Investing in Learning

In The 100 hour asset from Seth Godin's Blog, Seth Godin shares,

“If you invest 100 hours in a rare skill, you’re likely to acquire it.”

I played an accordion since I was four years old and I still play it occasionally. I have invested over 100 hours in learning this musical instrument.

I have been writing since I was a young child and I really enjoy it. I would say that I have over 100 hours invested in it also.

In 2007, I started working with fiber. I began crocheting, then knitting, and then spinning yarn. I still love it and do it daily. I can’t imagine not doing this and I like creating new things.

I have tried several things that I didn’t invest the hours into it. Either I didn’t like it or it didn’t hold my interest. Obviously, I didn’t acquire the necessary skills to be good at it.

I have spent my entire life invested in learning. As a young child, I liked learning new things and getting better at some of the things. As I grew older, I became more specific in the things that I wanted to learn. Even now, I find things that I’m interested in learning how to do. Some things I want to continue to learn about and others may fall to the wayside.

I want to help my students learn that they need to invest the time into a skill if they want to get better at it.

If they want to get better with a musical instrument, they need to consistently practice at it.

If they want to be a better athlete, they need to put in the hours of training.

If they want to be a better reader, they need to read more.

If they want to be a better artist, they need to work hard on creating art.

If they want to get better at gaming, they need to put in the hours of practice.

In this age of instant gratification, most skills do not get perfected immediately and many people get disappointed in this. Usually with patience and hard work, the skill is perfected, but it takes time. Time may be days, months, or even years.

Students seem to think that everything comes easy for everyone else than themselves.

One way that I like to show this to students is to model my learning process. I like to take photos and reflect on my learning from the very beginning. I monitor my progress with more photos and more reflection either on a weekly or monthly basis. When I look back at my starting attempts, I can feel proud of my progress and see how much I have improved.

How do you help your students learn that they need to invest their time into learning? Please share.

Photo by Jonathan Chng on Unsplash

P is for Practice

Teaching takes a lot of practice.

When I first became a teacher, it didn’t feel natural. I had to work at what I wanted to do. I wanted to be the best teacher that ever was, but I had to work at it.

Just like athletes and musicians, no one starts out being great. It may take many years of practice with frustration included. Yet, if you keep trying and practicing, you can’t help but improve.

When I first started, I used to write notes as a kind of script to make sure that I said all the necessary things that are expected of all teachers. The more I taught, the less that I needed to use this type of script as a reminder. The more I practiced, the more natural these things became. It is like learning to ride a bicycle or driving a car. At first it feels awkward but all of the things you do are important steps so you don’t get hurt or hurt others. Teaching is a lot like this.

Many times I would get frustrated because lessons didn’t go as planned. I expected the students to do better than they did. The important step was reflecting about the lesson and looking at what went well, what didn’t do well, and what I would do differently. This also took a lot of time and effort but it was important.

My first year of teaching I kept a journal. This helped me the next year so I could look back at lessons and try to improve on them in this new year. This practice improved my other lessons. As years passed, I no longer needed to keep a journal but I was always reflecting on my lessons in order to improve them. Many of the strategies that I improved would apply to different lessons.

My first five years of teaching was pretty hard and frustrating, yet rewarding. It is important for new and struggling teachers to know that being an effective teacher takes practice. It is important not to give up and not to stop trying to improve.

Give Time to Practice

In Maybe We Could Just Get Better from Practical Theory, Chris Lehmann states,

“Perhaps we are a time where we can admit that our best practices are the ones that we actually get the time to practice.”

I think that is the biggest mistake we make in education whether we are the teachers or the learners. We want immediate gratification and we want to be the best or be known as the best immediately.

I know that when I learn something new, I compare my results to the sample. Of course it won’t be as good as the original because that person probably had more practice creating it than I do. When I learn a new knitting technique or spinning technique, I want it to be perfect as soon as I’m finished. I need to remind myself that it will take practice. I might have to practice many times until I get the results that satisfy me.

In the same respect, I need to help my students practice. I need them to practice their skills until they become adept at what they are learning. I saw this a lot in the summer course that I taught. Many of the teachers were practicing and applying the skills they learned in all of their previous courses. This was a time for them to practice their skills but they all expected to earn an A and have a perfect score after 16 days. When they didn’t earn a perfect score, they got upset. I’m not sure how to help them learn that they probably won’t have a perfect score at the end of the course. Even though I give them a rubric to follow, many don’t read the rubrics or meet the course requirements outside of the classroom observation which results in a lower score. Then they want to argue that their teaching was exceptional so they should receive an A. Getting a B is nothing to be ashamed of and means they are still Above Average.

I would really like for my students to pick a skill that they want to practice and take the time to learn it well. I wish they would take the time getting better at this skill rather than be mediocre at several skills. My mother used to have a phrase about this: Jack of all trades and master of none.

I remember reading the book Outliers and Malcolm Gladwell states that it takes roughly ten thousand hours of practice to achieve mastery. I wish teachers would give students the time needed to practice skills before discouraging them or labeling them as failures. I also wish that administrators would do the same thing for teachers. I can’t tell you how many times the district gives a new tool or strategy and gives you one school year to master it without sufficient training or time to practice. No wonder so many things fail or fall through the cracks and people become frustrated.

What skill would you like to practice more? Please share.

mage: 'Little violinist'
http://www.flickr.com/photos/44892881@N05/9854326094
Found on flickrcc.net