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How do we make sense of adversity? We all face daunting intellectual, physical, emotional, interpersonal and spiritual challenges. Many of us rail against the pain associated with the challenge. We lament that it is too difficult, too overwhelming, too upsetting to handle. We interpret related experiences through this lens as we continue to spiral downward into a funk or downright depression. Yet, from adversity comes learning. As educators, we can use struggles with adversity to open up the potential for understanding and compassion in our classrooms and our community.
Over the past eighteen months, I have had my fair share of adversity in health-related challenges. On March 27, 2010 I had an acute stroke. While my family and friends showered me with love and support, I knew that it was up to me alone to chart my own course for recovery. I held fast to my unwavering belief that I could recover and tried to enlist help from the medical community. Throughout it all, my husband and children witnessed my struggles, anticipated what I needed, consoled me in my disappointments, and celebrated my victories.
Initially, I viewed my stroke as both unpredictable and patently unfair. Yet, it focused me in a useful way ultimately. It slowed down my thinking, my travel schedule, my multi-tasking to the point where I could actually start showing up in the present. I became more receptive to sharing what I was going through, listened more intently to others, and had a greater appreciation for the challenges people faced. I have learned first hand that adversity brings people together; once I started sharing my story, many others followed suit. I actually told a close friend that I was grateful that this life-changing event had happened to me.
And then tragedy struck again. Three weeks ago, my ten-year old son was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes. After he was stabilized and moved to the ICU, we learned about his condition (his pancreas no longer produces insulin), what the “new normal” will be (checking his blood glucose levels, taking a minimum of three shots per day, making food selections based on carbohydrates), and how we will pull through this together as a family. He looked deep into my eyes and smiled.
“Don’t worry, mom. I got this.” He squeezed my hand. “I had a good teacher.”
As the tears streamed down my face, I thought about his wisdom in that moment. By walking shoulder-to-shoulder with me through my adversity, he had significantly honed his own bravery, compassion, and kindness. Since then, he has been the most courageous kid I know (okay, I am just a little biased) — he is proactive in adding up carbs, taking his blood glucose level, and communicating when he doesn’t “feel right.”
His teachers, principal and nurse have also been phenomenal. From the get well cards, to assigning him a weekly buddy to take him to the nurse’s office to a Q and A session about what diabetes is and giving students the opportunity to share about their family members who have this condition — the entire class grew and continues to grow through my son’s adversity.
Often times, however, the adversity we face is not so public. Many struggles are closely guarded and we are left to make sense of them on our own. What my story should remind us as educators is that helping kids (and colleagues) tell their story is a crucial part of learning and growth. And sometimes to get them to tell their painful story we sometimes need to tell ours, to develop empathy and resilience.
To that end, here are a few suggestions that will take the struggles that people face and bring them out into the open so we can grieve, learn, and understand together.
IDEA #1: What if every student had to walk in another person’s shoes — in the classroom, school, community — to see what his or her life is like and to better understand how he or she wants to be treated by other people? This can be done as a whole class or small group interview with young students via a guest speaker (in class or Skype). In older students, it is important to have them identify the type of adversity, seek out an interview subject, create questions to focus the conversation, and use the questions to guide the conversation. After the conversation is done, students could write a summary from the point of view of the interviewee and/or could write a reflection of how they felt and what they learned from the experience.
IDEA #2: What if every student had frequent opportunities to self-reflect about ongoing and/or unpredictable struggles that he or she was facing, thus empowering the student to take a small action to improve the situation? This could be directly connected to a particular subject where he or she faces an academic challenge or to frame a special period (homeroom period or guidance counselor, social worker, or school psychologist plan) for a personal challenge. If the challenge is private in nature, the educator can teach the class about “naming the adversity” and what constitutes a small action that is under their control. The student then is responsible to document the adversity, one or several action steps to take, and time to implement the step(s). Then, the student can evaluate how the action step(s) went and make adjustments accordingly. This not only focuses the students on a meaningful goal that can impact their lives, but also teaches them to develop action plans — identify the problem, identify the goal, create a plan, monitor and evaluate the results, make adjustments.
IDEA #3. There are countless stories about how people overcame difficulty or failure to produce some of the most powerful, beautiful, and innovative ideas, products, and performances of our time. Here are just a few recognizable individuals who can be directly connected to a range of disciplines.
