2 simple rules for high grades and low stress

When it comes to succeeding in school, the “rules of the game” are simple:

If teens know how to manage and engage in their work, they’ll do well.

Learning these two rules is how I went from failing classes and thinking I wasn’t smart to an “A” student who earned over $100,000 in scholarship offers and awards.

In the years since, I’ve distilled these rules into a super simple and ridiculously effective daily routine:

Check - Plan - Do

I’ve taught this routine to 3,000+ students. Every single student who has learned and followed this routine experienced higher grades and less stress.

Here’s why:

• It gives students easy steps to follow.

Procrastination, trouble focusing, feeling overwhelmed - all symptoms of not being sure what to do or how to get started. Ambiguity, especially for struggling students, breeds anxiety - so thinking about school in vague terms of “homework” or “studying” is unhelpful.

Managing and engaging in schoolwork one step at a time gives clarity and certainty, both of which minimize procrastination, distractibility and ‘analysis paralysis.’

This really boils down to the fact that clarity = power. If your kids are clear on the specific steps they need to take to do something, they will be empowered to do so. If they are not clear on the specific steps they need to take, they are disempowered: “deprived of power, made weak or ineffectual.”

• It reinforces process > product.

Trying to get A’s or focusing on A’s isn’t a solution.

I’ve worked with tons of students who believe they have tried their best yet continue to get C’s and D’s. In fact, this is the point at which so many students give up - it doesn’t matter how hard they try, so why bother?

Here’s the thing: students equate “trying” with effort and energy - not strategy. And effort without good strategy doesn’t bring them closer to their goal; your teen can study for 2 hours and fail their test OR they can study for 25 minutes using strong learning strategies and ace it.

Similarly, focusing on the outcome doesn’t help us achieve the outcome. Focusing on the process required to achieve the outcome does. When that process is made up of easy-to-follow steps, even better 🙂 

• It gives quick wins.

Each completed step is a ‘quick win’ that helps teens feel accomplished. This helps with buy-in and motivation, while generating evidence that they can take control over their schoolwork and feel confident academically.

The more they practice these steps, the better they feel and the more evidence they accumulate to support the belief that they are capable when it comes to school. Small wins lead to big wins 🚀 

• It encourages systems thinking.

Since our education system is designed around subjects, teens approach school in terms of individual subjects instead of the universal skills that lead to success in all subjects (and life).

When students stop viewing subjects in isolation and implement a learning system that works for school as a whole - that applies to every assignment for every class they’ll ever have - they optimize their overall performance for the long term.

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If your teen doesn’t have a learning system, if they don’t know or understand the “rules of the game” for school, consider joining my Student Success Accelerator program that starts in a couple of weeks.

Details are below, hit “reply” with any questions or click here to sign up.

Happy Friday,

Kelsey