#GTD Collect/Organize Dynamic

The primary question I bring to a parent/teacher conference

Calendar & looking forward habit

Legend:
ES = Elementary School
MS = Middle School
HS = High School

Using a calendar to cultivate a looking forward habit is a great game to play with your kids, especially in the early years.  It introduces them to the concept of time.  I think the key is to have a healthy dose of fun stuff to talk about to get them excited about coming to this magical tool we call a calendar.

"Hey, look here.  I see your birthday is one month away!"
"Wow, only 1 week until your birthday!"
"Your friend is coming over for a play date in 2 days."
"I see the school dance is next Friday."
"If you could plan a cool trip this summer (3 months away), what would it be?"

If you start in the early years, when you get the the later years you won't have to introduce "here is a calendar and here is how you use it."  It will be natural - hopefully mystical and magical, too.

Baseball, GTD, Playing with checklists

(Fixed technical problems with last post. Thank you Duece)

We live in the Northeast so our baseball season is just getting underway (we still have snow on the ground!). I don't know about you but spring is a very hectic time for our family. There are a ton of school events, spring sports and more.

One of the things that keeps me busy is coaching my son's baseball team. Our routine looks like this:
- I leave work
- I drive home
- I pick up my son
- We drive to practice... oops, what do you mean you can't find your socks? Your hat, too?... we are late
(that was last year)

This year I thought, "Hey, another good opportunty for a checklist! Also, a good time to create a 'target' area for all our baseball 'stuff.'" Helping kids create checklists and creating a named space for stuff has really worked for our family. This was a fun GTD moment that was light, playful and meaningful. We are off to a good start!