Albert Einstein
J.K. Rowling
Mahatma Ghandi
Michaelangelo
Isaac Asimov
Steve Jobs
Booker T. Washington
Walt Disney
Michael Jordan
“Colonel” Sanders of Kentucky Fried Chicken
Stephen King
Ludwig von Beethoven
Vincent Van Gogh
Bill Gates
What if every student had to do a research project on the significant failure(s) that one of the greats had experienced and how he or she overcame that adversity? This can be directly connected to the development of research, critical thinking, and communication skills. A student also can use a teacher-generated list (perhaps targeted to a specific discipline) or a student-inspired list (so that they can read with empathy because that student is struggling with the same challenge). This time the communication should be public (as opposed to IDEA #2). Students may also be comfortable sharing with the class (or small group or perhaps just a staff member) about how this gave them inspiration, hope, or another way to think through their own adversity.
Everyone learns from pain — it may harden our outer shells, it may open us up to new opportunities, it may make us more compassionate, it may send us spiraling down to a dark place, it may do all of the above… —but there is so much power in knowing that you are not alone, that it can get better, and that even the smallest steps toward the larger goal should be celebrated. This is not tangential to our aims as educators, it is at the heart of our mission: to make our students (and ourselves) more decent human beings and responsive citizens.
How do you teach adversity and resilience to students in a meaningful way? Would love to hear your thoughts and ideas.
For more information and ideas, check out my latest book: Breaking Free from Myths about Teaching and Learning (2010)
This past week, I traveled to the Upper Grand School Board in Ontario to provide feedback and guidance on the development of their curricular units. One of the most powerful moments happened on the fifth day with the Vocational Technology Education teachers. Now, I want to give a disclaimer right up front — I met my husband, a Culinary Arts teacher, at my high school, and I am a passionate advocate for teachers who not only keep students from dropping out of school, but also teaching them much of the core content areas through application in their particular domains.
The goal was to write essential questions to focus critical thinking, problem solving and deliberate practice in their specialized classrooms. As we were developing these questions, we discussed what teaching and learning looked like in their environments. The auto repair instructor nonchalantly stated, “My curriculum is really shaped by the vehicles we service. I teach based on the problems we have to solve. You never know what you are looking at until you put the vehicle on the lift.”
I was stunned by the magnitude of what he was saying and the casual way that he said it. “So, based on the problems you see in your shop, you design the lessons so that a novice can see the tools and techniques for a repair and a more sophisticated mechanic can do the work with feedback and guidance from you?”
“That’s right. But don’t all teachers do that?”
He looked around at his colleagues… the Culinary instructors, the Carpentry instructors, etc.… and they shrugged their shoulders to indicate that it was a “no-brainer.” Of course they design backwards from authentic and immediate applications of the soft and hard skills that govern their vocations. This is what normal looked like in their teaching world.
• Give an unpredictable problem or complex task.
• Assess the situation to design the best course of action.
• Work as individuals or as a team to implement.
• Get feedback from peers and instructors to ensure high degree of quality control.
• Evaluate results.
• Do it again.
The simplicity and sophistication of this learning structure is profound. An authentic inquiry, problem or challenge inspires intrinsic motivation in the students so they can withstand the deliberate practice, the setbacks, and the ability to grow from feedback.
How might this translate into all content areas? Consider the following prompts.
• What do experts do in the discipline? What tasks, problems, challenges and questions do they solve? (This will focus on the short-term and long-term transferability in the discipline.)
• Given such tasks, problems, challenges, and/or questions, can you preview them at the beginning of the unit or course? Can you revisit them throughout to provide focus for the student? (This will provide a reason to acquire the knowledge and skill.)
• Can you build in consistent moments for feedback? (This will create a collaborative learning environment as students should work together with their peers as well as the teacher to complete the task.)
• Can you review the results when the task is completed? (This will evaluate individual or group performance so that students can set challenging, yet worthy goals for the next time.)
Here are examples of the essential questions the teachers came up with that day. Many of these questions are applicable in a range of content areas.
• How precise do I need to be based on the product (and the specs)?
• Which measurement tool (scale) is most appropriate for a given task? How do I use it properly to produce a quality product?
• How do I use what I already know to make sense of this current situation?
• How do you adapt techniques if the most appropriate equipment/ingredients/resources aren’t available?
• How do I increase efficiency without sacrificing quality?
• How do I choose the right material/tool for a task to keep the customer/client happy?
• What are the sounds/smells/sights/texture that I sense that indicate there is a problem?
• What professional language (terms, abbreviations, and symbols) is common in the work environment? How can I remember?
• What things do I do to show my professionalism? Where do I need to improve?
• How do I learn most effectively?
• Is this good enough? Is it done to a high standard? (different standards in each industry; getting it done right vs. meeting your own high expectations) Could it/How can it be made better?
• How do I know the customer /client/instructor is satisfied with both product and professionalism?
What essential questions can you liberate or tweak to make them applicable to your content area or your school? What tasks or problems inspire your students? Would love to hear your ideas.
