Category: Organization

Organize Students with Google Keep

I work with a lot of students who want better, easier, faster ways of organizing school and personal life so they can be MORE successful and LESS stressed. Google Keep, connected with your Gmail account, is a VERY powerful, flexible and easy tool to help. In this video I teach students how to get started in 10 minutes with some great ideas they can implement today. Here I offer 9 categories they may want to create at least for now to get a jumpstart.


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Students Who Lose Stuff

This vlog is based on this email:
First, you are the best! Love all the help you provide EF-challenged kids! Question on your simple schoolwork system: How do you tell high school kids to manage carrying all of these separate folders/comp books? Most times they can’t go to locker til lunch and may have 3-4 classes to prepare for — that’s kind of why the zipped 3-ring binder is helpful — but the ONLY reason! 🙂 Most schools these days do not let kids carry around their backpacks (safety reasons). I’m afraid my freshman will leave his science stuff in math and then move on to Spanish. Any suggestions you have would be great! Thank you. — Nicole
Here are my tips as explained in the vlog:
  1. Consider AM PM setup
  2. Color coding
  3. Labels
  4. Type of folder
    1. Pocket
    2. Manilla
    3. Accordion
    4. Zip binder, remove rings
  5. Moleskins or composition books
  6. Help student practice walking through the process MANY times
  7. When to do it “for” them?
  8. Baby steps, persistence

🎦 YouTube: Visit my official YouTube channel here. Subscribe, like & comment to support my work. 👉 Share: To support me, please *CLICK* at the bottom to share on FB or Pinterest. ✏️ EF101: Here’s my jumpstart course for parents and teachers. 💚 Give: Love my work and want to donate? 🙏 Thanks! — Seth

Video transcript:

