Week 4: Shaking Hands, Resources, Allegiance, & Personal Letters

Source: NPR
Credit: Elissa Nadworny

Today we introduced a new tool we'll be using for the rest of the year.  We're going to be creating our own "Adulting Handbooks." 

Your Adulting Handbook is the place for all of your notes on what we're learning in class.  It should include the definitions for new words, diagrams of how to do the different things we discuss, quotes, as well as anything else you think should be in your personal Adulting Handbook.  Feel free to decorate or personalize the cover of your handbook.

The inspiration for our Adulting Handbooks came from an NPR article and the blog published by the teacher highlighted in the article.  It is called an interactive notebook.

We started class off by practicing how to shake hands and introduce ourselves properly.

Then we spent some time learning about what our personal resources are how we can use them to unleash our capacity to do good.  We shared a couple of different ways of looking at what our resources are and how growing even one small part of our personal resources can have a much greater impact on our capacity to do good.

We used the math equation:   Character + Competence = Capacity

We learned that we prosper when we become excellent stewards over our personal resources.  We also learned that the synergistic use of our resources can be used for great good or for great evil.  That's why it's so important to have our personal allegiance in the right place.

Our discussion of Allegiance included the four basic types of allegiance and some examples from The Prince by Machiavelli and from the life of Mao Tse Tung.  The four types are:

1. Self
2. Others
3. Evil, Dark, Bad
4. Good, God, Right 

We ended class with a lesson on how to address envelopes and the format of an informal letter.

HOMEWORK:

• Finish writing and then send your personal letter.
• Finish numbering the pages in your Adulting Handbook 
• Think of three adults, who are not related to you, and ask them if you can use them as a reference on your job/school applications.
• If you haven't already done so, update your personal calendar/planner with any activities, appointments or other items that you are participating in.  Also enter any major assignment due dates, test dates, book due dates, etc.  (Hint:  You may need to look at Mom's master family calendar to get some of the info you need.)
• Start reading Modern Manners