In a previous post, I shared about the power of keystone habits. The ideas are based on the book The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do In Life and Business. So what are keystone habits? They are habits that seem to have a spill over effect. The changing of a keystone habit leads to changes in a person's other habits too. For instance, getting enough sleep might be a keystone habit. It could also result in improving other habits like better communication, more productivity, or avoiding late night snacking. The initial goal was just to get better sleep, but it can lead to improvements in other areas too. One critically important keystone habit is willpower. In fact, it has been shown in research to be the most powerful habit of all.
In a 2005 study, for instance, researchers from the University of Pennsylvania analyzed 164 eighth grade students, measuring their IQs and other factors, including how much willpower the students demonstrated, as measured by tests of their self-discipline.
Students who exerted high levels of willpower were more likely to earn higher grades in their classes and gain admission into more selective schools. They had fewer absences and spent less time watching television and more hours on homework.
"Highly self-disciplined adolescents outperformed their more impulsive peers on every academic-performance variable," the researchers wrote.
"Self-discipline predicted predicted academic performance more robustly than did IQ. Self-discipline also predicted which students would improve their grades over the school year, whereas IQ did not... Self-discipline has a bigger effect on academic performance than does intellectual talent."
Sounds a lot like grit and growth mindset to me. These have been very important topics in the education community. We see this every day. Kids with willpower habits do better. But I wonder how much success schools are having with teaching these skills? And should we be doing more?
Starbucks has an intensive training program to help employees develop the willpower to handle the moments they believe will make or break the company. It must be working because we all know how prolific Starbucks has become. They focus their training on what employees will do when they hit rough patches. Each employee develops a plan for how they will deal with an angry customer, for instance. And there are opportunities for role playing. They want to develop automatic response loops that employees can rely on when faced with a problem. So if the Starbucks employees encounter a certain situation, they automatically use the strategies they've learned and practiced. I wonder what that would look like in the classroom? Sometimes, I think we simply tell students to work harder or to persevere, but we aren't giving them tools they need to learn these skills. We aren't teaching the behavior we want to see. Sure, we may reinforce qualities like grit and willpower when we see them, and that's a good technique, but could we be doing more to explicitly train students how to have willpower? Based on the studies of willpower as a keystone habit, it seems like it should be one of our most important priorities. Most of your students who are struggling in your class have probably always struggled in school. That becomes a pattern of frustration and failure. Part of that might be attributable to a lack of willpower. How can we disrupt that pattern? That's something to think about. I'm curious what curriculum or programs readers have been using to teach grit and willpower? For instance, I've heard some good things about Leader in Me, but I've also heard it's expensive. I would like to find a more systematic way to teach these habits in our school. Leave me a comment below or respond on Facebook or Twitter.
In 1993, famed college basketball coach Jim Valvano gave an inspiring and hopeful message at the ESPY awards. Valvano was fighting terminal cancer that would soon cut short his remarkable life. I occasionally watch the speech over again. It reminds me of what's most important. During his passionate speech, Valvano helped put everything in perspective:
"If you laugh, you think, and you cry, that's a full day. That's a heck of a day. And if you do that seven days a week, you're going to have something special."
I invite you to take a few seconds to listen to Jimmy V speak these words in the video below.