Hey, what’s up, parents and teachers? It’s me Seth with SethPerler.com, I hope you’re having a great day. It is spring. Spring break is upon us. This is the time of  ‘The Dip,’ a lot of things are falling apart; this is our final push for the year. We’re getting into what I call ‘Hail Mary’ time, and this is a difficult time. Good luck with this time of the year in terms of helping your students, helping support your students to navigate this final stretch Today I’m going to talk with you, you know those students that you’re working with whether your a parent or a teacher, and they just forget stuff all the time. They leave it in the wrong classroom, they lose stuff all the time, they spent all this time working on homework but it never got turned in and they got a 0 on it, those types of students. I’m going to talk today a little bit about that type of student and I’m going to read an email from a mom named Nicole to answer a question that she has about one of these students. So by the end of this video you’re going to have about eight ideas to help these students. I’m going to go rather quickly, but you’ll have some concrete ideas on how to help these students. I’ve helped a lot of students really figure out ways to manage their stuff in a way that they can handle it and that they don’t feel overwhelmed, and I’m going to go over some of those elements for you. Here is how the email goes: “First, you’re the best. I love all the help you provide executive function challenged kids. Question on your simple schoolwork system. How do you tell high school kids to manage carrying all of these separate folders and composition books?” So basically they’re saying, ‘what do you tell them to do in terms of carrying all this stuff?’ Most of the times they can’t go to their locker until lunch and they may have three to four classes to prepare for, and that’s kind of why the zip binders are helpful, but the only reason, and they put a smiley face because they know that I’m not big on three-ring binders. But the zipped one, because of that zipper on it, it helps them contain their stuff. “Most schools these days do not let kids carry around their backpacks for safety reasons. I’m afraid my freshman will leave his science stuff math and then move on to Spanish, etc. Any suggestions you have would be great. Thank you, Nicole.” All right, so I have eight ideas that I’m going to go over here. Number one: First of all, one thing that works for a lot of students has to have an AM and PM binder, or an AM and PM accordion folder, or an AM and PM zip binder or bag or backpack. Now, it may seem like overkill but you don’t want these AM and PM things to be two giant things. You want them both to be a slim-downed version. If you’re familiar with my work, you know that I really am very minimalist, very essentialist. I want my students to really have the minimum that they need. The more stuff they have, the more stuff they have to manage. Not only in school, but also in life. Their ‘stuff,’ like their email inboxes. So we want to slim down the stuff. We want them to have less stuff, we want them have what they really need to manage. So the first tip is that you can do an AM and PM version. You can tailor that and you guys can figure that out on your own, I’m not going to go into more depth on that. Number two: Next, color-coding is so so so important. I don’t want my students to be thinking, math, for example. I want them to be thinking ‘yellow. Okay, so maybe these two would be math, or maybe read is science,’ or whatever it is, but I want visually things to be very color-coded. I want my students to get their stuff in the right place, it’s a huge problem. Color-coding is one tip to help do that, and I really take this seriously. These kids are often very visual, they’re not often reading the words but they’re seeing the color. So use that. Number three: Next, labels have got to be huge and clear and obnoxious. If you have the type of student who leaves something in one class or leaves something at home, or whatever, you want to have clear labels. I can’t tell you how many times when I was a school teacher that I saw somebody leave a folder on the floor and two minutes later it’d be kicked all the way down the hall. Papers will be all over. That kid is never going to get their stuff back in a meaningful way. And if their name was not on it, it’s never coming back. If their name is on it, it’s a lot harder for people to kick around something on the floor that has a human being’s name on it. It looks more meaningful. So it’s more likely, I’m not guaranteeing, anything to get picked up and also to get back to the student. So somebody picks us up and they go, “Oh that is Seth Perler’s folder,” then the one of the teachers or parent in the hall or one of the kids to be like, “oh we’ll get that back to Seth.” Or if you put the name of the teacher like here it says ‘Miss Smith’ for example on the folder. They might not know who that is, but it can go back to Miss Smith the math teacher, and clearly, this is math. So Seth knows not to put science or social studies or language arts in this folder because it says math. You can even go so far as to put if it’s an A day or if it’s sixth period. You can go crazy and get all the details on here. I call that front-loading. You can go and get detailed with trigonometry. You can have a big giant ‘M’ or a big giant ‘MATH’. I do recommend putting your name on the front and the back. At the very least get your name on the back also. But you want big giant obnoxious labels, you can make it cool, you can make it graffiti, you can make it art, I don’t care. But get at the very least, get a big clear clear clear label on it because I have had so many students be like, “oh, yeah. I lost my planner,” and they’ve used it for 3 months but now it’s gone and they have to start a new one. Or, they’ve lost a folder with lots of work in it. Just get the clear labels. Have I made myself clear on that one so far? So that was tip number three. Number four: Next is the type of folder. So I generally recommend the cheap 50 cent folders. Now you’re going to want to buy two or three of these because they do fall apart, but who cares. You get two or three of them for the year, you label them all so that they’re done so you can just throw recycle the one and get the new one. I generally recommend these. I don’t like the plastic folders because for kids that are messier, they can go like this and everything can fly out of the plastic one. I like a cheap paper folder like this. Now, I do have some students that just use these simple manila folders and that’s it. So some of my students and I’m like “Look, can you just get it in here? Can we at least use these?” Now if your student is not using a zip binder or backpack or something, it’s more likely to fall out of this so you want to consider every detail. With some students I just, “Can you get it into this folder”. I use these for some students, I’ll use an accordion folder for a student who is not as motivated to use a folder. Are they going to really pull out an accordion, set it on their desk, flip back the front of the accordion and go through to get it? Some of my students do that, but not many. Or can you do the three-ring binder? That’s very few of