For more information and ideas, check out my latest book: Breaking Free from Myths about Teaching and Learning (2010)
My son is a fifth grader now, dancing on the precipice between childhood (wanting to tell me every last detail about his day) and adolescence (where shrugging as he says, “nothing really happened”). He has seen over ten teachers or so in his career as a student, plenty of experience to develop his perspective about what makes a great teacher. That was the topic of our walk one afternoon, about two weeks after the start of school. As my son explained what he valued, there was such power and simplicity in his description. And what he said completely lined up with what we know about how people learn.
• “The teacher has to be kind.” Relationships are vital to the health and growth of the individual learner. When a student experiences significant stress such as being the subject of ridicule, being reprimanded, or being ignored, the brain moves into survival mode: fight (lashing out at a student or a staff member), flight (running away to the bathroom or the nurse’s office, skipping class), or freeze (putting his head down on his desk, zoning out in class). Once the student sees that a teacher is not habitually kind, it will permanently damage not only his relationship with that teacher, but his willingness to take risks in that classroom and his likelihood to succeed. There are a lot of areas we cannot control — influence of peers, media, family environment, poverty, budget shortfalls — but this one we can. Never underestimate the power of a kind word, a firm but respectful reprimand in the privacy of the hallway, an unwavering belief that with significant effort everyone can improve.
• “The teacher needs to be smart, she needs to know a lot of stuff.” Students want to believe that the teacher is the smartest person in the room, but at the same time they don’t want to be told all of the information. Ideally, there should be a robust blend between exploration (through the use of essential questions, rich problems, and complex tasks) and “just in time teaching” to ensure the students see the value of what they are learning and why they are asked to learn it.
• “It helps a lot if the teacher is funny.” Humor goes a long way. Whether it comes in the form of an entertaining anecdote, an amusing photo or comic, or role play in the classroom. Not only does it add joy and lightness to the experience, but humor has another impact — it makes the brain much more likely to retain information. When students experience an emotionally charged event, dopamine is released from the Amygdala which strongly benefits memory. John Medina, author of Brain Rules, describes the effect of emotionally-charged events, “Getting the brain to put a chemical Post-It note on a given piece of information means that information is going to be more robustly processed.” Other powerful emotions that you can incorporate in the design of instructional hooks: fear, disbelief, astonishment, and happiness.
• “The teacher tells lots of stories to help you remember and help keep you interested.” Narratives are another form of an instructional hook that are very powerful in conjunction with the information you want students to remember. It may reveal our humanity, our flaws, our struggles, our perseverance to continue to communicate that we are all a work in progress. As many “door handles” you can create so that the students can retrieve what it is that you want them to remember, the better. The key with all hooks (both this bullet and the one above) is that they must be directly connected to the content material. Judy Willis advises, “Memories that are associated with emotional or personal meaning are most likely to become relational memories and be stored.”
• “It is important that the teacher shows what is expected.” Modeling what quality work looks like is absolutely imperative. Teachers can do this through identifying or creating several strong examples paired with an accompanying scoring tool. Not only do students need to see the connection between the strong examples and how they are scored, but they also benefit from studying weaker examples and discussing potential strategies for improvement. By examining outside examples first, students can depersonalize the process when it comes to analyzing their own work and offer meaningful suggestions to their peers.
• “The teacher gives you space to try again and again. I worry when I have only one time to get it right.” The stress of taking a test, writing an essay, or completing a project has a negative affect for many students. From the way they prepare (cramming it in the night before with very little sleep) to how they perform (rushing through without deliberation on the question, the problem, or the task), to how they review their performance (focusing on the score rather than the comments), it is a recipe for disaster. Everyone learns from mistakes, but when a mistake is made with no opportunity for correction, it has a counterproductive effect on the learner. First, provide timely and actionable feedback for the student. Second, offer a clear revision policy on summative assessments where every student can take advantage of using the feedback given. Third, encourage reflection through conferencing, self-evaluating on the scoring tool, and general feedback on how the test/essay/project went from the student’s perspective.
Imparting some basic knowledge about the brain and growth mindset can go a long way to improve both effort and achievement in your classroom. Judy Willis’ webinars, blog posts, and Ed Leadership articles are great resources for both you and your students. John Medina’s Brain Rules is a very accessible book that focuses on twelve rules that we need to know about how the brain works. Carol Dweck’s book entitled Mindset is another must read and certain passages can be excerpted for students.
I would love to hear your insight and ideas about how you teach students about the brain, the importance of relationships, and the role of failure as a natural part of learning.
For more information and ideas, check out my latest book: Breaking Free from Myths about Teaching and Learning (2010)
