Have you ever been surprised with an unexpected kindness?  There was a recent story of an older man who regularly jogged some remote roads in the hills of southern California.   His biggest fear was of an attack by a mountain lion but since he rarely strayed into the denser areas so he was not worried.  One particular day as he jogged he heard the loud blare of a car radio and the lyrics of a rap song.  The beat of the music got closer and closer.  This man had encountered rude drivers in the past but the noise and the approaching speed of the car worried him.    Suddenly a car full of teenage boys sped past him and slowed to a stop.   Filled with fear the man worried how he was going to jog past the car without incident.  As he got right next to the car one of the boys handed him a Popsicle out the window. 

Simple acts of kindness like the gift of a Popsicle seem strange and out of the ordinary.  Why is that? 

Unfortunately today in workplaces and schools across the country reports of harassment and violence have increased.   P. M. Forni author of the Civility Solution writes that most school and workplace violence began in rudeness.  The roots of rudeness are a failure to value the intrinsic goodness of each person.  When individuals are not seen as worthy and competent its easier for  rudeness to erupt.  

Most people see rudeness as something done to them instead of a symptom of a culture that reacts to any  injustice with anger.  This anger is like lightening in a bottle, when directed at others it scorches everything in its path, work relationships, friendships, families and eventually the health of any institution.   Rudeness can become anger burning out of control. 

School can be the one consistent place in this society where children can learn to practice compassion and simple acts of kindness.  A compassionate mind learns to look at a situation more broadly, seeking a solution that’s acceptable to everyone. 

So how can you as an educator begin to practice and teach children to cultivate the compassionate mind? 

Begin first with yourself.  Examine your daily habits, how do you interact with your co-workers.  Are you tolerant of their shortcomings or do you react with criticism and gossip?    Next evaluate your relationship with your students, are you inpatient with their inattentiveness, disruptions and little unkindness?   When you become the model of compassion you can create a vibration in your classroom that will resonate into all your relationships.

Teach your students to practice sitting with their frustration and anger.  Tell them that in their body there is a biochemical surge that has it’s roots in primitive man.   The fight or flight response was a holdover from the days when the main threat to our survival was a saber tooth tiger and not waiting in line or a redundant question. 

Feelings of anger manifests differently in each person, some of us get so revved up that we can’t think straight.  To address this  teach students deep breathing.  Begin each day with a classroom-breathing lesson, instruct students to close their eyes and begin to observe their breath.  Instruct them to begin to breath more deeply inhaling in for 7 to 10 seconds and exhaling through the nose for the same time.  Repeat this exercise for several minutes. 

Anytime you see agitation tumbling onto rudeness and anger take a time-out to breathe.  Students will begin to practice this and take their cues.  Compassion does not come naturally.  For students to truly become wiser they need a wise and compassionate teacher.    

Have you ever dismissed your own shortcomings by saying, “it’s just the way I am,” or “I can’t change that?”

If you have you truly are a creature of your own habits.  Question is do your habits own you or do you own your habits?   Most people are owned by their habits simply because the human brain forms synaptic pathways like an expressway and it’s difficult to exit off that path without consciously developing new ways of doing and thinking.  When you change anything you create parallel synaptic paths and new brain cells that can jump onto a new track. 

The problem is whenever you initiate change even positive changes you activate fear in the emotional brain, and if the fear is big enough your flight or fight response will go off and you will literally run away from what you’re trying to do.    That’s why extreme changes like a new diet, fitness regiment or change in career will be difficult and uncomfortable. 

Authors Dawa Markova of “The Open Door” and M.J. Ryan of “This Year I Will” have found that humans approach challenges in four primary ways: analytically, procedurally, collaboratively and innovatively.   What happens is during adolescence the brain shuts down half of that capacity and uses only those modes of thought that seemed the most valuable during the first decade of life.   The result is few use the innovative and collaborate modes of thought.  It’s these two that creates discovery, invention and excellence. 

Teachers have the perfect opportunity to help students adapt to change by creating a stretch zone in their classroom.  The stretch zone is the place in the middle that will feel awkward and unfamiliar but it’s where true change occurs.  When students stay in the stretch zone their brain is healthier because it’s constantly challenged to learn not just new things but create new pathways. 

So how do you create the stretch zone?   Look for ways to challenge students to make tiny continuous improvements. 

• Students should have their own improvement list and work to check off one item every week.  
• Teach students how to access their weak areas and grade their own progress.
• Guide students along their learning path by moving though new material like an explorer in a new place, it’s here they will go from curiosity to wonder.
• Remind students that new ideas like new habits feels awkward at first, and feeling awkward is a valuable moment one that scientists call confusion because it’s fusing the old with the new.  If the process is repeated enough the brain will begin organizing the new input with new synaptic connections.

