Hotshots: A little bit of Hard work…

more by Jason Gardner | Youth

Title: A little bit of Hard work…

Preparation:

This works better with a Flipchart or a huge piece of paper.

Write four attributes in a row across the top leaving a margin on the left hand side: Gifted/ Hard Work/ Beautiful/ Lucky.

In a column down the left hand side write: Professional footballer, Bank Manager, Supermodel, Nurse, Pop star, politician.

Activity

Keep your flipchart covered for now. Ask the young people for a show of hands to see what they’d like to be when they leave education. Work your way through the career list above eg ‘How many people would like to be a professional footballer?’

After you’ve run through all six. say ‘Now we’re going to find out what you think it takes to achieve these jobs.’

Reveal the chart and again work your way through the list eg. ‘What does it take to be a pro footballer?’ ‘Who thinks gifted?’ if you get a loud enough response tick it on the sheet – ‘who thinks hard work?’ etc. Mark an x if little or negative response.

Work your way through all the options then make comments , eg making it as a professional footballer might take a mix of being ‘gifted’, ‘hard working’, and ‘lucky’ – getting spotted at the right time, but, as Rooney proves, being ‘beautiful’ doesn’t really matter. They might think becoming a supermodel might involve just being beautiful and lucky – Kate Moss became a model after being spotted by the founder of mega modelling agency storm in an airport in New York when she was a teenager. But does it also take hard work to stick at being a ‘supermodel?’ – sticking to all those nasty diets?

N.B some might shout you need to be ‘clever’ but explain that some say clever is about being gifted some say it’s about hard work – so you ‘ve got it covered.

Talk

What will it take for you to become what you want to be? Luck? You might think as soon as you walk out of the school you’ll win the lottery. The odds though are 14 million to one. You may think you might get spotted to join a premier football league but that’s a longshot – so is winning X factor. So how about being ‘beautiful’? Again the chances of you becoming a model might be slim unless you get lucky. So what about being ‘gifted’? Everybody’s gifted in some way; it might mean you’re naturally clever, you’re a great musician, a great sportsperson but anyone who’s made it as a Bank Manager or a Pro footballer would say that it also took hard work. The thing is you can’t rely on being gifted, being beautiful or being lucky to get you anywhere. You can rely on hard work though. Now it’s just the truth that even if you work at being a footballer or musician chances are you may not make it to the premiership or the pop charts, but getting an education gives you a chance to find other areas you may be talented in as well. Hard work will always get you somewhere.

In school you’ve got a chance to work at discovering what all your giftings are then working hard to make sure you make the most of them. Don’t waste that opportunity.

Further Illustrations:

Christian Perspective:

Proverbs 6.6-11 harsh but fair advice against laziness.

Quote:

Gary Sinise – actor from CSI New York on hard work:

‘Careers, like rockets, don’t always take off on schedule. The key is to keep working the engines.’

Film Clip:

Goal! 3mins 0 seconds to 5.16

Mexican migrant worker Santiago dreams of making it as a footballer…

Use as introduction to assembly – what will it take for Santiago to make it?