Psychological Corollary

If a task is difficult, success may require long-term effort.

Lesson Objectives

Students will be able to identify two examples of long-term effort required to succeed in specific goals. For example, a person who wants to save a lot of money will have to save consistently for months; a person who wants to lose 30 pounds will have to go on a long-term diet.

Social Behaviors

This lesson shows students that successful people:

• set realistic goals
• plan ahead
• act industriously
• want to work ahead
• Desire success
• are persistent

Social Vocabulary

• persistence

Suggested Lesson Plans

Introduction

• Define persistence. Ask students to suggest goals that would require persistence to achieve (e.g., quitting smoking, losing weight, and passing a test).
• Why would you need to be persistent to achieve these goals?
• How can you tell if a person is being persistent?

Group Use of Students Workbook

• Ask students to read about Hal and Julio's vacation plans.
• For each set of cartoons:
• Have students look at what Hal did to save money.
• Have students write or draw what they think Julio did in the same situation. (Remind students that Julio did not save money for the trip.)
• Ask students
• Who was more persistent in trying to reach his goal?
• Did being persistent make it easier or harder to reach the goal? Why?
• How do you think Hal felt about being able to save the money for the trip?
• How do you think Julio felt when he couldn't go to the beach?
• Have students describe additional ways Hal could save money (e.g., by washing his own car vs. going to a car wash).

Follow - Up

• Ask students to pretend their goal is to save money to have a vacation at the beach. Have students list the plans they would need to make to reach their goal. For example:
• Choose a beach.
• Decide how to get there.
• Decide where to stay at the beach.
• Find out how much lodging and food would cost.
• Compute the approximate cost of the entire vacation.
• List possible ways of saving money.
• Set a realistic weekly goal for saving money.
• Determine how many weeks would be required to save the amount of money needed.
• Ask students to identify ways they could persistently save for their trip.

Behavior Development

To encourage students to set realistic goals and plan ahead:

• Put the following list on the board:

• Then give students the following hypothetical situation:
• Sam has to do all the things listed above after he gets home from work and eats dinner. He'll have to plan his evening carefully if he wants to get everything done. He still might not have time to finish.
• Ask small groups to plan Sam's schedule, using the following chart

• Ask students:
• Will Sam have enough time to do everything and still be in bed by 11 o'clock?
• What things should Sam leave out?
• What do you think is most important for Sam to do first, second, etc.?

Review

• Ask students to identify two goals for which persistent efforts are required (e.g., quitting smoking, saving a fairly large sum of money, and losing 30 pounds).

Homework (Optional)

• Ask students to design their own evening calendar; students can use the plan they made for Sam in the Behavior Development Activity as a model.
• Students' plans should include
• A list of activities they must accomplish,
• A list of activities they wish to accomplish,
• Estimated time to do each,
• TV shows they'd like to watch and times the shows are on, and
• Their priorities - what is most important for them to do first, second, etc.