These Learning Links provide ten quick-and-easy, five-minute mini-lessons to promote student thought and dialogue about service and civic engagement. You may use as many of them as you wish, and in whatever order best meets your needs and the interest of your students. The purpose of these mini-lessons is to provide a deeper understanding of philanthropy (the giving of time, talent, and treasure for the common good) and to reinforce the lesson focus. These Learning Links also promote the development of character traits, civic engagement, and student leadership. As appropriate to your grade level, it is recommended that students play an active leadership role in presenting these mini-lessons to their classmates.

1. Read: Many consider Mother Teresa, a Roman Catholic nun who stood less than five feet tall, to be a giant!  She founded the Missionaries of Charity and won the Noble Peace Prize in 1979 for her humanitarian work. For over forty years, she ministered to the needs of the poor, sick, orphaned, and dying people of India. As the Missionaries of Charity grew under Mother Teresa’s leadership, they expanded their ministry to other countries. By the 1970s she had become internationally known as a humanitarian and advocate for the poor and helpless. She always said it was the small things that we do for each other that make the greatest difference. “We cannot do great things. We can only do small things with great love.” She said of her work, “What we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But if that drop was not in the ocean, I think the ocean would be less because of that missing drop.”
   
   Discuss: As we consider our role in our service event, how might it be seen that what we intend to do is just a drop in the ocean? How might our world be less if we do nothing? How can we encourage our peers to understand that every little bit helps and every little bit does make a difference?
   
    
2. Read: There are some teenagers who think they are better than most other people are. According to teenage public opinion polls however, most teenagers really think that other people are better than they are. Of course, we all know people who are really good at using a particular skill. When we compare ourselves to them, we realize that they can use their skill so much better than we can. But think about this for a minute: Is an author more important than someone who reads a book to a child. Is a professional sports figure more important than someone who volunteers to coach a little league team? Is a researcher working in a lab more important than the person who holds a dying soldier? Is someone who gets all A’s in school more important than one who struggles to get average grades because they have an after-school job to help support their family? Perhaps the answer lies in the middle somewhere. There really are no “important” people and then “the rest of us.” We are all important! We all have a contribution to make in helping the world become a better place for everyone. One of the excuses people often use for not getting involved in volunteer work is they do not feel that they have anything to offer. They think that others are so much richer, so much more talented, and so much more popular.
   
   Discuss: How might we help convince those, who use these “excuses” for not getting involved in our service event, that they do have something to offer? How do we convince everyone that his or her contributions are important?
   
    
3. Read: Recently Brett Lorenzo Favre, more commonly known as Brett Favre broke the all time passing record in NFL history previously held by Dan Marino. “It feels great, but I never considered myself as good a quarterback as Dan Marino,” Brett admitted to reporters. But all of his recognition and prowess on the football did not come without its challenges. Behind his “toughness” and strong willed perseverance, Brett experienced life with its adversities. Soon after Brett’s wife Deanna was diagnosed with breast cancer Brett’s father died. Ten months later his brother-in-law, Casey Tynes, was killed in an all-terrain vehicle accident on Brett’s Mississippi property. Favre's family suffered yet another setback when Hurricane Katrina blew through Mississippi, destroying his family's home there as well as extensively damaging his property in Mississippi. A team spokesperson said of Brett, “At 38 years of age and all the stuff Brett went and is going through, most players would have hung up the helmet and said enough is enough, but not Brett. He’s not a one-day man; he’s in it for the long haul.”
   
   Discuss: When the NFL thinks about perseverance, Brett Favre comes to the top of the list. In the game recap following Brett’s breaking of the all time passing record, a sports commentator said of Brett, “He set the record because he was always there.” Our service project is a one-day event. How can we make the most of it? Brett had all sorts of reasons to quit, but he didn’t. What “reasons to quit” do you think we’ll face during our event? How might we overcome them?  Why is it important for us to commit to our event and be there for the “long haul”?
   
