Lesson 1: Define Success Before It Defines You
Before the year supplies its own definition—rank, credits, approval—students decide what success will mean and what evidence will count.
Lesson 1: Define Success Before It Defines You
Ngā Whāinga Akoranga — Learning Intentions
WALT: I can define success as evidence I can influence, not a label someone gives me
WILF: I can name one result, two controllable actions, one contribution and one person I can approach before I am stuck.
Whakataukī | Traditional Wisdom
“Ehara taku toa i te toa takitahi, engari he toa takitini.”
My strength is not mine alone; it comes from the many.
Te Whakatakotoranga | Run of show
Tirohanga Whānui | What this lesson is doing
Senior-year launch lessons often mistake motivation for planning: students write an impressive destination, then leave with no way to tell whether this week moved them closer. This lesson separates results from actions, contributions and support. Students keep their goals private where needed; nobody is asked to disclose grades, health information or whānau circumstances.
You'll need
- Four signs labelled Result, Action, Contribution and Support; paper or a private digital document.
- A copy of the school's current pastoral and learning-support contacts for students to consult, not hand in.
Do Now — Who decided? 8 min
What it is: A quick audit of the definitions of success students have inherited.
Run it
- Write, sort, notice (8 min): Students finish three prompts privately: “A successful senior student…”, “My whānau or community would notice…”, and “A result that would look good but feel wrong is…”. In pairs, share only one answer they choose. Sort volunteered examples under result, action, contribution or support. Ask which column school usually makes most visible and which columns actually describe a week.
Act 1 — Four kinds of success 15 min
What it is: Students test whether a definition gives them something they can do, notice or ask for.
Run it
- Stress-test a definition (15 min): Give groups four statements: “earn a strong result”, “complete three planned study blocks”, “make one contribution the group needed”, and “ask for clarification before the deadline”. For each, mark what is controllable, what evidence would exist and what could still go wrong. Groups then repair “be successful this year” so it contains one item from each column. A result may stay, but it cannot stand alone.
Act 2 — Build the receipts 15 min
What it is: Converting aspiration into evidence a student could genuinely collect.
Run it
- Make success observable (15 min): Students choose one academic, hauora, cultural, creative, work or community goal. They write four possible receipts: a calendar record, a draft or revision, feedback acted on, and a contribution another person could name. They cross out any receipt that depends on displaying private information. Partners apply one test: “Could this exist even if the final result was disappointing?” If not, it is still only a result.
Act 3 — Support before crisis 15 min
What it is: Mapping who can help with which problem, and rehearsing the first sentence.
Run it
- Map problem to person (15 min): On a page students draw four boxes: I do not understand, I am behind, something outside school is affecting school, and I am worried about someone. For each, name a role—not necessarily a person—and a first sentence they could use. Examples: “Could you show me which part of the criteria I have missed?” and “I need help making a plan before this gets bigger.” Students may use the school's contact sheet and keep the finished map.
Synthesise — Your definition 8 min
What it is: A definition that can guide an ordinary week, not decorate a first-day page.
Run it
- Write and test (8 min): Students complete: “This year, success means ___; each week it will leave evidence such as ___; I will contribute by ___; and before I am stuck I can approach ___.” They underline the part within their control and circle the part involving other people. If nothing is circled, return to the whakataukī: the plan is still pretending success is solitary.
Exit ticket — Next Friday 4 min
What it is: One near-term commitment and its evidence.
Run it
- Name the receipt (4 min): “By next Friday I will ___, and the evidence will be ___.” Students keep or photograph the ticket. The teacher sets a date to revisit it; without the revisit, this becomes another goal-setting performance.
Ngā Huarahi Ako | Differentiation
Tautoko / Support
- Offer a completed four-column example and let students select receipts from a list before writing their own.
- Allow the support map to name roles only; no personal disclosure is required.
Toitoi / Extension
- Write two competing definitions of success for the same year—one individual and one collective—then identify what each would cause a student to notice or ignore.
Te reo Māori
- Kupu: angitu (success), taunakitanga (evidence), tautoko (support), mahi tahi (working together).
Mātauranga Māori | Strength is relational
The whakataukī interrupts a narrow senior-school story: that the independent student succeeds alone. It does not erase individual effort; it locates that effort inside relationships, teaching, whakapapa and collective contribution. Do not turn this into an instruction that Māori students must set goals for an iwi or speak for a community. The practical consequence is smaller and stronger: a credible success plan names the people it relies on and what it gives back.
Hononga Marautanga | Curriculum
Te Mātaiaho (2025) · Health and Physical Education · Phase 4 · statement id 48806Reframing, setting boundaries, and building supportive relationships can strengthen emotional wellbeing, and learning to use these tools takes time.
The lesson does not present support as a vague wellbeing value. Students specify the problem, the relevant role and the first sentence they can use; they also set privacy boundaries around what need not be shared. The statement says these tools take time, so the exit ticket is deliberately revisited rather than treated as mastered in one period.
Sources and checking
- Curriculum quotation: statement 48806 is pasted byte-faithfully from the canonical active curriculum corpus.
- Local contacts: the teacher supplies the school's current support roles. This page does not name services or response times that may differ by school.
- No outcome claim is made: students test whether their definition creates controllable actions and observable evidence; the lesson does not promise that a planning exercise causes academic success.