Life Skills & Leadership: Unit 3, Session 4: Setting Priorities, Managing Time | Page 53 of 68“Each group has an empty cup and three other cups that are filled with rocks, sand, and water. With
the other members of your group, I’d like you to figure out how to get the largest amount of rocks,
sand, and water into the empty cup without spilling anything.”- Give participants a few minutes to solve the puzzle. Watch for interesting things people do that you
can later point out as analogies for how we think about and use time. When teams are finished,
give each about two minutes to show how much of each item they were able to put into their
empty cup and to describe how they did it.
If it doesn’t come up in the participants’ description of their experiment, point out that the way to
use the greatest amount of all ingredients is to start with rocks, fill in with sand, and slowly pour in
water. Then lead a discussion with these questions:What if you wanted to fill the empty container with all these ingredients but your team had
started with water. What would have happened when you wanted to add sand and rocks?
(Possible answers: The container was already full. The water would have spilled out. You would
not have been able to add much sand or many rocks.)Suppose the empty container that you started with represented all the hours of the day from
when you wake to when you go to sleep. What might the rocks, sand, and water represent?
(Possible answers: The things I need to do during the day. All my daily responsibilities. The
schoolwork and chores I need to do. The friends, family, and people I want to spend time with.)Suppose the rocks represented the big, important, or long-range things you wanted to do, like
saving money, getting a good education, or preparing for a better job. The sand might stand for
the things you have to do every day, like chores at home, schoolwork, or taking care of younger
brothers and sisters. Then the water might stand for the things you want and like to do, like
meeting up with friends, playing sports, or going out dancing. What would this experiment then
tell us about how to use our time? (Possible answers: We need to start with the big important
things. We can often do more in the same amount of time than we first thought. If we don’t
take time to do the most important things first, we won’t have time for them at all later on.)D. Summary
Summarize by saying:
“If you fill your day with water – all the things you want and like to do – you won’t have room or
time to do the things that you have to do or any of the long-range things for your future. Similarly, if
you do the things you have to do, you’ll have some time left to fill in with things you want and like
but you won’t make any progress doing things for your long-range future. But, if you begin with
some of the big things, your long-range future, you can still do most of what you have to do, as well
as some of the things you want and like.
“It’s common to feel overwhelmed, with our time filled up just doing what has to be done. We don’t
always have enough time to do things we really want and like. It’s also easy to put off doing the
things that help us reach our long-range desires when we are so busy with other daily