“Good Enough” vs. “Completely Awesome”

“Just good enough” is one of those sayings that reminds me of Facebook’s “Done is better than perfect.” It’s something that is meant to tell me when I can think of something as ‘done’, or ‘complete’, or at the very least, something that I can move on from. But each of us will have a different threshold for when something is ‘good enough’, and – if you’re anything like me – that threshold changes the more you see others doing things that, in your view, are “completely awesome”.

Personalized Learning

Cohort 21 is built as a personalized learning model. Cohort 21 provides a really strong ratio of participants to coaches & facilitators (I think it’s about 1:2). It is our participants that determine the content, the guiding How Might We questions, and the pace. For example, there are many of us that publish regularly (?!), and there are just as many that will publish at the deadline.  And this is what personalized learning is. It’s having no participants the same.

The biggest obstacle to personalized, inquiry-based learning is that the learning is personal. Some may see/read/hear about Cohort 21 participants doing things that are “completely awesome”, and this will shift their threshold of ‘good enough’. They won’t see as much value, as much quality or thinking in their own work. They will see the work of others and compare. This is NOT personalized learning. This is a mindset that is a hold-over from the industrial model of education.

This is a mindset that we carefully try to disassemble.

The End of the Beginning

I use this phrase often, and I use to to show participants that we all have different starting lines, and we all have different finishing lines. As we approach our final Face-to-Face at Holy Trinity (shout out to @tfaucher for hosting!) it is important to know that we are all at different places on our journey, and where you are is simply where you are.

So, at this point on your journey, you ARE ‘good enough’. At this point on your journey, your ideas may seem simple to you, but AWESOME to everyone else.  I’m not going to tell you that they are completely awesome – you’ll have to take that step and share them first. BUT, once you do share them, I can guarantee that you’ll get encouraging, thoughtful, and meaningful feedback.  That’s a Cohort 21 promise!

 

 

PS: Shout out to @adamcaplan for inspiring this post!

3 thoughts on ““Good Enough” vs. “Completely Awesome”

  1. Garth,
    Thank you for this post. I have felt the difference in Cohort’s approach to personalized learning from the very beginning. At first I couldn’t really articulate it, I just knew that after our F2F sessions, or a ‘hangout’ the impact kept me wanting to do / be better. My experience has been nothing short of inspiring, and I think it is this shift in ‘mindset’ that you point out, that has made all the difference.

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