my students that can successfully use a 3-ring binder to manage their stuff. So it’s not actually doing the job it’s intended to do, but it may work. Now as far as the zip binder that you are mentioning. I have had students break out or cut out the rings themselves and just used it, but you could probably find something else that zips. But that is not a bad idea at all. If you have an AM and a PM, small zip thing or something that is enclosed that can keep, you know, if they have three folders for the morning and three for the afternoon. Maybe the three in the morning are yellow with another color, maybe the three of the afternoon or blue with another color, whatever you want to do. But if you can find a container like that or two, that might make things easier. So again, the type of folder. You got your pocket folders, you got your manila folders, you got accordions, your 3-ring binders, and then your zip binders. Number five: Next, I’m going to talk about what you mentioned. This is number five. You mentioned the composition notebooks, right? So if they have six composition notebooks, one for each class, that might be a lot to manage. Here is a trick that you can do. You can have the front part of the composition notebook for one class, and they can flip it over and you can have the other side. Let’s say behind this sticky note for another class. You can also do this to divide it, or you can creatively divide it so that this is actually two notebooks. That’s probably enough room for one semester for a lot of classes. So this can actually be two in one. Another thing that I love is moleskins. I love them because it feels like an art book now. Let me show you the size comparison. Here is your composition notebook. And here is a moleskin, they are so small. So to have one moleskin per class, and again you can do art all over them and decorate it and put their label with their name so that it gets back to them. But it’s also it just it’s so small. These are so easy to carry that you can even fit them inside of a folder like this. They’re so small. There is another perspective of how small they are. So think about the moleskins, they’re kind of pricey for what they are, but whatever. If it does the job, who cares? Number six: You have to help them walk through the process of managing their papers in a folder many many many times. If your relationship with your child is such that they will allow you to help them do this on a regular basis, even daily for six weeks or so, that’s going to help the habit. To expect them to just do this then manage it and really be good at it, it’s not going to happen overnight it takes time. But at least if you’re doing the SNO, the Sunday night overhaul that I teach, if you’re doing that at least once a week and overhaul on the folder, get rid of everything they don’t need. If they still need to do something, pull it out so that it gets done and everything that just needs to be stored can go in here, but they need practice over and over and over walking through the process of managing the papers. Really their folders never should be very thick. They really should never need any more than 10 or 20 papers in here at any given time for most classes, unless the teacher is forcing them to hold on to the papers for some reason. Some teachers like to do binder checks and stuff like that, or folder checks or whatever. But really what they need in here is their current work. Some families that I work with, what happens is the parents will take everything out and archival for the kid until the teacher does the binder check, that way the kids only has to keep in here the things that are more current so that they can actually manage what needs to be managed and they can build the skill of managing the things in a rational way. Number seven: When to do it for them. Look, a lot of times I will organize this for them. I will see what doesn’t have their name on it, have them put their name on it. I will straighten out the papers, I’ll put it in a good order for them. I will remove things that are at the wrong subject and put them in the right for them. A lot of times I will do a lot of that for them (at times). So if my student is working on a paper, they’re working on their homework, or they’re working on really the learning stuff, the learning part of their classes, their homework. Then I often times will take this off their plate. Okay, and then at other times I will sit down with them be like “Let’s overhaul all your folders now,” and I’ll go through it in a really detailed way on a night when there isn’t as much to do as far as their homework is concerned. So there’s a time and a place when to do it for them. In your mind the question you always want to ask yourself is, “Am I enabling them? And am I giving them more of the learned helplessness experiences (which we don’t want), or am I empowering them in and having them focus on what they need to focus on?” So you kind of always want to be balancing that question in your head. Number eight: And my last one is baby steps and persistence. Look, like I said before it’s not going to happen overnight. You have to persistently help support your child to build these structures. I know they’re resistant. I know I get it. That is the number one problem that my students deal with is resistance in so many different forms. That is the number one thing you’re going to deal with is that resistance. How do we help them to do things like building this skill of organization, for example. Things that are good for their life, for their own future, for their own well-being. How do we help them build those skills when there is so much resistance? That’s the question here, right? But the final tip is baby steps and persistence. Just keep pushing on. Baby steps are everything. People want to see like, “oh, yeah my kid figure out this new system. Now, they’ve got it and it’s awesome.” It’s not going to happen like that. It does occasionally, but it’s extremely rare. That’s not how I get students to experience a change in their life. What I do that works is baby steps over and over and over. Let’s take the system and let’s see how we can refine it just that much more. Let’s see how we can polish your ability to use the system just that much more. Like it’s just bit by bit by bit and you have to trust me that this is what works with these types of students is these tiny steps, but persistently. Trying all the time trying to just take get them to the next level even if the next level is just a millimeter or fraction of a millimeter. With that, again, my name is Seth Perler with SethPerler.com. If you like this, please share it with somebody right now and subscribe. You can also subscribe on YouTube. You can hit the bell if you want alerts on YouTube, but please subscribe to my blog SethPerler.com where I send out freebies and updates every week, generally on Sundays. And if you want to leave a comment on YouTube or on the blog with what have you done about this? How do you help students who are losing things and do you have any tips and tricks that you used yourself or with children that you’re working with be able to manage their stuff? Go ahead and leave that in the comments if you want and have a fantastic day. I will see you next Sunday.

