Another reason for the end of the day assessment is to create a bookend to the day with the planner.  We want them to start the day with the planner and a thought about study skills and their own personal motivations and to end the day with the planner and a recap of how it went.

Some schools have found the value in getting parent and teacher initials as a way to engage parents in the process of using the planner. With the inclusion of real planning tools including chores, parents have even more reason to encourage their children to use the planner both in school and out of school.

We have a beta test site that uses a “Student Planner Assessment Sheet” to help the teacher to assess the use of the planner and to give the student feedback on improvement.

Student Planner Assessment Sheet
Student Name: ___________________

Date: __________________

5—Monthly calendar, daily planning section, and overall quality of student planner is neatly and thoroughly completed.  Each day has the date properly and prominently labeled on the appropriate pages.  It is evident that the student is applying the student planner to academic life and is using it as a tool for time management in academic, extracurricular, and family activities.

3—Only parts of the monthly calendar and daily planning section are complete.  The overall quality and neatness of the planner indicates that the student is not taking care in managing and completing the required pages.  It is evident that the student is only somewhat applying the planner to everyday life and they are not fully using it as a tool for time management in academic, extracurricular, and family activities.

1—Few, if any, parts of the monthly calendar and daily planning section are complete.  The planner is sloppily maintained and is not being used as a tool for time management.  The student should seek further instruction from a parent or teacher on planner expectations.

Score: ___________

How about turning to the Study Skills Tips in your favorite student planner. About paragraph 3 or so you will see a sentence that goes something like this… “Be sure to block off time in your schedule for study time and breaks…” Hmm…now what schedule would that be in? Obviously not the one in your “PLANNER” because it doesn’t have one. And if it does have a partial day schedule, your 15 sq. inches of assignment space just went down to about 9 sq. inches.

Student’s lives start early and go late. The AgenDUH study skills student planner has a 15-hour schedule to mirror the schedule of real life students. They appreciate seeing their day laid out in front of them. How else are they going to learn about self management unless they can get a grip on the hours in the day.

Middle and High School students have 14 – 16 hour days.  They need to start learning now how to plan their day like an adult.  Just like we don’t turn them loose in college not knowing how to balance a check book, the same thing applies for planning.  And they don’t figure this out in a class.  It needs to become a discipline that is developed and refined over time.

The AgenDuh planner does exactly this.

Every year I get several free “planners” with some company’s logo on the cover. These are throw away planners because what person with a busy life can fit a plan in such a small amount of space? And here we give kids a student planner formatted like a freebie all polished up like it’s going to really make a difference.

Sorry…on my rant again. No! Kid’s need a full page planner just like you and me! Look at a Franklin-Covey planner or a Day Timer for grownups. We have kids with poor penmanship trying to use 15 square inches of space to keep up with 6+ classes and outside activities!

Now compare those 15 square inches to the AgenDuh’s 50 square inches of planning space! Questions?

More tomorrow…