BONUS MATERIALS The 40 Hour Teacher Workweek Club THE 40HTW LIST-MAKING SYSTEM Learn how to choose actionable steps to help you: q Mark important, inflexible events on a calendar q Get EVERYTHING out of your head and onto a list q Choose The Main Thing for the day and get it done first q Consult your weekly to-do list before you start working instead of just tackling random things as they pop into your head q Empty the day s to-do list at the end of your allotted work hours 1
BONUS MATERIALS: Weekly/Long Term to-do lists In this bonus, I m sharing the list-making system that will allow you to implement The Big Five and all the other strategies you ll discover through the club. Getting yourself in the habit of making prioritized to-do lists is a simple way to solve a lot of pervasive problems: No more keeping a running list of big projects and small tasks in your head No more lying in bed at night thinking about all the items that didn t get done No more 75 item to-do lists that make you want to quit before you even start No more wasted time trying to figure out what to do first and what s really important Let s dive in! You MUST get information out of your head and onto a list Creating lists is essential to getting things done. If you don t write something down, it will take up space in your mind which could otherwise be used for creative tasks and being productive. Holding information in your mind is also very stressful. You ll feel like you can NEVER stop thinking about work if you re trying to remember everything you need to do. So, when you re lying in bed at night or grocery shopping and suddenly think of a task, write it down, and then dismiss the thought from your mind. 2
What if I already have a good list-making system? If you already have a system you like and that s working well, keep it! Just make sure you re following the strategies you ll learn here: Marking important, inflexible events on a calendar Getting EVERYTHING out of your head and onto a list Choosing The Main Thing for the day and getting it done at the beginning of the work block Consulting your Weekly To-Do list before you start working instead of just tackling random things as they pop into your head Emptying the day s to-do list at the end of your allotted work hours and putting an X on it If these strategies aren t part of your current system, you can adapt it. Either a digital or paper to-do list system is fine: a combination of the two also works for some people. The forms I m providing can be printed or typed into, and they re fully editable so you can customize them. If you re the type of person who gets very overwhelmed by reading about systems, try watching the overview video FIRST. The 40HTW prioritized list-making system has 4 parts: Calendar Long-term to-do list Weekly to-do list Project Planner PART 1: THE CALENDAR Purpose: To record inflexible events so you won t forget them, avoid overscheduling, and help you batch similar tasks so you re more efficient I like using calendars to help me see important events at a glance, but I don t recommend writing much on them. With the 40HTW system, the only things that need to be on your calendar are big events that you don t have much (or any) flexibility to change, like holidays, appointments, and meetings. You can use any calendar you already have to do this, whether digital or paper. Everything that s on the calendar will get copied onto the Weekly To-Do List when 3
it s time. This way you can plan a realistic set of tasks for each week and not overschedule yourself in your to-do list. If the calendar is full of appointments and meetings, you ll know not to plan too many self-selected tasks on those days. You can also use the calendar to help you batch similar tasks. For example, if you have a friend s birthday party on Friday night and a concert on Saturday, you can plan to stay in fun and relaxation mode from Friday afternoon until Sunday morning. By not scheduling any work tasks for yourself during that time period, you ll have a chance to fully decompress, and can then get work done on Sunday afternoon and evening if needed. As another example, if you can see from your calendar that you have 2 appointments for home repairs in one week, you can make home repairs the theme or focus for that week, and tackle other household tasks then, too. This will allow you to stay in home repair mode throughout the week, and once the week is up, it will free you to focus on other priorities for awhile. In general, this is a more productive and less stressful approach than trying to focus on too many different types of tasks at a time. PART 2: THE LONG TERM PRIORITIES LIST Purpose: To help you get all the tasks out of your head and written down without creating a long list that makes everything feel urgent and overwhelming. 4
You know how an idea will pop into your head at the most inopportune time, and you ll think, Oh yeah, I ve GOT to get that done? Do NOT put those items on a weekly to-do list unless they re truly urgent. Things that don t have to be done this week or next belong on your Long Term Priorities List. The Long Term Priorities List is organized by categories, and further divided into High Priority, Medium Priority, and Low Priority sections. This will help you decide which items to schedule in first when you re making your to-do lists. You can probably keep the same Long Term Priorities List for an entire month or more, and add/subtract things over the weeks. You ll find one version of the Long Term List for use over the summer (and/or at home throughout the school year) and a version for school tasks. Here s an example of how the school list works: Whenever you think of a task that does NOT have to be done in the next two weeks, write it on the Long Term List in the appropriate category. If it does need to be done soon, write it on the Weekly To-Do List for this week or the following week. (I ll explain that next.) Once a task has been written down, you can put it out of your mind. Don t worry, it WILL get done eventually! You re going to have a simple system for moving tasks from The Long Term List over to the Weekly List in a way that s realistic and not overwhelming. PART 3: THE WEEKLY TO-DO LIST Purpose: To help pace yourself as you allocate time throughout the week to various tasks, ensure the most important things are getting done, and avoid wasting time wondering what you should be doing. 5
