I have several goals for my children this school year. One of them is to develop consistent habits, especially with their memory work. Another is for them to develop their skills as a result of following a habit of study. So to help them keep a visual of their goals, I created a checklist of 300 “LEGO” bricks. I call it the 300 Brick Challenge Checklist!
Because this was certainly easier than going out and buying 300 LEGO bricks or counting them out from the huge stash downstairs. Okay, MAYBE a little less fun, but… easier.
For my youngest, he is working on memorizing ALL twenty-four weeks of our Classical Conversations memory work. This requires diligence and slow-but-steady weekly memory practice. He has historically not loved this review time, but I know anything LEGO related motivates him.
Every week, he recites all the previous week’s memory work to me. For every week recited, he gets to color in one brick. That means on week 1, he only colored in 1 brick. An easy win! On week 2, he colored in 2 bricks. Pretty easy. Week 3… you get the picture.
As it get progressively harder, he’ll be motivated because he gets to color in a larger chunk of the chart. My hope is that seeing bigger and bigger pieces of the chart get filled in each week will keep him motivated.
For my oldest, he wanted the same challenge, but his work is slightly different. He is studying Latin which involves a lot of vocab memory. So I told him for every week he can say all his Latin vocab, plus daily piano practice or typing practice, he can color in a brick. He’ll move along at a slightly slower pace than his brother, but I think overall it will keep him motivated.
So you can see, these charts can be used in any number of ways. Why 300? Because 24 weeks of memory work, starting with 1 week and adding a week’s worth every week is… a total of 300. (We even had to figure out a formula to figure this out. It is n/2(first number + last number). N=total number of weeks. First number is 1 and last number is 24. So… if you are working on some kind of accruing goal, that’s how to figure out how many items you need on your checklist.
My older son is not using the chart this way, since he’s just accruing points depending on how many times he does his work each week, which may vary.
What’s the prize at the end? LEGOS, of course! My boys know that when the checklist is complete, they will get to pick out a large LEGO set of their choice at the end of the year! (Yes, we plan for this to take all year – we’re also trying to teach them about delayed gratification!).
What do you think? How do you help your kids keep track of goals?
What kinds of goals are you working on? Cleaning their room? Feeding pets? Exercise? Books read? Drinking enough water?
Could you use a chart like this? Because I have it available in 8 different colors!!
Just put your name and email in the form, and a new window will pop up where you can download and save the file!
