MINDSAGE DURABLE SKILLS
Designed by industry professionals, refined by educators.
LESSONS LIBRARY
The MindSage durable skills training program originated as an intern training program. Our approach is specifically designed to move students out of the ‘classroom mindset’ and into the mindset of high-performing professionals to achieve the fastest transformation possible.
To attain this objective, the Core Professional Skills (CPS) durable skills training is split into four levels, each level includes a mixture of the following durable skills lesson types:
Type 1: Lessons that focus on developing what we call the foundational durable skills: self-awareness, self-appreciation, and self-acceptance – the bedrock for developing all other durable skills.
Type 2: Lessons that assist in shifting participants away from the "classroom" mindset and reliance on constant supervision and instructions to a workplace mindset that encourages confident expression, critical thinking, ideation, and fosters collaboration.
Type 3: Specific durable skills lessons are designed to yield swift, readily applicable durable skills that will immediately benefit employers. These skills nurture proactive, self-reliant, out-of-the-box thinkers, ready to contribute effectively in the workforce.
Each level is covered over eight weeks and focuses on one durable skill per week. The lesson covered are listed below.
CPS L1: Core Professional Skills Level 1
Effective Communication
Week 1: Students learn the MindSage States of Communication to identify emotions in conversations and respond positively. They emphasize listening to both spoken and unspoken cues. The lesson helps students understand how communication can influence, persuade, and assist in understanding motives when collaborating or negotiating.
Self-Esteem 2
Week 6: Students learn to limit the negative effects of comparisons for self-growth. Extract helpful aspects, and leverage them for motivation and growth. Develop self-respect through self-awareness. Embrace personal development; future employers value individual contributions.
Breaking Chains/Limiting Beliefs
Week 8: This lesson helps students identify limiting beliefs shaped by past events that may no longer be valid. Adjust student mindset to view mistakes as learning opportunities. Identify and move beyond limiting beliefs. Embrace diverse learning paces, prioritize progress, growth in intellect, and ability.
Self-Esteem 1
Week 5: Students gauge self-esteem baseline, noting influences. Embrace uniqueness for self-appreciation. Learn to value efforts and set realistic self-expectations.
Achieve/Success Loop
Week 4: Guided by Harvard's Clayton Christensen's research, this lesson shapes personal success definitions. Shift focus from short-term grades to broader life achievements. Identify diverse progress indicators beyond grades. Avoid defining self solely by grades; emphasize growth. A long-term success view improves academics and reduces stress.
Influencer Types 1
Week 2: This lesson empowers students for workplace impact. They recognize self and external influences. Identifying role models and media's power is highlighted. Aware of shaping forces, students choose influences intentionally.
Influencer Types 2
Week 3: Lesson two raises students' awareness of workplace impact. It highlights expressing thoughts for decision-making influence. Different influencer types are introduced. Using metacognition, students identify and choose roles consciously. Promoting equity, diversity, and inclusion is highlighted. The lesson emphasizes influence's power, including both positive and negative peer pressure.
Emotional Intelligence
Week 7: This lesson emphasizes life's interpersonal nature and the value of emotional intelligence (EI). EI involves recognizing personal and others' emotions, enhancing daily interactions at school or work. Students grasp the drawbacks of emotion-driven choices. Empathy's role in teamwork and leadership is highlighted. Non-verbal cues and group EI's impact are explored.
CPS L2: Core Professional Skills Level 2
Natural Born Learner
Week 1: Students recall inherent curiosity and learning desire and how a shift occurred after entering school. Embrace a positive learning attitude valued in both work and life. Rediscover curiosity for constant motivation. Introduced to self-directed learning via outside-class insights. Innate learning disposition reiterated.
Growth Mindset
Week 4: Building on prior foundational lessons, this lesson reinforces the concept that challenges are opportunities for growth. Students recognize their innate learning ability, as demonstrated in infancy. They're encouraged to work diligently, learn from errors, manage self-talk, and practice patience in skill acquisition. Methods for fostering a growth mindset are discussed.
The Value of Self-Motivation
Week 5: This lesson explores the vital role of self-motivation in education and careers. It emphasizes moving beyond external factors like grades for true drive. Self-motivation involves pursuing goals aligned with personal values and interests. It covers intrinsic and extrinsic motivation, tackling overcommitment, and overcoming obstacles. It stresses self-awareness, self-acceptance, and self-appreciation as fundamental for fostering self-motivation.
Self-Directed Learning
Week 7: This lesson emphasizes self-directed learning's value: planning, continuity, and assessment. Students grasp employer appreciation for adaptable learners. The lesson explains how exploring extracurricular learning motivators and linking them to innovation and problem-solving skills will better prepare them for the workplace.
True Innovation
Week 3: In this lesson, students explore innovation's essence. Students distinguish iteration from true innovation. Emphasis on imaginative thinking and future-oriented planning for empowered innovation The value of innovative thinking in the workplace is emphasized.
