How Grit is Shaping my 2016-2017 Academic Year

grit-the-power-of-passion-and-perseverance_achieve-your-goals_1540x860-800x450This summer, I read my first non-fiction book (other than academic textbooks) and the impact it had on my life was greater than I ever could have imagined. This book was “Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance” by Angela Duckworth.

 

The point that I like that Angela honed in on, was that talent alone can only take you so far. Following through in your areas of passion and persevering through challenges leads to purpose and success in life. In one part of her book, she describes a psychology study performed on rats. In this study, the rats that faced challenging tasks when they were young were able to complete unrelated challenging tasks when they were older. However, the rats that faced only simple, easy tasks why they were young gave up and were unable to complete the unrelated challenging tasks when they were older.

This is when it hit me – This is why I teach high school chemistry!

I know that not every single student that I teach is going to be a chemist, or discuss hydrogen bonding at the dinner table (although the thought of this brings a tear to my eye). BUT if I can support the student persevering through a number of scientific challenges (be it conceptual, investigative, inquiry-based, mathematical, modeling, etc.) and they can follow through with this challenges, then I am setting these students up with being able to complete unrelated, challenging tasks in their adult life. Let’s face it, the world is a complicated place, and as I get older it somehow seems to become more complicated. But with a toolkit ready to tackle difficult tasks it all seems a little bit more manageable.

This mindset gave me a new sense of purpose this year. My overarching goal this year is to allow students to see that they can do hard things. When I am struggling with time management or a difficult lesson I need to also remember that I can do hard things. We are all capable of more than we think, we just need to push, follow through and persevere.

(Note – my colleague Lesa has really instilled the “you can do hard things” quote into my head)

5 thoughts on “How Grit is Shaping my 2016-2017 Academic Year

  1. Hi Sarah – thanks for your post on Grit and your review of Angela Duckworth’s book. Grit is for sure something that I grapple with when thinking about the students in my Grade 4 class and myself. I like the motto “you can do hard things.” Did the book give you tangible ways to help develop grit in your students and in your classroom community? I think I need to read this book. Thanks for sharing!

    1. Hey @ddunlap. Thanks for your comment! This book is certainly a great read.

      This book is focused more for the general public so does not really focus on things teachers can do (although if I were to look at certain areas of the book again, I’m sure I would find tangible ways written in the text). In terms of the classroom, it more provides stories of people who persevered with some examples of teachers who influenced them. In general, it was seen that teachers who embraced focused their teaching on embracing a challenge and encouraging follow through, rather than praising talent.

  2. Thank you so much for this post – I *love* that motto, and I think I want to adopt it in my classroom as well! I’m adding this book to my TBR list and would love to chat with you about it when I read it. Maybe you could do a Google Hangout book club about it??

    This phrase “You can do hard things” seems to me like it could replace pretty much all of the curriculum in our schools. As teachers, we are taught to focus on big ideas and essential questions when planning lessons, but couldn’t this be the biggest idea of all?? When faced with suggestions or ideas of really cool, innovative lessons or teaching strategies, so many teachers reject them outright saying that they need to get through the curriculum and already don’t have enough time. I’m not saying that the curriculum isn’t important, but if we want to emphasize 21st century skills like perseverence and creative thinking, adopting an approach whose motto is “You can do hard things” might be the answer!

    We had Kevin Brookhouser speak at our school last month about 20% time in his classroom, and nearly everyone I spoke to afterwards said how it was a cool idea but that they just wouldn’t be able to fit it in with all of the material they had to cover. It made me sad. However, your blog post makes me happy. Focusing on “you can do hard things”, to me, is a step in the right direction when it comes to what is most important in our schools. Thank you for this.

  3. @sregli I think language and words are such powerful tools to help shape and reframe mindset. Just the simple use of the word “yet” has an powerful way of changing the statement “I can’t…”. By adding “yet” we add hope, aspiration and positivity. I love that you are interested in this and I hope you find a ways to deepen your understanding of how to build “grit” in your students through your action plan. We all would certainly benefit.

  4. Thanks for this post! I think you’re uncovering something really special and I wonder if this is something you want to explore as an action plan? Grit is one of those words that gets tossed around in education – we want students to have grit and I love your catch phrase “You can do hard things”. To Justin’s comment – deepening your understanding of what this looks like and how you foster it in your students is a really interesting idea to explore.

    It’s great that you have a colleague who can help to push and support you as well! This will be important when things aren’t going so well and you start to wonder if what you’re doing is worthwhile. Plus you’ll have everyone with C21 to lean on as well. I haven’t read this book yet but you’ve inspired me to pick up a copy! Thanks!

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