So how can this apply to what we do as educators? Well, I think a great day at school includes the same things. We should laugh, we should certainly think, and we should also cry. I'm guessing that crying is harder for most of us to think about. We tend to think of some emotions as good or bad. We tend to hide those emotions that are sad or might be considered weak. But emotions are an important way for us to connect. It's how we better understand ourselves and others. Emotions help us to reach the heart and not just the mind. We know that stories are powerful for learning. I think that's because of how stories connect to emotions. You can talk about ideas all day, and I might be interested and even learn something. But if you connect those ideas with a story, and you touch my emotions, I may never forget what I've learned. I remember one day years ago I was teaching freshmen English. It was one of those days when for whatever reason, I had a class period that was ahead of the others, and I needed to fill some time. I decided to read a short story, The Scarlet Ibis, to the class. It was the first time I'd ever read the story myself, so I didn't know exactly what to expect. But as I read, I was drawn into the story in a powerful way. No doubt the class could sense my quivering voice, my efforts to fight back tears, and my unsettled body language. As they saw how the story was connecting with my heart, they too were drawn in. You could've heard a pin drop. The story is about two brothers. The younger brother is born with health problems, and he was never able to keep up with his athletic older brother. At times, the older brother is cruel and ashamed of his handicapped sibling. At one point, he even thinks of smothering the little brother with a pillow. But he also demonstrates his love for him. He nicknames the younger brother Doodle and decides to teach him the things he will need to be ready for school, how to run, swim, climb trees, and fight. You know, the important stuff. But the Saturday before school starts, the older brother pushes Doodle to physical exhaustion while rowing a boat. And then a storm blows in suddenly. The older brother runs ahead angry with Doodle for not keeping up so they can get out of the rain. But when the older brother's anger calms, he notices Doodle is missing. He goes looking for him and finds him curled up under a bush with his head on his knees. He is bleeding from his mouth. He is dead. It's a tragic ending. I remember talking with the class about how the two boys reminded me of my own sons. Both of my boys are perfectly healthy. But there was something about the way the brothers interacted that reminded me of my own sons. I also remember talking to them about empathy and cruelty. How most of us have it in us to be cruel. How we can fail to understand what someone else is going through. How selfish we can be. I know without a doubt, even many years later, during that class period, there was laughter, there was thinking, and there were definitely tears. I think every student in the class felt something special that day. So what does a perfect day in the classroom look like? 100% mastery of the objective for the day? For me, I think a great day is when students are learning the objective, and the learning is also connecting with the heart. I'm not sure who said it, but I believe it's true, "Information without emotion is rarely retained." The lessons that stay with us the longest connect to our emotions. Are you teaching with heart? Let me know what you think. Leave a comment below or respond on Twitter or Facebook.
A teacher at one of our elementary schools shared this recently. She was talking about how she encourages her students to persist in the face of difficulties. Instead of saying something that makes a wrong answer seem like a curse or worse, she encourages the process. She says to students with curiosity and wonder, "Oh, that's my favorite mistake!" Students are then able to view problem-solving as something that is not just about getting a right answer. It's about having thinking that perseveres. It's about staying with the problem longer. Thomas Edison failed over and again in trying to invent the incandescent light bulb. He documented 1,000 failed attempts before he was successful. When a reported asked him how it felt to fail 1,000 times, he replied, "I didn't fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps." Our district has adopted new math curriculum, and it's challenging. But kids are rising to the occasion. And a big reason it's successful is the focus on the process and the greatness of teachers to promote perseverance and model growth-mindset thinking. Here are five questions to ask your students to help them reflect on their own mindset. The questions might need some unpacking for younger students. But I think all kids can think about these ideas. 1. When I start to feel like quitting, what will I do in that moment to persevere? This might be the most powerful question on the list. When people decide exactly how they will respond to a difficulty in advance, they are far more likely to push through in the face of the challenge. 2. What are my thoughts telling me about how successful I might be at learning this skill? If these thoughts are limiting to me, how might I think differently? Lots of kids are thinking thoughts that are self-limiting. "I'm not good at math" for instance. It's helpful to think of phrases that are filled with belief and resourcefulness to replace the negative thinking. Teachers can help students find the words for this. 3. What am I saying or doing to myself that is holding me back? There are many things that can undermine a growth mindset. Excuses, justifications, worries, perfectionist thinking, thought patterns, past failures, etc. It's important to recognize what unhelpful beliefs students need to overcome. 4. What would I want my teacher to say to me when he/she sees me taking a risk, trying hard, or pushing through mistakes to pursue this goal? This question is helping to shift the perspective to expecting success. When I try hard, good things happen. My teacher will say this to me, and that feels good. 5. Imagine how you will feel when you accomplish something that is really challenging. Describe that feeling. Again, this one is beginning with the end in mind. Getting a picture of success is so important. Humans are the only creatures on the planet with imagination. We can experience the whole range of emotions through our minds. Visualization is extremely valuable. It teaches the brain to expect success. When gymnast Mary Lou Retton won her first gold medal, a reporter asked her, "How does it feel to win gold?" She replied, "Just like it's always felt." "But this is your first gold medal?" said the puzzled reporter. "Yes, I know. But I've experienced this moment thousands of times in my mind," she explained. The power of belief cannot be understated. What do you think about these questions? Do you have suggestions for other questions that might be helpful for students? Leave a comment below or respond on Facebook or Twitter.