Use a new blank copy of this to-do list every week. I recommend having a copy available for the current week AND the following week at all times so you don t have to unnecessarily cram every time-sensitive task into this week s list, or put tasks on the Long Term Priorities List when they actually need to be done soon. Each day has: A big space at the top for you to write down appointments, important events, and reminders Slots for your tasks at different times of day. I limited them to just a few tasks per time period, because longer lists feel overwhelming and tempt you to overschedule yourself. A section called "Find Out/Get to help you remember and accomplish things like finding out when benchmark test data is due or get science materials from the lab. A place for a target number of work hours and a section for notes to yourself about whether you went over/under your allotted number of work hours for the day (in the school version of the list only). You can disregard this until October when I teach you how to pick a target number and allocate your hours. We re not focusing on hours worked during Back-to-School time. 6
At the beginning of each week: 1) Look at your calendar and copy any holidays, meetings, or other important events onto your Weekly To-Do list. Since these tasks are inflexible, you want to work in all the other tasks around them. 2) Start listing tasks in the daily slots. If a task doesn t have to be done on a specific day, put it in the anytime this week column. Don t overload yourself-- remember, you have a Long Term List for stuff that doesn t HAVE to be done right now. There should be lots of open space on your list so you can make time for new tasks that crop up during the week. Each day: 1) Look over your list and add/move things around as needed. 2) Figure out The Main Thing you need to do in order feel a real sense of accomplishment for that day and highlight it. 3) Add to your list of tasks as you think of things, or as they arise. Choosing the Main Thing for each day is essential to feeling a sense of accomplishment and ensuring you re working the most important tasks. Even if nothing else on your list gets done, you will feel good if your Main Thing was completed. Check out the video above for tips on this, and make sure you ve read The Big 5 for Teacher Productivity (in your other sign-up bonus) to learn exactly how the Main Thing works. How to accomplish and mark items on the Weekly To-Do List Plan to get the Main Thing done at the very beginning of the first block of time that s large enough for you to accomplish it. Don t wait to do the Main Thing and take a chance on unexpected interruptions keeping you from getting it done. Also remember that it s better to batch similar tasks so you can get into a work flow, so if The Main Thing is entering grades into the computer, don t do a little bit all day long--do it before school or first thing after school when you can reallyfocus and knock it out. Check off the other tasks as you go throughout the day. Whenever you have a few minutes, look at your list and choose something you can get accomplished. If you finish every task in the slot and still have time left, choose whatever you want from the Anytime this week section of the Weekly List. It s much more rewarding to have a short list for each time slot, finish it, and then get to pick something else to do than it is to cram the time slot full of things you probably won t get to. 7
Cross out any tasks that resolve themselves or don t need to be done this week after all. If you think you ll want to do something later in the month or year, cross it off your Weekly To-Do List and write it on the Long Term Priorities. If you can t do everything on your list, it s okay to cross things out and write them on another day s list (maybe tomorrow s list, or maybe the list for a day next week, or even on your Long Term List if you decided other tasks are the priority right now.) Truly productive people are always re-analyzing their priorities and shifting things around. The goal isn t to have a perfect to-do list you complete exactly as-is, but to have a functional to-do list that helps you plan for each new task as it arises. When you re done for the day, EVERY task must be checked off (completed) or crossed out (not completed, and re-written on the list for another day or your Long-Term list.) You may want to put a big X over the day s list for closure. You don t have to DO everything on your list for the day, but you cannot leave incomplete tasks written there. It s hard to relax if you feel like you didn t finish everything, and it s discouraging to start tomorrow by looking at all the things you didn t get done today. In order to feel a sense of accomplishment, every task MUST be checked off (completed) or crossed out (not completed, and re-written on the list for another day.) When you put a large X over the day s list, that s your signal that working hours are finished. Be realistic about how much you can achieve in each set period. If you never finish everything on your list you re going to get frustrated. Try to check off your entire todo list for the day about 75% of the time. If that s not happening, you re probably overscheduling yourself or underestimating the amount of time it takes you to complete tasks. You may need to plan fewer tasks for each day to allow time for unforeseen circumstances, or focus on working more efficiently using The Big Five strategies. 8
