Sunday night reset
Your jobWrite one thing that is on your mind, then press the box it belongs in. Nothing has a right place.
Please do not type learner names or anything that identifies a learner.
0 of 12 written
Do first
It matters, and it cannot wait.
- Nothing here yet.
Give it a day
It matters, but not on Monday.
- Nothing here yet.
Ask or hand on
It is pressing, but it need not be you.
- Nothing here yet.
Let go for now
Neither. It can wait until it matters.
- Nothing here yet.
Your jobGive each of Monday's three a time and a first step. A vague plan does not let your head rest.
Nothing is in Do first, so Monday is clear. Go on to My Monday.
Nothing written yet. Go back to Sort it and write one thing.
Why this works in your room
Three things with a time beside them is a Monday you can stop thinking about.
For your learners
They get a tutor who starts the week on the things that matter to them most.
For you
The list is out of your head and on a page, and you have decided what is not Monday's job.
A specific list helps you sleep
People who spent five minutes before bed writing a specific list of what they still had to do fell asleep faster than people who wrote about what they had already done. The more specific the list, the faster they slept.
Scullin and colleagues, 2018 (opens in a new tab)A plan quietens an unfinished job
An unfinished task keeps coming back into your thoughts. Making a concrete plan for it, with a when and a how, stopped that happening in experiments, even though the task itself was still not done.
Masicampo and Baumeister, 2011 (opens in a new tab)How sure is this?
Fairly, for the list and the plan: both come from experiments, though small ones with students and not with teachers. The four boxes are a planning habit usually called the Eisenhower matrix. They are a sensible way to sort, not a research finding.
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