How it works

What the room says set it off

1

A deadline got close.

Something outside them changed first.

2

Somebody else started.

They caught it from the person next to them.

3

A mark came back.

The proof came after the work, not before.

4

I had already done a bit.

The answer that explains the whole lesson.

Every trigger the class names is something that had already happened before they felt motivated.

1
It starts with a memory, not a lecture.

Six minutes of quiet writing: when did you last really want to do something, and what set it off? The triggers go on the board, and the class notices that every one of them had already happened before the wanting turned up.

2
Then they prove it on themselves.

Each student writes down three things they have been avoiding and scores each one out of ten for how much they want to do it. They take the lowest, shrink it to something they can do at a desk, and do it for five minutes in silence. Then they score it again, and the class count goes on the board.

3
It ends by arguing with itself.

“Busy people stay busy” is only half right. The last part of the lesson separates real action from just keeping busy and from rest you actually chose, using cards the students sort into three piles. Three of the cards are written to start an argument.

Some students will be avoiding something because of what is happening at home, or because they are struggling with more than a tutor time lesson can fix. Nothing written down is collected, read out or marked, and the slides say so twice. Stay somewhere in the room where a student can come and speak to you at the end.

Get the lesson

PPTX

The lesson slides

Twenty slides. Each one is labelled with the part of the lesson it belongs to, so you can teach straight from the deck.

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PDF

Teacher resource pack

Five pages: the whole guide on page one, then the four things to print.

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