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Writing checklist lines you can tick honestly — one action, a verb, a visible end, in order — and choosing read-do or do-confirm.
Paper packet. Every task here also exists on screen, where it is checked automatically; answers written on paper are not assessed by Nydus. When you are back at a device, enter your answers there.
You will test checklist lines for one action, a verb and a visible end, rewrite the ones that fail, and put a list in the order it is done.
In lesson 1, a checklist was the aid for a task made of steps: the laundry, leaving the house, closing up at night. In lesson 2 you wrote an entry for a reader who was not there. A checklist is written for the same reader — you, in the middle of the task, perhaps tired or interrupted.
This is optional practice alongside any care you receive; nothing in it measures memory.
| Term | What it means |
|---|---|
| Checkable line | A step you could look at the world and see is done. |
| End state | What is true once the step is done: the door is locked. |
| Read-do | Read a line, do it, tick it; for new or rare tasks. |
| Do-confirm | Do the task, then check the list; for familiar tasks. |
| Tick as you go | Mark each line when it is done, not at the end. |
A checklist is a short list of steps, kept where the task happens, with a place to mark each step done. It can be a card taped inside a cupboard door, a laminated sheet with a dry-erase pen, a page in a notebook, or a list in any notes app that lets you tick items.
What makes it work is not the paper or the phone. It is that every line can be ticked honestly: you can look at the world and see whether that step is done.
A line such as get organized cannot be ticked, because nothing in the world tells you when it is done. A checkable line passes four tests.
1. One action. Unplug the iron and close the windows is two steps; if you do one and are interrupted, the tick is a lie. Split it.
2. It starts with a verb. Keys is a noun. Put keys in the left coat pocket is a step.
3. It has an end you could point to. Tidy the kitchen has no end. Wipe the counter does: the counter is wiped.
4. It is in the order you do it. A list in the order you thought of it sends you back and forth.
Then tick as you go, not at the end. The tick is what lets you stop, be interrupted and pick up again at the right line.
Another way: steps
For each line ask: Is it one action? Does it start with a verb? Could I point to it being done? Is it in the right place in the order? Fix the line until all four answers are yes.
Another way: story
Marcus's list for Sunday said sort out the car. It stayed unticked for three weeks. He rewrote it as Check the tire pressure at the gas station, Top up the washer fluid, Throw out the trash in the door pockets. All three were done that Sunday: each line told him what to do and when he had done it.
In The Checklist Manifesto (2009), the surgeon Atul Gawande describes two ways of using a checklist, and they suit different tasks.
Read-do: read a line, do it, tick it, read the next. This is for a task that is new, rare, or easy to get wrong — setting up a new coffee maker, closing a vacation cabin for the winter. It is also the errorless way to learn a routine: following the list means the first run-throughs are done right, so the right sequence is the one practiced.
Do-confirm: do the task from memory, then read down the list to check nothing was missed. This suits a task you know well — the morning routine, leaving the house — where reading every line would be slow.
Gawande also suggests keeping a checklist short, roughly five to nine lines, and leaving out steps that are never missed. A list of thirty lines is skimmed, and skimming is how steps get missed.
In 2007 and 2008 the World Health Organization tested a 19-item Surgical Safety Checklist in eight hospitals in eight cities around the world, from Seattle to New Delhi. Haynes and colleagues reported in the New England Journal of Medicine (2009) that after the checklist was introduced, the death rate after surgery fell from 1.5% to 0.8%, and major complications from 11.0% to 7.0%.
The checklist did not teach surgeons anything new. Its items were things every team already knew — confirm the patient's name, count the sponges — and its job was to make sure a known step was not skipped on a busy day. That is exactly the job of a checklist at home. The study is about operating rooms, and it says nothing about how much a home checklist helps any one person; it shows why the idea is taken seriously.
A checklist waits to be looked at, so keep it where the task happens: the laundry list on the washer, the leaving-the-house list on the inside of the front door, the closing-up list by the light switch. A list in a drawer is a list for a different task — finding the list.
A fictional family is leaving for a week. The first draft of their list reads: Sort the kitchen. Security. Plants and mail. None of it can be ticked.