B2S The Truth About School Supplies Lists

Please CLICK above to share. It’s that time of year again, back to school shopping. K-College, your child needs supplies. But what do they really need to buy? What goes to waste and what’s most beneficial? Sometimes it’s best to take supply lists with a grain of salt in favor of getting items that are best aligned with your child’s learning needs. This video will help you know what to buy, what not to buy, and how to choose. Grain of salt
Love my work and want to give? Click here! To support me, please CLICK at the bottom to share. Click here to visit my official YouTube Channel & subscribe if you want! Thank you — Seth
Reading the transcript? Great! We’re currently uploading hundreds of transcripts so you can read them asap, but they are NOT all edited yet. This is a big process. If you notice anything wrong and want to help us, feel free to click this Google Form to share it. Thanks so much for pitching in!

Video transcript:

What’s up, it’s me, Seth, with SethPerler.com. I hope you’re having a fantastic day. Today, I’m going to talk to you about the supply list that you guys are going to be getting very soon. So if your kid is in elementary school, middle school, high school, or even if you have a college student, your kid is going to need supplies. A lot of schools will have a supply list that’s available at their office or supply stores. Usually, go see a little spinny thing in there, and there’ll be all different schools with different grades and even down to the detail of different teachers that’ll have their own pages of what they want you to get for their class. I want you to take this with a grain of salt because if you’re watching my videos, your child is not a traditional learner and they don’t need the same things that everybody else needs. Not only that, but a lot of the things that you will get will also go to waste and will sit in the locker the whole year and often even be thrown away at the end of the year before the package has even been opened. I’ve seen this many times because I taught for 12 years and it happens more than you care to believe because it’s just a complete waste of your money, your time, and the resources that you bought. I’m going to break this down for you. I’m going to share a little note on advocacy. If you’re worried that your teacher is inflexible or that the school is inflexible, and that they’re going to really demand that you get certain supplies, making it clear they’re going to give your child a hard time for not having certain things. I want you to write them an email, an advocacy email, send it to a couple of the people who relevant on that list. Might be an administrator, a school counselor and it might be a teacher or two, and go ahead and send them an email and say, “Hey, look I’m doing things a little bit different for my kid. If you really have a problem with this and you really need us to get the supply, and you’re going to support my child learn how to use it, then fine. I don’t have a problem with that. But if you’re not going to support my child and really hold their hand through learning how to master using this particular supply, then we’re doing a different system and we’re working really hard to help our child. Please support us in that and let us know what you need. But please understand that we’re just trying to really support a child that’s struggling with executive function. So we’ve chosen to do some different things.” You’re going to get the supply list, it’s going to have all kinds of stuff on it. Sometimes you have to get stuff to share with the class. That’s pretty normal, you know, sometimes they ask for tissue boxes. They get the tissue boxes from 30 different families and they have tissues for the whole school year. That’s pretty normal stuff. What’s going to happen is you’re going to see a list of ‘get this and that and this and that and this and that.’ You’re going to have a lot of parents really trying to do the right thing. Is this the right type of pencil? Are these the right type of highlighters? And all that. Don’t worry too much about that. You can always get it after school starts. Don’t purchase if you think that your child isn’t even going to use it. Anyway, keep it at home and see if the teacher even cares because sometimes they really don’t need it and you can return it and save the money from that. Oh, by the way, I want to know that you can also often find the school supply list by checking your teacher websites. Now at the beginning of August teachers are already going to be updating their personal websites with things like the supply list. There a few key things that I really want to mention. One is, kids who struggle with executive function often do horribly with binders. If your child does well with binders, I don’t care and if the teacher supports them to consistently use the binder how the teacher expects them to that’s fine, but often binders are overkill. In middle school and high school teachers will have them get binders and get all these dividers and have a divider for class and have a divider for homework, etc. These kids are struggling executive function have no interest in maintaining things to that level of detail. Their brain doesn’t work like that. They need to bring power for other things. So if you know that that’s your kid, don’t get the three-ring binder. What I recommend is either in accordion, or what I prefer in do with most students, is get a simple folder system. Color-coding is very important. I get cheap folders and I will recommend the families get two or three of the same folder. Let’s say that your child says, “I want a green folder for science because it reminds me of plant some plants or science or biology.” Fine, green is Sciences. I recommend that you get three of these cheap paper folders. I don’t recommend getting slick folders because kids with executive function issues are often the kids at toss the folder places, and if it’s a slick plastic folder, stuff flies everywhere and good luck getting it back in there to the detail that they need to. I recommend cheap paper folders with huge labels. If it’s science, write: “SCI, John Smith” on the front of that folder and write it on the back of the folder. Put their name on the front of the folder and the back because these are the kids who lose their folders all the time. So have everything very clearly labeled all over the place. Don’t worry, you are not overdoing it. Do this, even if they’re in high school, even if they’re in college, so go ahead and grab different colors. Green, blue, red, yellow, whatever, go ahead and label them. Get two or three of the folders because they will wear out and just when they wear out just get rid of him and replace them. Okay, I am very green. I don’t like to waste stuff. But in this case, when the folders warrant out for the purposes of this, get a new folder. Again if they have to use 3-ring binders, get them. But if the school is flexible, and it’s a more progressive school, then go ahead and get what you need. If it’s a more traditional school and they’re more rigid, then you might have to advocate for them. And again, if the teachers will support them, fine. Now you also have things like compasses and protractors and calculators. These are generally for math. Again, the labels are very important. Sharpie it all over the place. Sharpie your child’s name all over the place on those compasses, protractors, rulers, and calculators because they will misplace them and lose them and you might want to have an extra set if your kid loses stuff all the time or doesn’t bring stuff home. Just buy a set for home and buy a set for school. So you’re going to buy two rulers, two compasses, two protractors, two calculators, or whatever, and just keep it simple so that they have everything they needed at school and they have everything at home. That goes for pens and pencils as well. Honestly, I really like them to choose the ones. They like the labels lot times, put stickers around them with their name on it. I’ll write with a sharpie directly on the pen or pencil if you can so you want to do that because if they lose it, it’s more likely to come back to them if their names on it bold. So write their name even on pens, pencils, highlighters, markers, crayons. And then as far as what not to get – don’t get anything that you don’t feel good about getting. A lot of times teachers will have multiples of these things in the classroom. And if you know your kids going to lose scissors, or that they never use something like colored pencils and that’s not their thing or whatever, listen to your God and don’t get it and just email you to be sure. There’s nothing wrong with it doing that. You’re not bugging them. Just say, “Hey, real quick. I just want to make sure do we really need this. And then finally planners. I’m going to talk about a couple of different things with planners. One thing with planners is to get the big wall calendar planner. First of all, without planners, there are things like sticky notes and notecards. I’m a huge fan of using things like this for daily plans for kids, just things that you can write down to list of what’s going on today real quick. Real easy keep it simple. So I use these tools for planning a lot. Even though those are not planners in your mind, I want you to be thinking that that is part of the planning process. Okay. Now, I personally as far as the planner goes, a lot of schools will give out planners and if you watch my stuff, you know, I do not like those for kids with executive function because there’s too much going on with the periodic table, all the colors, all the famous quotes, and also the primary fact that they’re weekly rather the monthly. These kids need to learn how to plan, they don’t need a big complicated 90-page planner. It’s overwhelming to their brain, believe it or not. You want a large 8.5″ x 11″ monthly planner. Rip out every page that has nothing to do with the school year. Leave in August, September, October, November, December, leave those pages in the planner, and teach them how to write shorthand. It’s big picture. They can see the whole month. It’s way better for their brain because they’re not good at managing time and they can really see things better with the monthly planner. So I do recommend those over the school planner or over weekly planners. If you’re a detail-oriented person, you think I’ll get my kid one with a daily planner to help them cuz it’s one day at a time. No, that is too detail-oriented for them. You want them to be able to see the big picture, in my opinion, anything I say, by the way, don’t listen to me if your kid uses another system successfully ignore everything I say about that particular system. So you have your planner, you have your note cards and stuff. But you also want a desk calendar. The big giant desk calendars. I’ll put up on the wall for my student and we get it planned out for the entire school year. We highlight all the days off and the only thing you write on those planners are important things, like practice, appointments, past papers, and projects. So that’s not a detail one, but that’s a big picture one that they can keep on the wall because with these kids, out of sight out of mind if they don’t see it. It’s not in their mind and you need to help them start to building systems where they can visually see what’s coming up and anticipate the big things that are coming up because these are the kids that wait till the night before and they tell you at 8 pm that night, “I have an 8-page paper due tomorrow. I haven’t even started,” and you do not want to experience that for any reason because it’s really hard and stressful on you and your child, so this is one great way to prevent that. That’s what I wanted to go over. I hope that helps you as you are entering the office supply stores this year to get your child their supplies. Advocate your kid gets what they really need to create a system that they’re going to use. Involve them in the process as much as possible. They should be there the store with you. You shouldn’t just be doing it for them. Their supplies build responsibility, the more investment they take in the process, the more effectively they’re going to use these things. Anyway, if you have any questions go ahead and work, go ahead and comment below. I hope you have an awesome 2017.

