A Lesson Plan from Life Planning Education: A Youth Development Program

NOTE:  Life Planning Education (LPE) is currently being revised. The printed/for-sale version includes an older version of this lesson plan. Please make sure you have looked at the PDF of Life Planning Education before purchasing - that is the version that is available to buy. 

Purpose: For participants to discover unique things about themselves – what they like and dislike, their qualities and future goals

Materials: Newsprint and markers for each participant; scissors, glue, pens and pencils; magazines from which teens can clip pictures

Time: 40 to 50 minutes

Planning Notes:

• Prepare a sample sheet of newsprint to use in Step Three as illustrated here:    
  

  This is Me!

  This is My Future!

  
  
• Be sure the magazines and catalogs reflect the diversity of the participants.  Ask the adolescents to bring in issues of their favorite magazines that they will be willing to contribute to be cut up for the project.  Ask your own friends and colleagues for magazines as well.  Be sure to include magazines that picture people of different ages, sexual orientations, and many racial/ethnic groups, as well as people displaying diverse interests and careers and an array of activities.
  

1. Say that Life Planning Education focuses on preparing for the future.  In this activity, the participants will spend some time thinking about themselves – their strengths, what they like and dislike, their favorite activities, and their goals for the future.
2. Ask the group to imagine that:
   A new movie will be filmed here. The movie is about an adolescent who is transported overnight into her/his adult future without any warning.  Producers are looking for adolescents as extras—people who are not actors but who will be paid to appear in one or more scenes in the movie.  The producers need to know something about the adolescents who apply for a job as an extra.  To decide whom to hire, they are asking for a “composite,” a picture or visual image of what makes each applicant special.  The producers also want to understand the future each adolescent visualizes for him/herself, so they can see how each one envisions adulthood.
3. Explain that each participants will create a composite visualization of him/herself and the future just as if applying to be an extra in the movie.
4. Go over how the activity will work:
• You will each receive a sheet of newsprint.  Fold it in half and write at the top of each half, This Is Me! and This Is My Future!  (Show the group your sample newsprint sheet.)
• Begin thinking about things that should appear in your composite picture.  It should present your positive qualities – your special skills, strengths, physical traits, activities, interests, and achievements – to help you get an interview.
• On the left side, use magazine pictures, personal drawings, words, phrases, poems, and/or lyrics of songs that you believe describe you.  On the right side, use magazine pictures, personal drawings, words, phrases, poems, and/or lyrics to create a picture of the future you want to have.  Include your dreams of education, career, awards, home, family, travel, and possessions.
• Be creative and have fun.  Remember that this is your big chance to show up in films!  So think big and be positive.
5. Be sure everyone knows where to find the magazines and art supplies and tell the group to begin working.
6. When 10 minutes remain in the session, ask participants to stop working and tape their composites on the board or wall with masking tape.  Ask everyone to walk around the room and look at the composites.
7. Ask everyone to sit down and conclude the activity using the discussion points below.

1. How easy or hard was it to find pictures that could represent you?  What would you have liked to include that you couldn’t find images of?  Did you create a poem or drawing to fill that need?
2. What did you learn about yourself as you did this?
3. When you looked at everyone's composites, what did you think?  Did you recognize anyone from his/her composite?  Did anyone else’s composite remind you of yourself?
4. Did you notice major differences between some composites and others?  If so, what differences did you notice?
5. How difficult is it to imagine your future?
6. Are your present and future composite pictures similar?  Why or why not?