7 Keys Engaging Screenagers Best Improve Their Learning Time
7 Ways Engaging Screenagers Best Improve Their Learning Time
In life it has been my experience that believing in yourself has more to do with success than most any other factor.
Don’t you agree?
When you believe in yourself then you make the decisions that support your success.
Often, we hear complaints about how Engaging Screenagers (aren’t we all now) are not making the best decisions with their time, but are we helping them learn how to use their time for what’s most important?
Are they learning to, as Stephen Covey says, “Put first things first?”
For example deciding not to play video games for hours on end (a few minutes for a break is great, but long term it becomes junk-engagement) can open those hours for hours on end of learning (optimal engagement.)
In the following I will describe what I learned when I went back to Graduate school, but I realize (now) how important these lessons are (and wish I had learned them) from when I was in junior high school (that’s what we called it then) and on through university.
Before I started Graduate school, I had been working in a world where we were stuck in a big building all day and mostly the only distractions came from work related interruptions.
I left that environment to a world where my time was mostly free, and that was a total shock to my system.
I was lucky to have a few months before the MA program started to experience a new freedom (more on that in future blogs,) so when things got really busy, I reflected back on what worked and what didn’t work.
Once I started Graduate school, I found a priority to re-think what I was doing at all times.
As the first semester began, I recognized all the undergraduate students were playing in the first few weeks of the semester and remembered how I played like hard the first 4 weeks of every semester in university.
Because I was working at Nordstrom and Teaching as a Graduate Assistant in the University, and was a full time Master’s student, I was a busy guy (i.e. not much time to play.)
Here are some of the Keys points I learned to help make life easier and more successful for this Engaging Screenager.
Key Point 1) Get enough regular sleep. (Make sure you go to bed at the same time and get enough sleep to recharge your system. It happens so often in the busiest times [in school, work, etc.] we don’t get enough sleep when we need it most. When I say regular sleep, I mean going to bed and get up at the same time 24/7. Can you say, “jet lag?” By staying up late 1-2 days a week your internal clock doesn’t work at it’s best. Why do you think there are 10% more accidents on Monday morning than any other day of the week?)
Key Point 2) Stop doing stupid (junk-engagement) stuff. (If you have family members to care for that is optimal engagement, but much of the stuff we do is quite mediocre in priority. You may be saying, “DrWarren, I need this extra job.” [So many of my Screenagers have told me that when they were explaining to me why they needed more time to complete an assignment after the had gone to Lake Tahoe or Las Vegas with their friends for a long weekend. Is working a job to pay for a long trip a priority when you’re a student?])
Key Point 3) Learn your most productive times of the day. (We all have different times of day when we are at our productive best, so what is yours and has it changed over time? When I started graduate school, I thought my best time was 10am-1pm and 7-10pm, but that changed to 9am-12noon and 3-6pm [with just reviewing before bed] as I got better at studying.)
Key Point 4) Plan, schedule, and fight to protect your Big, most productive blocks of time. (If you have most productive times in your day, fight to protect those times like they are the most important value you have ever owned. Others will push you to give up your value times, not because they mean harm, but because they just want your time. As Dale Carnegie suggests, are we honestly looking at things from the other person’s point of view?)
Key Point 5) Work like it’s exams week(s) from the beginning of the term. (There’s a saying, “Preparing for the exam begins on the first day of the semester.” Imagine, during exam week we turn up our study efforts to 100%, but what if you worked at 80% for every week or your semester? [I’m saying 80% because I’ve seen so many people try to live their lives at 100% productivity and they most always burn-out.] How much would your scores improve. BTW, this is important for most every endeavor in life. )
Key Point 6) Have little stuff to do (review, note, write, collaborate [with Google Docs,] etc. on your device) whenever you are waiting for anything. (How often do you see someone looking at Facebook, Instagram, chat messages, etc. when they have a few seconds? Before I started teaching [and later researching] 100% blended courses in university, I saw my Engaging Screenagers continually checking their screens for updates. I wanted my Engaging Screenagers to check their devices to review their learning, collaborate, etc., so all the content I share with my learners[university or training or coaching] must be available within 1 tap on my learners’ devices by saving shortcuts on their homescreens. Do you have your most important learning content on your homescreen? Challenge yourself to learn with your device whenever you are waiting for anything.)
Key Point 7) Track your productive time. (This is the most challenging, but one of the most valuable in the long run. Keep track of your time for a week [Wednesday to Tuesday] using a time log where every hour ask yourself, “How did I use mo last hour?” and focus on 15 minute intervals. Then as an ongoing practice, just check your schedule at the end of your day and write your score on a scale of 1-10 [10 is high] to evaluate how you followed your schedule. Do this with your week too. When you are new to this practice look for open blocks were you were not productive, and with practice you can look for blocks where you were productive and yet you could have been more productive.)
Engaging Screenagers, you will fail quite a bit with this at first.
When you were learning to walk how many times did you fail, but how many times did you give up?
With everything that is worth doing, it is worth doing poorly until you can do it well.
By embracing these keys you will build your own quality of life, by having the time to experience optimal engagement in what is most important.
I’m not saying you will have enough time for everything, but you will have enough time for the most important things in your life.
Wouldn’t you like to have enough time for the most important?
Do you believe in yourself enough to chose what is most important over what is not so important?
Value time for optimal engagement in what’s most important.
Remember, come join tomorrow to see more Improving Your Engagement with Screenagers and others inspirational experiences and ideas for Optimal Engagement in the ScreenAge.
Remember to engage tomorrow.
Following with you.
Keep it simple.
All the Best, Warren
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