The “Organizationally Challenged” [Video 2/3]

Please CLICK above to share. Here’s part 2/3. In part 1, I mentioned the following: I recently received this email:
My youngest (age 11) is challenged by organization. We’re working together to figure out systems and tools that help align her success in this area.”
Well, here in part 2 I will break down how and why you need to have labeled “homes” for everything. Enjoy, and please share.

The Homes 7-day Challenge:

Try this and let me know how it goes:
  1. List the categories of things you want homes for. Use your own words. This might include things like School Supplies, Art Supplies, Sports, Electronics Misc., Memorabilia, Random Junk, Valuables, Tools, etc..
  2. Find or buy a good “home” for these things. You might use storage boxes, Ziploc baggies, drawers, shelves, etc..
  3. Clearly label everything. Label all sides.  Use sharpies, stickers, label makers, whatever. Do not skip this step.
  4. Give yourself 7 days to make homes for all relevant categories.
  5. Email me or leave a comment here to let me know what happened. Share a before and after photo if you want and I’ll include in a future post.
Good luck! Love my work and want to give? Click here! To support me, please CLICK at the bottom to share. Click here to visit my official YouTube Channel & subscribe if you want! Thank you -Seth

Video transcript:

The “Organizationally Challenged” [Video 3/3, The Overhaul]

Please CLICK above to share. Here’s part 3/3. In part 1, I mentioned the following: I recently received this email:
My youngest (age 11) is challenged by organization. We’re working together to figure out systems and tools that help align her success in this area.
In part 2 I broke down how and why you need to have labeled “homes” for everything. Here, in part 3, I discuss the difference between “maintainers” and “overhaulers” and tell you how to do regular overhauls. Enjoy, and please share.

The Overhaul Weekly Challenge:

Try this and let me know how it goes:
  1. In your planner, schedule a weekly 30-minute overhaul (although it may take less time).
  2. Do an initial “reset” or “overhaul” of everything related to school!
  3. Each week, repeat the process for 1 semester.
  4. Email me or leave a comment here to let me know the results.
Good luck!
Love my work and want to give? Click here! To support me, please CLICK at the bottom to share. Click here to visit my official YouTube Channel & subscribe if you want! Thank you — Seth
Reading the transcript? Great! We’re currently uploading hundreds of transcripts so you can read them asap, but they are NOT all edited yet. This is a big process. If you notice anything wrong and want to help us, feel free to click this Google Form to share it. Thanks so much for pitching in! – Seth

Video transcript:

Alright finally were onto video three out of three on challenge by organization. If you were challenged by organization in your students or your parent in your childish and very ization that are three main things that you’re going to do that are going to help you to get over to his first of all, the first one was in video number one was to minimize get rid of stuff get down to the essentials declutter. Okay, get everything cleaned up. The second one was for the things that you do. Keep you want to have home for everything like this is a home for paper clips. Okay, when a very clearly labeled simple home for supper, very simple, very easy to use you need homes for things third is the overall okay people who are not naturally organized or are not good at maintaining. Okay. I call it maintainer is an overhaul Earth maintainers are people who maintain things very easily. They brush their teeth. They learned about should see the young and they get in the habit and it’s a habit is done. They actually Like making the bed they’re maintaining making their beds. They actually will do their own laundry at an early age. They they maintain things they’re taken care of things things. Don’t get out of hand. Their deaths can get out of here in their backpack doesn’t get out of hand their locker doesn’t get out of here in their bedroom doesn’t get out of hand. The bathroom doesn’t look like an explosion happened. Everything doesn’t get out of hand because they’re maintainers. They’re constantly maintaining and refining and they’re the type of people who put things away when they’re done with them. They don’t need to be reminded. They put their dishes in the sink after they’ve eaten things like that. Okay, but if you’re watching this video, You’re not a maintainer. You’re an overhaul are okay. So if you’re a student who is in a maintainer, you’re an overhaul or which means that periodically you will go to town and completely redo your whole bedroom or completely redo the whole backpack or completely clean something or all your video games are all your that so that so generally speaking you’re someone who likes to overhaul when some other problem is that I see with the students I work with is they don’t over how regularly and then things do get out of hand and then they get behind on their homework and then they’re swimming Upstream for the rest of the semester trying to catch up with grades and their grades are not reflecting with are truly capable of nor are they enjoying school as much as they should and this also affects other areas of life. Either way. The point is you need to get a weekly habit of overalls. Okay, you need to overhaul certain things on a weekly basis and you’ll be fine. Trust me on this the most important thing to overhaul is your school materials your backpack General. Speaking with you’re going to want to do in a very easy ways every single Friday everything in your backpack from your locker or your desk everything that belongs to you from school and just bring it home dumped it all over the floor at first it might take you a while to do the overall black as you do this on a weekly basis it all eventually only take you five to ten minutes a week to maintain everything and what you’re going to do is you’re going to pull everything out of the backpack every single thing every gum wrapper every pencil shaving everything out of the backpack go through all of it reorganizes papers recycle everything. You don’t need throw away the trash you don’t need me when I’m doing overalls with my students. I’ll find sandwiches in there and old drinks in there and crumbs of food in there and papers from from months ago and things that are just not important. So you want to do this overhaul. I’m really be doing this on a weekly basis make it habit just that every Sunday night’s my favorite time do this because it helps you close out the free. This week and prep for the upcoming week, but every Sunday night or whatever you want to do a dune overhaul 5 or 10 minutes will everything out go through all your papers get them back in the right folders anything that needs to be done get it in your queue or your homework folder or your planner. I write things in your planner update your planner cross off everything from the week before right in the assignments that are coming up in the upcoming week. The overhaul is designed to be a maintenance type thing. Since you’re not a maintainer you need to have regular overhauls so that you’re maintaining so that you’re having maintenance to do a thorough check and make sure that you’re not leaving any important business. I’m done. Homework that you need to turn in the homework you need to do whatever so once you get those three things you are well on your way to developing better habits with organization. You’re not going to be perfect North should you ever be perfect with organization? You will probably never look like a naturally or a nice person that doesn’t matter. If you get in the habit of the first video of eliminating the stuff you don’t need and then the second video which is creating homes that for the things that you do need in actually using those homes. And then on this video doing regular maintenance overalls, you will be in really good shape. Now I mention the overhaul for the backpack, you can also over call your bedroom and clean it once a week or the laundry once a week or whatever other areas of your life your art area and whatever your things are. You will probably want to get in the habit for that as well. But at least if you start with his backpack overall once a week, you’re going to be in much better shape. All right, get to it have an awesome week. I hope this helps you. I’ll see you soon.