    
4. Read: Did you know that a golf ball has between 330 to 500 dimples depending on which company makes the ball? All together, the dimples help the ball travel further and higher. Did you know that there are 108 double stitches on a baseball? They are sewn by hand, using 88 inches of waxed red thread. The first and last stitches are completely hidden. All together, these stitches help pitchers and those who throw the ball from the field to grip the ball better and control the flight of the ball. Did you know that a football has eight stitches that stick out along one side? All together, these eight stitches help quarterbacks and other players grip the ball when throwing a pass or running with the ball. Many things need to work together in a certain way if those who use sporting equipment are going to be successful.
   
   Discuss: How is the importance of stitches and dimples to sporting equipment like the importance of our working together on our service project? What do you think would happen if there were only 100 dimples on a golf ball, or 10 double stitches on a baseball or only two stitches on a football? What could happen during our planned event if only a few students participate? How can we share with others that their being involved in our service project is very important?
   
    
5. Read: T.S. Eliot wrote, “For us there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.” Scholars of T.S. Eliot’s work interpret this writing to mean that while we may be unconvinced that our actions will have any positive effect much less a long range one, does not give us license to do nothing. We should avoid assessing our actions in terms of immediate or short term outcomes. To do so only invites frustration, burnout, and the hallow feeling that we may have not made a difference. While the immediate results of any action and how others might respond to it is important, it is more often the long term results that should be the judge of the things we try to do to make difference.
   
   Discuss: What relevance might T.S. Eliot’s quote have for us as we consider our service project(s)? Is taking the “long look” an easy thing to do when one is trying to make a difference? A recent TV product commercial encouraged viewers to “Just Do It”. The intended message was to encourage users of this particular product to take an active role in life; to do more than just think about it, worry about it, or wonder if what they do will always have a positive results. In what way is T.S. Eliot’s quote and the “Just Do It” commercial alike? Different? How might we be able to talk to our peers and remind them that doing nothing is not the answer either?
   
    
6. Read: Many businesses and organizations boast that they are willing to “go the extra mile” when it comes to the services they offer. But just what does that mean? For them to make this statement they are saying that they will make more of an effort to do more than is expected of them to meet the needs of their consumers. The phrase to “go the extra mile” has been traced to very early religious teachings by spiritual leaders who encouraged their followers to be and do more than was expected.
   
   Roger Staubach puts an added spin to this saying. Mr. Staubach is a former quarterback and Heisman Trophy Winner from Navy. He later joined the Dallas Cowboys of the National Football League (NFL) where he led the club to four Super Bowl games. Mr. Staubach was named the MVP (Most Valuable Player) of Super Bowl VI and six times in his 10-year NFL career he was named to the Pro Bowl, which is the All-Star game of the NFL.  He is credited with saying "There are no traffic jams along the extra mile."
   
   Discuss: Why do you think that this phrase originated in religious teachings? What do you think Mr. Staubach is trying to tell us when he said, "There are no traffic jams along the extra mile"? How can our involvement in our service event be considered “going the extra mile”? How can we help be sure that there will be a “traffic jam along the extra mile” during our event?
   
    
7. Read: We hear a lot about multi-tasking lately. It is a term taken from the world of computers. It means the ability to do a variety of things at the same time. While multi-tasking seems to work fine for computers, when it comes to humans it often does not work as well. Headlines in newspapers read:  a driver caused a fatal accident while driving her car and reading through her mail. A man drove into a restaurant window while using his electric razor to shave. We hear on the radio that multi-tasking promotes stress in the work place. Owners and employees are living the nightmare of running faster and faster to stay in the same place. People are feeling undervalued, feeling unable to say “no” to any demand, but not working productively on anything. As one frustrated parent explains it, “The rat race continues, too much to do and too little time.” So what is the answer? Stress can be caused by any number of situations and circumstances. Behavioral Psychologists all agree that the answer lies in our ability to focus our attention on one task at a time. We can accomplish “multiple tasks” if we focus on one task at a time and give it our full attention. Not an easy thing to do in a world that rewards those who are good at multi-tasking and looks suspiciously at those who cannot or choose not to do so.
   