How to move tasks from the Long Term List to the Weekly List Once you re in the habit of using these two lists and emptying your list at the end of your allotted work hours each day, you can start focusing on some of those longterm and non-urgent tasks: 1) When you plan the week ahead using your Weekly List, identify days that are less busy. Some weeks, every day might be packed, especially when you re first trying this system. That s fine: don t include anything from the Long Term List then. But other weeks, you ll have a couple of days where you can probably squeeze something in (especially if you re using The Big 5 strategies to work more efficiently.) 2) Cross out a high priority task on your Long Term List and write it on your Weekly List in a time slot that s not too full. You could also put the task in the anytime this week column and work on it whenever possible, but if you re likely to ignore that section, then schedule it in for a specific day. 3) As your high priority task list dwindles, you can start crossing out and moving over your medium and low priority tasks. PART 4: THE PROJECT PLANNER Purpose: To break down large goals and projects into actionable steps which you can schedule into your Weekly List. You ll notice that some of the examples on my Long-Term list are NOT good tasks for the Weekly List because they re way too big and abstract. Do not take something like "Adapt science work stations for new curriculum" from your Long Term List and write it on the Wednesday after-school slot of your Weekly List. You will hate yourself for it when Wednesday rolls around! The task will create a sense of dread every time you look at your list, because you have no idea where to begin, and you probably won t be able to finish in the time allotted. 9
Familiarizing yourself with a new curriculum and adapting your existing activities for it is not an actionable item for a to-do list. It s a project with multiple steps. You have to look through the teacher s guide, figure out where there s an overlap between the old curriculum and the new, analyze what materials and activities you already have for work stations, decide how to adapt them, determine which concepts you need to create new workstations for, find and organize ideas for them, choose which ideas to create now, and then physically make them. Whew. No wonder so much stuff just piles up on our lists! For less complex projects, you can probably figure out the individual steps or tasks in your head. Look at the project on your Long Term List, mentally break it down into tasks, and write each task into your Weekly List: Monday, step 1; Tuesday, step 2; and so on. However, you can use the fourth and final component of the 40HTW List Making System to help with larger projects. I highly recommend you use the Project Planning List if breaking down tasks is not intuitive for you, or if you have projects that you need to conquer over the course of several weeks. The Project Planner allows you to list big goals (projects) and break them down into actionable steps or tasks. You can then cross out the tasks on the Project Planning List and write them on your Weekly List a few at a time until the goal is accomplished. q
How to break down large projects into tasks for your Weekly List When you re ready to take a big item or goal off your Long Term List, start by writing it on your Project Planner. Use the Project Planner to list all the things you think you ll need to do, organizing them loosely within the categories of First Steps, Later On, and At the End/Eventually. Once you ve got everything written down, you can number the tasks if they re out of order (if you want.) You will probably think of more tasks as you start the project. In the science workstations example I gave earlier, you might realize you don t have all the materials you need for making the workstations, and need to run to the Dollar Store. Add that to your Weekly List (or push back your timeline a bit.) You might also come across a science resource online you d like to explore more fully later on: add that to the At the End/Eventually section of the Project Planning Sheet ( find more ideas on X website ) so you can remember it s something you d like to get done at some point. Gahhhh! I don t know if I can do all of this! You absolutely can. Give yourself permission to invest time and energy now into creating systems that will save you countless hours and frustration later. This list-making system is the core of what enables club members to start trimming hours off their workweek. It s the critical element that makes them feel less stressed, more organized, and more productive. If you don t do anything else with the club materials you ve received, use this list-making system. w
If you re feeling overwhelmed: Go back and watch the overview videos again so you can see the system in action and hear me explain. Ask questions in the Facebook group about how to adapt this system for your situation Open the editable versions of the lists and alter them so they make more sense for you Your goal I want you to focus on getting the List Making system in place now so it s not one more thing you have to think about once your break is over and school s back in session. You can start with just the school work version of the lists, or just the home version, or do both. These are the habits you want to practice: Marking important, inflexible events on a calendar Getting EVERYTHING out of your head and onto a list Choosing The Main Thing for the day and getting it done at the beginning of the work block Consulting your Weekly To-Do list before you start working instead of just tackling random things as they pop into your head Emptying the day s to-do list at the end of your allotted work hours and putting an X on it} See, doesn t that sound doable? You are THIS CLOSE to having an efficient way to prioritize tasks and get them done. You CAN do this, and we re here to support you. e