The “Organizationally Challenged” [Video 1/3]

Please CLICK above to share. The “Organizationally Challenged,” Video 1 of 3 I recently received this email:
My youngest (age 11) is challenged by organization. We’re working together to figure out systems and tools that help align her success in this area.
Well, all the students I work with are “organizationally challenged.” But what can we do about it? Here is the first in a 3 part mini-series about what works.

30-Day Challenge:

Try this and let me know how it goes:
  1. Download the free Quick Decluttering Guide right here.
  2. Print it and overhaul everything on it to the best of your ability.
  3. Give yourself 30 days to make as much of a dent as possible.
  4. Email me or leave a comment here to let me know what happened.
Good luck! How to organize students
Love my work and want to give? Click here! To support me, please CLICK at the bottom to share. Click here to visit my official YouTube Channel & subscribe if you want! Thank you -Seth
Reading the transcript? Great! We’re currently uploading hundreds of transcripts so you can read them asap, but they are NOT all edited yet. This is a big process. If you notice anything wrong and want to help us, feel free to click this Google Form to share it. Thanks so much for pitching in! – Seth

Video transcript:

Everybody that’s the stuff the stuff for the.com and this week. I’m going to share with you a quick email from a parent and she writes my youngest age 11 is challenged by organization. Working together to figure out some system is in tools to help align her success in this area. Challenge spy organization 100% of the students that I work with are challenged by the by organization. It wouldn’t be coming to me if they weren’t challenged by organization. So I’m going to dive into this topic and I’m going to make three videos for you. This is part one where I’m going to discuss three ways that you can really help tackle getting more organized and help kids who are challenged by organization. Before we get into it, let’s look at why. Somebody would be challenged by renovation the first place and what it comes down to is the bring executive function in the brain the prefrontal cortex the front part of the brain, the brain’s ability to execute task organizing requires organizing is part of the executive function it part of the ability to execute ask you must be able to organize things in order to execute ask let’s look at to tasks one with the writing a paper into we’ll look at cleaning a bedroom. Okay. So if you’re writing a paper cleaning a bedroom in order to do either of those you have to organize you have to organize your thoughts to organize your space. We have to organize the materials. You have to organize the Clutter you have to organize stuff. So if you’re writing a paper you have to organize the paper organizer thoughts and do a good outline to a good plan, which these kids do not like to plan their Take me to start riding in vomit all their words out and then that it goes all over the place and it’s very disorganized. Right and if you look at cleaning a bedroom that you have to organize space you have to be able to think categorically in systematized and think about where the places are four things. So what I’m going to do is I’m in these three videos. I’m going to look at 3 things that you can do either as a student to get more organized in life in general or as a parent to help these students who are not organized again. This has to do with the brain the brain is still developing the brain will continue to develop with executive functioning to kids about 25 years old. So there’s a lot of growth in the brain that still going to happen and the more you can help these kids to have habit that really support this the better executive function will develop So today I’m specifically going to talk about the first tip to help people who are challenged by organization in the first thing you want to do is declutter. You want to get rid of clutter? You want to minimize you want to get down to the essentials. He want to get rid of everything. You don’t need there’s some different domains you want to do this. You want to go through all your stuff all the closet under the bed all the old books. All the old toys all the old things that you don’t need any more. You want to get rid of so long time ago. I met this guy named Lou and he was a multi multi-millionaire. He lives in this big mansion in Indiana and Every once in a while you’d have people over and is this place is huge. There were four wings to the house. And one of the things that Lou said to me is he said that the more stuff you have the more stuff you maintain because he had a lot of stuff actually had somebody we was living on the grounds just to maintain the lawn. He literally lived at the house just to maintain the exterior. So this is the more stuff you have the more you have to maintain now for these kids the more stuff. They have the more they have to maintain the more shoes. They have the more shoes that the track the more stock the more they have to track them or clothing the more bucks. The more toys the more stop whatever their hobby is the happiest snowboarding and skiing the more stuff that has to do with that the more they have to maintain there’s so much stuff stuff stuff. Your first step is to declutter and I will put a downloadable declutter. Checklist on the blog post for you. So you can download that print it and use it to help you declutter in a systematic way so that it’s not overwhelming but when you don’t declutter your coloring and there’s so much stuff that it creates not only clutter in the physical space, but it also creates clutter in the mind. So these kids were not great at systematizing. They have a lot of it when they have a lot of clutter. They’re even more overwhelmed mentally it takes up mental space when there’s a lot of physical stuff that’s unnecessary. And so you want to recycle it give it to Goodwill sell it throw it away, whatever you need to do declutter. So that’s the first step. Now as you declutter your mind begins to be able to clear as your space to give the clear your mind against the clear but it’s not just a sin stuff. It’s also on the computer. So I also want you to declutter your computer. That means getting rid of emails unsubscribing from email list deleting any and all photos that you don’t need. So many people have thousands of photos 17 photos of the same thing like get rid of the Clutter that stuff now teach kids to do this early so that they’re not coming up their minds and their space in their computers with all of this before. Company email list that I was working with a student the other day. We were going through his head about seven thousand emails. We’re going through the emails unsubscribing from all these lists because we would look up he was he’s in snowboarding and we would look up a particular company that he had described to there be a hundred emails from them and he didn’t never opened any of them. So we deleted him an unsubscribe. So you really want you to be thinking those three things one de-cluttering space physical stuff to decluttering the computer very important to get in that happened with the technological world. We live in 3 declaring your mind. And when you do these things that will help declutter your mind, but also when you resolved internal issues and conflicts and things like that that also helps to declutter the mind so you like what I’m doing go ahead and share this video with somebody had really appreciate that and I will get on to the next video, but for now go to the block if you want and you can I’m download that free worksheet checklist to help you declutter. They’re just make it very clear. So have an awesome day. Take care.