   Discuss: As we approach our service event, there are almost a limitless number of task we could do. Why is it important to focus our full attention on one task at a time? How can doing so help us avoid burn-out; avoid becoming so overwhelmed that we give up? Most arcade and handheld video games require focus in order to successfully play the game. How can we use this same “focus” to help make our event a success?
   www.cbsnews.com/stories/
   2005/08/17/health/webmd/main783814.shtml
   
    
8. Read: Just over 50 years ago, it was believed by everyone that it was impossible for anyone to run a 4-minute mile. Even doctors in those days felt that running at that speed would result in the runner’s death. While many, many runners tried to do so they failed. But on May 6, 1954, Roger Bannister ran a mile in 3-minutes and 59.4 seconds! He did what was considered, the impossible. But not really, just six weeks later John Landy, an Australian, ran a mile in 3 minutes and 58 seconds and by the end of 1957 sixteen more runners had run the mile in under 4- minutes! Today there are many runners who run the mile under 4-minutes. John Walker has done it, not once, but more that a hundred times! Hicham El Guerrouj from Morocco presently holds the record for the mile as he ran it in Rome, Italy in 1999 in 3 minutes and 43.13 seconds.
   
   Discuss: What do you think would motivate someone to go beyond what others think is possible and do the seemingly impossible? Why is it important that we listen to ourselves when others say that something is impossible? Something can’t be done? Something won’t make a difference? How might we react if someone were to tell us that our efforts during this project probably are impossible? That they probably won’t make a difference?
   
    
9. Read: If wishes were horses, then beggars would ride.
   
   This Rebus Rhyme and so many like it were originally designed to help children  learn how to read using rhymes. In addition, most Rebus Rhymes contain a  moral or a truth to help guide ones life.
   
   Discuss: What do you think is the moral or truth of this rhyme? Assuming that ‘wishing’ could make things happen would there be any reason for us to plan and  participate in our service event?  Since wishing doesn’t necessarily make it so,  how will our service event be the next best thing to help people in need?
   
    
10. Read:  If you were one of the employees of a company who received this message would you know what it means? “Att: Can we G.T.D., STAT? R.S.V.P, A.S.A.P. THX? ” The message asks if we can get things done in a hurry, requests a response as soon as possible and then thanks us. We use abbreviations to shorten our writing or conversation. They work well for those who know them, but their use can be frustrating for someone who does not. Most of these abbreviations are probably familiar to us, but if you’re like me G.T.D. had me stumped. G.T.D. is the common abbreviation for Getting Things Done. It is an action management method described in the book by the same title written by David Allen. G.T.D. operates on the principle that a person needs to move tasks out of thinking by recording them somewhere. That way, the mind is freed from the job of remembering everything that needs to be done, and can concentrate on actually performing one task at a time. Desk Top Planners and To-Do List Check-offs are two of the more common methods used to accomplishing this. A strong advocate for not procrastinating, Mr. Allen was among the first to propose the two-minute rule: If it will take less than two minutes to do something, just do it right away. Mr. Allen would strongly advise any student with a lot of homework to stack all of his/her homework assignments into one neat pile, pull the top project off the pile and deal only with that piece of homework until it is completed or completed to the point that it can be at that time. Then move on to the next piece of homework dealing with it in the same fashion. There are no messy desktops using the G.T.D. method.
    
    Discuss: As we plan for our service event, how can we organize it in such as way as to G.T.D.? Why is it important that everyone clearly understand the plan and his or her role in it? Sometimes there is so much to do that we procrastinate, because either we don’t know where to start, or we tend to get overwhelmed. How will concentrating and doing one thing at a time help us accomplish our plan? How can we make use of the “two minute” rule? Why is it important to remember to THX all those who participate?