In Zander’s book The Art
of Possibility, a couple of things caught my attention. Notes on practicing,
Roz tells a story about her first white water rafting trip and the guide
educating everyone about what to do if you fall out of the boat. The guide kept
repeating toes to nose and look for the boat. It reminded me of my boss, Mr.
Williams, telling our department staff to sell your program. He said it over
and over in our department meetings. About the time the economy went south, the
Georgia Department of Education changed the name of my introduction to
construction class to Occupational Safety and Fundamentals. My first thought
was what high school student would sign up for a class with that name. I
thought about it for a few minutes knowing that to keep a CTAE Program alive
you had to have numbers. My numbers were always high because my class was easy
to recognize by the name until now. Then I could hear Mr. Williams say you have
to sell your program. I began to sell my program by talking about what the new
class would offer. I had to re-call the catch phrase that Mr. Williams had
provided to me in advance.
Giving an A and taking away
the fear of making mistakes would benefit my students. I remember back to my
first construction job. I ran a crew for a small company remolding offices. My
boss had a saying if you get into a situation and was unsure about what to do,
he would say do the best you can with what you got. He also gave me an A from
the start. He said to always make a decision and go with it and if it’s wrong
we will fix it later. He said it was better to make a decision right or wrong
than to just sit around and not do anything. I think as teachers we need to do
the same for our students. I think if we provide for students with a learning
environment free from the fear of making mistakes student learning will
increase. I think sometimes teachers hold back students from learning because
of the fear of failure.
Del,
I understand how you were put inside the box about your course.
You had to think outside of the box to find a way to sell your course so
students would sign up for it. You were presented with the problem and you had
to find the solution to it. But by thinking of it, you created possibilities to
find the solution. On giving an A, I could not agree with you more. I always
tell my students to do their best and not to worry about they are going to make
as a grade. When people tell you to move on and not to just stand there with
arms crossed not knowing what to do. One has think and learn from life to be
able to move on and not get stuck on the path of life. Life goes on and so will
you. I really enjoyed reading you conclusion to the readings.
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