Backpack overhaul 101: Your new best friend (Video)

Today I’m going to teach you exactly how and why I teach students to do a regular “backpack overhaul” and why it’s a critical tool for student success. Trust me, this is one of the best game-changers.

How long the overhaul takes:

1 hour the first time you do an overhaul. 15 minutes once a week after that.

Age:

I teach ALL of my students to do this, elementary through grad school.

About my students:

The students I work with are notoriously outside-the-box thinkers who struggle with organization, overwhelm, remembering details, homework, studying, time management, planning, prioritizing, focusing on one thing at a time, and thinking things through. They need outside-the-box solutions, not cookie cutter fluff. The overhaul is key since they aren’t natural “maintainers.” I always say that my students are “overhaulers”, not “maintainers”. They tend to do occasional overhauls, but aren’t the type who naturally maintain systems on a regular basis. In other words, they tend to be pretty disorganized. They’re the classic start-a-million-projects-but-finish-none type of people. Once in a while they overhaul something (their bedroom, hobby area, papers, etc.), rearrange it, go through everything carefully, and make it awesome. A couple days later it may be mayhem again for another year. As far as backpacks are concerned, these students tend to have a knack for losing very important papers deep in the abyss of the backpack. The backpacks fill with papers, electronics, trash, books, clutter, etc.. Papers get compressed into bizarre shapes as the ink fades from weeks of friction in the backpack. Sometimes the backpack appears organized, sometimes it looks like a volcanic explosion. Either way, when it comes to having an effective system for managing the minutiae, their system isn’t cutting it.

How to do the backpack overhaul:

  1. I start by telling them we are going to do a backpack overhaul, that we will go through every single thing, even gum wrappers, and get the backpack fully reorganized. I ask if this sounds like a good idea because they have to take ownership and have buy-in or it’s not going to do much good. Once I have buy-in, we move on. Do not underestimate the importance of honoring this discussion and getting the buy-in, even if it takes a half hour to talk! It usually takes me a couple of minutes.
  2. I always ask if there is anything personal that they don’t want me to see, and I let them get rid of it before we start. You must honor their privacy, so make sure to create that sense of safety and respect.
  3. We find a big area, a huge table or an open floor space.
  4. We grab a recycle can, a trash can, a box labeled “archive”.
  5. Now we pull every single thing out of every pocket on the backpack. Consequently, I like the simple 2 pocket backpacks, not the 100 pocket backpacks that things get lost in the most. Either way, empty it out, shake the remaining debris outside if necessary.
  6. Next, we literally go through every single thing in the backpack and start making piles. Trash goes in the trash can, paper in the recycling, we start a math pile, an LA pile, a science pile, a pile of supplies, etc.. They often need a lot of help with figuring out how to categorize their piles.
  7. I ask a lot of questions that are designed to make them think about their organizational choices. This is how I help them develop “metacognition”, or how I help them become more mindful, aware and conscious of their choices. I ask things like, “why are you keeping that? Do you really need it? Why? Why are you getting rid of that? Are you sure it can’t be turned in? Where is the best place for that? Why? Do you have a “home for that? Where? Should we write your name on this? Would it help if this had a label?”
  8. Sometimes I go through the piles once again to see if there is a special order they want the papers in, to see if everything has a name or to see if there is anything that is must be turned in. All papers that must be turned in are flagged with a post-it or are put in the queue (see post).
  9. Finally, we put everything back in the backpack very intentionally. Usually the load is considerably lighter, literally and figuratively.

