Life Skills- Beginning the New Year

Okay, so I'm 3 weeks late on this topic but really only 2 weeks late since we had a week off for the holidays! However, to begin our Life Skills for the New Year I thought it was important to reflect on the year past before making goals & plans for the year to come. So here are my ideas for teaching the topic. Remember that I always start each topic with a brainstorming session with my kids before having them do activities by themselves or with me.


1.) I always start my New Year by reflecting on all of the good things that happened to me in the past year. Ask the kids why they think this is important. My reasons are that it helps me to have a thankful heart no matter how rough my year has been, it helps me to see what our family has done in the past year & it helps set the tone for the New Year to be a good one as well.
Activities: This task could end up as a list with or without drawings attached to it. It could be a collage or a drawing or a calendar. (Perhaps you could take one picture from each month in the past year of good things that happened & make a calendar for this year.) It could be a scrapbook or a story or a newsletter that you can send out to everyone you didn't get around to sending Christmas cards to.


2.) If you made a goal list last year, go back & see what all you accomplished off of it. Some things you may have done, some you only did part of & some you may not have gotten to but everything you can mark off of your list is an accomplishment.
This is also a good opportunity to talk about how unexpected things may have come up last year but how, even though they weren't in your original plans, your family was able to get good out of them.


3.) Make a list of things you would like to do or have happen this year. If you have a list from last year, you can look at it for ideas. Perhaps there are places you want to go to, movies you want to see, people you want to do things with. This can be projects you want to do, ideas for school topics. The possibilities are endless. However, if you never give kids a chance to think about what they'd like to do, it's hard for them to learn to set goals & work to accomplish their goals. The New Year is a great time for setting goals.
You might take special note of the things on your kids' lists & add some of them to your list so you can help them achieve their goals. We don't always know what is important to our children but this can give you some ideas.


4.) Now look at the goals set out for the year & decide on a few that you want to do this month. Explain to the kids that even big tasks can be accomplished if we break them down into smaller goals. Look at the lists & try to come up with ideas on how to accomplish them. Is there a project that you need supplies for? Are their friends they want to see that needs arranging into the schedule? Work together with them & see what you can help them do during the month to achieve their goals.
Activity: Have the kids post this list (or drawing if they are little) in a prominent place where they (& you) can see it during the month & remind you all to work on your goals. I find that it is nice at the end of each month to review & see how much we have accomplished. Then the following month, we make a new goal list.


So there you have Life Skills lesson #1. Not too hard, is it? Think, though, of the benefits that come from learning to set goals & work towards them. Feel free to take any ideas you come up with & use them to expand upon.
That's all for now but I will try to post another Life Skill by Wed. so we have a few of them going in January! Ha, ha! (Plus, I am seeing that as I write this out, it solidifies the idea in my head for my own lessons. Perhaps I should try writing these BEFORE I try teaching them at home!)
God bless you all & Happy New Year!- Bj