Objective - Children will be able to avoid procrastinating by dividing up dreaded tasks into smaller, more "do-able" chunks. They will be able to identify what interferes with their concentration and learn ways to regain their focus.

How Do You Eat an Elephant?

A. What would you do if the king ordered you to eat an entire elephant? Cry? Give up? Jump up on the elephant's back and start eating? Most of us would probably look at the king and say, "That's too big a job for me."

Now let's imagine that the king offers you a huge reward. He'll give you thousands of precious jewels if you'll just eat the elephant. Chances are, you'd figure out a way to eat the elephant. Because an elephant is so large, you would have to break it down into pieces and eat it one chunk at a time, one meal at a time.

B.Sometimes you are overwhelmed by large school projects that see just as big and hard as eating an elephant. You do not start them because you do not know where to begin. The key is to cut up that big assignment into a bunch of bite-sized pieces that you can swallow!

See how this works. Suppose you need to clean your bedroom. Visualize how nice the results will be. Now, break up the task into chunks. Write down each task that needs to be done:

making the bed
putting clothes away
stacking your books
vacuuming
dusting

Now put all of these chunks into a sequence. #1 should be done first, #2 done second, etc. By setting priorities you will know what needs to be done in what order. NOW IT'S YOUR TURN: Suppose your teacher wants you to do a five page paper. She wants you to chose the subject, find three library books on it, write a rough draft, show it to someone, design a cover page, and turn in the final copy.

What are the rewards for tackling this project?

How many different bite-size tasks are there? Can you list six? More?

In what order should you do the little tasks?

If you do ONLY ONE task per day, what is the maximum amount of time you'll have to spend on a single day? How many days will it take you?

Discussion:

Have you ever found yourself daydreaming in class?

Have you ever realized that you read a whole page of a book and don't remember a word?

Have you ever been called on by your teacher and realized you did not even hear the question?

Paying attention to the little details in class is the best way to stay prepared for studying!!!