Apply the four tests. Sort the kitchen becomes Empty the trash can and Take the milk out of the fridge: two actions, two lines. Security has no verb; it becomes Lock the back door and Set the porch light timer. Plants and mail is two things; it becomes Water the plants and Ask Dee to collect the mail — and the US Postal Service's free Hold Mail service, which holds mail for 3 to 30 days, turns the second into Request a mail hold online.
Put the lines in the order the family walks through the house — kitchen, back door, plants, porch — and the three-line draft has become a seven-line list. It is used read-do, because they do this once a year. It goes on the inside of the front door, the last place they stand before they leave.
A longer list is a safer list. Past about nine lines, people skim. Leave out steps that are never missed.
Ticking at the end is fine. If you are interrupted halfway, a list ticked at the end shows nothing. Tick each line as it is done.
Once I know the routine, the list is pointless. Switch to do-confirm instead of throwing it away: the check at the end still catches the step a busy morning drops.
Read the draft line.
Draft: Get ready for the trip
No verb names an action, and it has no end.
Split it into single actions.
Pack the charger · Print the bus ticket · Fill the water bottle
One action per line, so each tick is honest.
Check each line has an end state.
Charger in the bag · ticket printed · bottle full
You could point to each one being done.
Put the lines in the order done.
Printing first; packing last, when everything is ready.
Read the crowded line.
Lights, stove, back door and keys
Four things and no verbs.
Give each thing its own verb.
Turn off the lights · Check the stove knobs are at OFF · Lock the back door · Put keys in the coat pocket
A verb says what to do; each line is one action.
Order them along the path out.
stove → back door → lights → keys
The kitchen first, the front door last.
Choose how it is used and where.
Do-confirm, taped at eye level inside the front door
A daily task: do it, then read down the list before leaving.
Split the vague line.
Clean up → Scrape the plates · Load the dishwasher · Wipe the table
One action per line.
Check each line has an end state.
plates scraped · dishwasher loaded · table wiped
Each can be seen to be done.
Put them in order and choose the use.
Which line on a leaving-the-house checklist can be ticked honestly?
A morning list is being rewritten. The first two lines are done; finish the last two.
| Draft line | Checkable line |
|---|---|
| Breakfast | Eat a bowl of oatmeal |
| Teeth | Brush teeth for two minutes |
| Weather stuff | |
| Bag |
Put the laundry checklist in the order the steps are done.
Number the steps in order (write the number in the box):
For each checklist line, write checkable, or the fault: no verb, two actions, or no clear end.
| Line | Verdict |
|---|---|
| Recycling | |
| Set the oven timer for 20 minutes | |
| Feed the dog and walk him | |
| Straighten up the hall | |
| Put the bin at the curb |
A fictional bedtime list has three crowded lines: *Unplug the heater and close the windows*; *Lock the front door, lock the back door, turn off the porch light*; *Set the alarm*. Rewritten one action per line, how many lines does it have?
The rewritten list has a lines.
The League of American Bicyclists teaches the ABC Quick Check before a ride. Give each part the checkable line that goes with it.
| Part of the check | Checkable line |
|---|---|
| A (air) | |
| B (brakes) | |
| C (chain and cranks) | |
| Quick (quick releases) | |
| Check (test ride) |
Lesson test: one question per skill, one attempt each, no hints. Your answers are checked when you submit.
A fictional list for a trip to the pool, jumbled. Write each line's position, 1 to 5, in the order it is done.
| Line | Position |
|---|---|
| Lock the front door | |
| Put the swimsuit in the bag | |
| Put the bag in the car | |
| Put the towel in the bag | |
| Take the pool pass from the hook |
Pick one routine you do most days and write its checklist in five to nine checkable lines. Decide whether it is read-do or do-confirm, and where it will live. Next: reminders that say what to do. This course is optional practice alongside any care you receive. It is not treatment and does not measure your memory. If anything about your memory or thinking is new or changing, tell your own clinicians. You can stop at any point: close the page and the lesson opens again where you were.
13. Your turn: clearing up after dinner, step 3
Scrape → load → wipe; do-confirm, on the fridge
A daily task, checked at the end.