Grit and Determination
Week 2: Students recognize the significance of overcoming life's obstacles and setbacks. They learn about the core elements of Grit, including adaptability, determination, curiosity, and accountability, which are crucial for personal growth. By reflecting on their past and present experiences, students analyze their approach to challenges, identifying areas for enhancement in these key components.
Effective Time Management
Week 6: This lesson assists students in recognizing barriers to effective time management, offering tactics to conquer these obstacles and promoting self-analysis to enhance organization and productivity.
Accountability for Success
Week 8: Despite hesitations, young people must embrace responsibility as they'll be held accountable for their decisions and actions in the future. This lesson guides students in understanding the crucial aspects of becoming someone who welcomes the challenge of taking on responsibility, both professionally and personally.
CPS L3: Core Professional Skills Level 3
Mastering the Game of Life 2
Week 3: In Lesson 2, students delve deeper into applying Chess principles to real life. They learn to embrace the concept of making even a 'bad' choice rather than none, leveraging historical outcomes for decision-making insights, gleaning wisdom from their own decision-making history, mastering their psychological approach, and avoiding decisions based on unfounded assumptions or emotions. These Chess-inspired approaches lay a robust foundation for honing critical thinking and effective decision-making skills, invaluable for success in both the workplace and life.
Foresight and Planning
Week 1: This lesson helps students identify limiting beliefs shaped by past events that may no longer be valid. Adjust student mindset to view mistakes as learning opportunities. Identify and move beyond limiting beliefs. Embrace diverse learning paces, prioritize progress, growth in intellect, and ability.
Mastering the Game of Life 1
Week 2: These two lessons explore how traits of Chess Masters enhance life mastery success. Concepts like strategic decision-making, goal-oriented choices, learning from examples, minimizing risks, and valuable connections are applied to life and work.
Habits of the Mind
Week 5: Students delve into the development of thought patterns during their teen years. They gain insights into recognizing entrenched reactions formed in adolescence, allowing them to adapt as their brains mature into adulthood. By exploring the roles of the Prefrontal Cortex (PFC) and Amygdala, and employing a behavior map, students acquire skills for making improved decisions now and in the future, both professionally and personally.
Building and Maintaining Relationships
Week 4: This lesson emphasizes the importance of building and maintaining relationships for future success in the workplace and life. In addition to key aides in building relationships, the lesson reminds students to build their own self-awareness, self-acceptance, and self-appreciation in order to develop meaningful connections and mutually beneficial relationships. Students are also made aware of the importance of cornerstone attributes of trust and respect to create strong connections.
Be Proactive, Take the Initiative
Week 6: Students uncover obstacles to taking initiative. Emphasizing self-confidence as the catalyst, they learn to surmount hindrances. Proactivity enriches value to employers, spurs personal success, and empowers future control.
Follow Through (Mirco Lesson)
Week 8: This lesson highlights the importance of delivering on promises. Students learn to build a dependable workplace reputation by following through on commitments. They grasp essential steps before and after making commitments to ensure successful delivery. Recognizing the value of fulfilling assignments, tasks, and promises becomes a crucial resilience skill.
Self-Discipline and Self Control
Week 7: This lesson helps students figure out if they possess and are using self-discipline and self-control in their lives. It highlights the difference between the two and how having both can help them accomplish more and reach their goals more easily - in the workplace and life. Lastly, it students how finding happiness and satisfaction often means giving up some small short-term wants to get those big long-term goals.
Additional Durable Skills Lessons
Effective Resume Writing
This lesson guides students through the fundamental steps of crafting a resume. It offers examples and templates to assist in creating a suitable resume tailored to the individual's skills and experience level.
Yet Method
Lesson two raises students' awareness of workplace impact. It highlights expressing thoughts for decision-making influence. Different influencer types are introduced. Using metacognition, students identify and choose roles consciously. Promoting equity, diversity, and inclusion is taught. The lesson emphasizes influence's power, including peer pressure.
Leveling up or Freezing Yourself and Others (micro-lesson)
Employers value employees who make those around them better. This lesson helps students understand that the classroom mindset of focusing only on your progress or grades, is not what need in the workplace. Rather, in the workplace, it’s actually to a person’s advantage to help others level-up. This lesson underscores the importance of aiding others in developing a growth mindset, rather than adhering to a fixed mindset about your abilities or those of others.
Appreciation Leads To Success
This lesson helps students understand how being appreciative encourages a positive mindset in the workplace and in life. It also highlights how complaining can hamper your ability to achieve success in school, the workplace, or life.
Collaboration Is Key (Mirco Lesson)
Supplemental: Students learn the significance of enhancing ideas and suggestions from others, as well as providing feedback that advances group goals and solutions. Recognizing and valuing both others' and one's own strengths are highlighted as essential aspects of effective collaboration.
Collaboration Is Key (Mirco Lesson)
Supplemental: Students learn the significance of enhancing ideas and suggestions from others, as well as providing feedback that advances group goals and solutions. Recognizing and valuing both others' and one's own strengths are highlighted as essential aspects of effective collaboration.