Why weekly overhauls?

Now that the initial massive overhaul is complete, I do a quick overhaul with clients every week for several weeks. As they get better at managing things, we can back off to every 2 or 3 weeks. I keep this up on a fairly regular basis for the rest of the school year because even when these kids say that everything is in place, inevitably, we end up finding things that were misplaced. They say things like, “oh yeah, I forgot about that. I was wondering where that was.” It never fails. These kids aren’t usually being dishonest or lazy, they just tend to have an unrealistic perception about things. Don’t worry, as the brain matures, and as they go through a reflective process like this over and over, it slowly gets more realistic. Keep at it, the brain will respond and you will see changes! Note: Help your students do the overhaul, don’t do it for them or they won’t gain the skill. Finally: If this is helping you, please help me by sharing my site with someone today. You can share on social media or just email my site to a friend. Thanks for your support, Seth

How to begin spring semester the right way

Here’s a 7 minute video where I share how I help prep students for the spring semester. Of course many students won’t want to do this. After all, it’s not exactly fun. But the amount of energy and frustration it will save makes it well worth it. Not to mention, it will help you have a much more successful semester, ultimately giving you more free time to do what you want.

Here are the main keys:

1. Bring everything home; books, folders, papers, everything from the desk or locker, etc.. (if you didn’t bring everything home, get it on your first day back and do this process.) 2. Purge papers. Recycle everything you possibly can (old assignments, busywork, etc.). Archive everything you might need and everything sentimental. 3. Freshen up folders and notebooks. Reevaluate your systems. 4. Update your calendar for the entire rest of the school year. 5. Get everything back into the backpack and you’re ready to go. Realistically, this process takes 30-60 minutes, but it’s well worth it. If you’re ready to hit the ground running, you’re less likely to end up swimming upstream all semester. Good luck, Seth

One solid tip for organizing papers & homework

Here’s a video that just might have some great insights for you. It’s about one of my favorite systems I help students develop. I call it “the queue.” It’s a simple, powerful method of tracking everything important, homework or otherwise, in one centralized place. As one of my students said, “it feels harder in my head when my important papers are all spread out in different folders.”  Most of my students are able to apply this easily and consistently, it works!

How to set it up:

1. First, set up your entire organizational system. This may include 3-ring binders (typically the worst system for right brained learners, but some work with it just fine), an accordion folder or a simple folder system (my favorite approach.) Color code and label everything, etc.. 2. Get a different looking folder. Perhaps it’s red, a great ALERT color. Perhaps it has a distinctive design. Either way, make it easy to visually identify. 3. Label the folder. Write QUEUE in huge letters across the front. Put your name on the front and back. 4. Put post-it “flags” inside the folder so they are ready to go.

How to use it:

1. The queue is for all papers that are current, or “active.” It can include: —Homework that needs to be done —Finished homework that needs to be turned in —Study guides —ANything that needs to be signed, etc.. —Anything important, active and current 2. Flag it with a labeled post-it. ex- “MATH TURN IN!” 3. Simple. Do it or turn it in. 4. When you get home every day, the first thing you should do is, at least, open your planner and open the queue. It would be best if you planned the night as well.

When done:

1. Throw away returned papers if you don’t need them. 2. Archive papers that are sentimental or that you might need. 3. If you still need it for another reason, throw it in your class folder.

Note:

As with ANY system someone suggests, tailor it to your needs. If it doesn’t feel right, don’t do it! If you want to tweak it, by all means do so. The point is that students take ownership in developing customized systems that work for their brain, NOT that they use a “tested” cookie cutter solution (especially for outside-the-box learners).

8 Quick & easy ideas to start school off right

Make no mistake, the patterns that are set in the first 4-6 weeks of school set the tone for the entire school year. If students hit a wall 6 weeks in, and red flags start popping up, chances are they’ll be afflicted with S.U.S.S. for the rest of the year (Swimming Up Stream Syndrome. Not fun). Therefore, it’s critical to hit the ground running and be prepared on day 1.

Here’s how:

(Take what you like and leave the rest) 1. Print 4 copies of the school’s YEARLONG calendar. Tape 1 in the planner, post one in your study space, one in the desk or locker at school and one on the fridge or other convenient reference spot. Refer to it often. 2. Enter ALL relevant info for the entire school year into your planner BEFORE day 1. This includes job hours, extra curriculars, birthdays, etc.. Box out every single day off with a highlighter. (If you are a college student, print ALL syllabi BEFORE day 1 and enter every single relevant detail into your planner. All tests, projects, assignments, etc.. BEFORE day 1.) 3. Print 3 copies of your SCHEDULE. Put one in your planer, post one where you do homework, and 1 in your desk or locker. 4. Clearly label EVERYTHING possible with your name- on a sticker or with a sharpie. 5. Get a MONTHLY planner. Not weekly. Create a simple shorthand coding system and use it. 6. COLOR CODE folders and composition notebooks, 1 color per class. 7. Make a CATCHALL folder to centralize important stuff, homework to do and homework to turn in. 8. Create a SACRED STUDY SPACE. Just as it sounds, this is a space that you have intentionally designed to be the ultimate space to focus and be productive. The more focused your study time is, the more free time you have.  Good luck. And feel free to leave a comment below with any great ideas you might have. It gives all of us ideas we can adapt to our situations!