Definite Plan - How Kid's Dreams Are Turned Into Reality - The Second Step

The key ingredient in teaching children how to get into the habit of planning, "The Second Step", is by simply encouraging them to do so.

Whether it's the parents not putting enough emphasis on the importance of planning and working with their child, or the school system not consistently working with the kids in planning methods, the bottom line is children are growing up missing the opportunity to learn about the value of planning their precious time. Working with many children, we have come to discover that kids really do like to plan, once they see the underlying value behind it.
They are quite perceptive to using a tool that is personal to them and assists them with direction, not only on a daily basis, but for the long-term as well.

We first need to start by explaining to them how planning will start to free up more time for them to do the things they want to be doing, instead of just doing the things they have to be doing, such as the chores, or for some, homework.

Now, there are many ways to go about teaching a child how to come up with a clear-cut plan and why planning is so very important.
We would like to share with you a simple, yet effective way you can communicate to any child in your life the significance of coming up with a definite plan for their respective futures.
To continue, you will need a piece of paper and a pencil. Start by writing the number twenty-four on top of the page. This will represent the number of hours in a day. Together, figure out how many hours each night they sleep on average and subtract that from your twenty-four.
So say they sleep ten hours we would be left with four-teen hours.

Then we subtract school time, so figure seven hours, we are left with seven hours.
Now together, brainstorm with the child a list of the things that they would normally have to do each day, besides going to school and sleep; such as brushing teeth, showering, homework, chores, eating dinner or snack etc. When you are done with that, associate the amount of time it should take for each one of those tasks.
For example, brushing teeth and showering equals 45 minutes.
Homework 1 hour, choirs 30 minutes, food time 30 minutes, planning for next day 15 minutes etc.
(Remember every family is different so base these numbers on what is the norm for your family.) We then go ahead and add those times up.

For our example we would total out at 3 hours.
Now we subtract these three hours from the seven that we were left over after sleep and school time were deducted.
In this example we are left with 4 hours for the day. This could be used for child's free time or what ever other activities they need or want to do. Some kids go to aftercare, some kids have practice for whatever they are into and that's fine. Make your adjustments accordingly and together. The bottom line here, is that children will know each day what is expected from them.

They will be more apt to do these things promptly because they took part in planning for it.

They then start to realize the free time it is giving them and then start to become consistent with it. For younger kids, create a plan book from scratch, even some of the older kids can get into this, too.
Design it however they want. They can add stickers or make fancy title pages within their planner.

The point here is for them to personalize it as much as they like.
You can even pick up an inexpensive planner for their use.
Talk to them about the importance of using the planner daily, and getting into the habit of planning for each day the night before. Like we stated in Desires - How Kids Dreams Are Turned Into Reality - The First Step "It all starts with a dream, a strong desire to accomplish something that you want". Second you have to have a Definite Plan. What is a Definite Plan? Here is an easy way to break it down for the kids that is self-explanatory.

These steps will help build strong character skills in your child which are necessary for being successful in all they do.

We will start with the D in Definite. D stands for Definite, Devoted, Dreams, Direction The D in Definite tells us that we must be Devoted to our Dreams. Constructing a definite plan gives us the Direction we need to make our desires come true.

E means Effort, Envision, Effective The E represents the Effort we need to put forth in making sure we do the things that are included in our plan.

If we continually Envision our goals throughout the entire process, we will be Effective in reaching the outcome.

F equates to Fine Tuning, Focused, Favorable The F stands for Fine Tuning.
This simply means that we must constantly make changes to our plan, along the way, to assure that what we are doing is leading us in the direction we intended.

Stay Focused at all times on what your doing and your results are sure to be Favorable.
I equals Identify, Inventory Always review your plan.

You must Identify all that's working, and not working, so your able to make the necessary adjustments.
Take Inventory of all your tasks and add any more that you can think of.
N tells us a plan is Necessary Having a plan, a definite plan, is Necessary if you want to achieve your goals.

I refers to Imagination and Ideas Let our Imagination spell it out for us.

What does your Imagination tell you? How do you see it? How much of it can you Imagine? Imagine that you have already achieved the Ideas you came up with.

Picture what it would be like if you already succeeded in reaching your goal.

How does it make you feel? T is for Thinking Thinking about your mission, reviewing your plan daily in your mind, will also help you reach your goals. Keep it fresh in your head as much as possible, and before you realize it, you will be there.

E is for Examine Again, Examine both the negative outcomes that you encountered, as well as the positive ones.

Mistakes will definitely be made along the way.

Take the time to Examine both and question what could have been done to avoid those particular mistakes.

Lets look at the word Plan now.

What does each letter in the word Plan tell us? The P tells us to Prioritize your tasks accordingly.
L is for Listing all your goals on paper, then taking each one and starting to associate tasks to reach those goals.

The A tells us to take Action.
Put the plan into play.

Keep in mind that if you don't take Action on your plan, you are doomed to fail.
You must take Action.

Finally the N in Plan Notifies us to Never give up.

We will run into obstacles along the way.

Just, whatever you do, don't let them stop you from reaching your goals.

Learn from those obstacles and move on.

You can do it.

Believe in yourself and your half way to reaching your desires.

While these are simply steps to creating and following a definite plan, they can also serve as inspiration for getting your child to act responsibly.
Kids like to impress adults, and often lack the skills necessary to show how responsible they can be.
Don't forget to check out the next step to success in Persistence- How Kids Dreams Are Turned Into Reality- The Third Step.