use this time in school to learn the life skills you will need to be a success in the future. By reading this blog you are one decision closer to success. What you decide to do with this material will determine your next step. Go for it!
