One cold afternoon in Northwest Montana, six students met in a quiet library during lunch. They talked in hushed tones about the possibilities of their new website. It would change the world! It had blinding possibilities, (for the people who could read.) It would stop global warming in its tracks. They took a bite of Danielle's homemade cookies, and continued their conversation. "These cookies are really good!"
"Um...guys...we need to do a website."
"But these cookies are REALLY good!"
Eventually, however, the team turned their focus from the now gone cookies and to the website they were creating. After a while, the sun came shining through the frosty windows. "Oh, wow! Look, the sun is shining."
"Um...guys...we need to do a website."
"But can't we go outside?!"
After long minutes of arguing over what their priorities were, the team got back on track and continued to work on their ThinkQuest site. They all agreed that after 45 minutes of hard work, they would take a 10 minute break outside. From then on, any time they met, they would take (frequent) breaks as a reward for all of their hard work in between.
Three months later, their hard work paid off as they added the final touches to their website on world population. They overcame their desire to stay off task by working hard and rewarding themselves. From then on, they could carry those skills throughout the rest of their school day and their every day life.