Teach your students to become innovative thinkers, create collaborative groups where they can explore all the possible solutions to a problem. Every time students do this they will ingrain their brain with the ability to create parallel pathways.

Your classroom can be the best place for students not just to learn but also to create the ability to become a creature of new habits. 

Almost every student will have heard of the character of Indiana Jones. This swashbuckling adventurer is fiction but in real life there is an Indiana Jones of science, his name is Stephen Hawking.  Unfortunately most students have never heard of him.   He wrote a popular science bestseller, “A Brief History of Time” in it he takes the reader along on one of the greatest adventure stories ever, the creation of the universe.  His book compels the reader to ask questions and challenges beliefs.  

Every child begins their life as budding scientists.  Most every parent will attest to the uninhibited and unabashed curiosity of their children, they want to know what things are and how they work.  Unfortunately by the time they have a chance to begin science in school this curiosity is replaced with boredom.  Science does not seem to relate to everyday life.  

Many studies have focused on this problem.  Recommendations range from increasing the level of training for science teachers to curriculum reforms.   But most of these studies fail in one important area.   The teaching of science fails to reveal the breathtaking vistas of the universe. The focus is on the need to first gain competency with details instead of engaging students with the big picture.  The big picture captures the drama and it’s a drama that’s been unfolding for thousands of years. 

Just to get a sense of the raw material available, in physics the most revolutionary of advances have occurred in the last one hundred years.  More recently the last ten years have witnessed an upheaval in the understanding of the composition of the universe, a whole new picture of the cosmos.  Unfortunately it is rare to see a mention of these paradigm-shaking developments in a middle school or high school science class.  And it’s the same for biology, chemistry and math. 

The root of the problem is a firm belief in the approach that you must master A before moving onto B.  But science is so much more than it’s details.   Our greatest scientists had the curiosity and the insights to move ahead of solving problems and reciting facts.  They were transported. 

Science needs to be taught young and in a way that captures the imagination.  It needs to be placed alongside of literature, art and music, as an indispensable part of an interesting life. 

Teachers can begin by becoming more curious and paying attention.  There’s a lot to bring attention to and engage students of all ages in the conversation of what things are and how they work.  The more this can be done the more students will want to know.  It is the birthright of every student to look into the sky and marvel at the creation of the universe. 

Perception is everything.  How you see things shapes how you interpret the world.  In the classroom the teacher’s perceptions can mean the difference between success and failure.  The verbal and non-verbal communication of the teacher lets a student know if he or she is capable and smart or inadequate and challenged. 

Consciously or not you tip people off as to what your expectations are.  You exhibit thousands of cues, some as subtle as the tilting of the head, raising an eyebrow or dilation of the nostrils, but most are much more obvious.  And your students pick up on these cues.   In other words once an expectation is set, even if it isn’t accurate an individual tends to act in ways that are consistent with that expectation.  Surprisingly often, the result is that the expectation comes true.

Students who lack academic and social skills continue to struggle sometimes even when they are capable and the help and encouragement is sufficient.  Could it be because no foundation has been built to give that student confidence?

Every student needs to learn in a quality environment.  This type of classroom allows for failure.  For students the perception is mistakes are bad and embarrassing and should be avoided.  When in fact mistakes are opportunities to learn something.  The more mistakes made the more a student will learn and the greater chance they will of have of succeeding on the next try.  The key is to learn from the mistakes, not making the same mistake twice.  

Thomas Edison would never have invented the light bulb if he did not take this principle to heart.  He failed more than 10,00 times before he found the filament that would create light for a sustained period of time.  He did not view these as failures. 

How a student views their failures comes from you, the teacher.  If you can eliminate judgment and comparing, you can give every student the mental confidence to know that they can succeed.  An interesting case in point is the story about a group of American schoolteachers who were visiting schools in Japan.  In one school they watched a Japanese boy struggling at the board with a single math problem.  For forty-five minutes this boy worked on the problem making repeated mistakes.  During this time the American schoolteachers became anxious and embarrassed for the little boy.  Yet the boy did not seem to mind.  The teachers wondered why they felt worse than he did.

What they didn’t understand is that in Japanese schools practice in making mistakes is accepted as a natural part of learning.  Once the boy got the answer right his classmates cheered.  Maybe in American schools it’s forgotten that achievement is just a matter of plain hard work.  If students are worried about meeting expectations they many never get on the path to success thus ensuring themselves of the very thing they are afraid of – failure. 

Teachers can empower their students to learn by making their classroom mistake friendly.   Create room to fail with collaborative and cooperative groups.  Give students a stretch zone in which they move away from what’s comfortable and challenge themselves everyday.  Let them learn from their mistakes.

Do you hit the brakes or the accelerator when you encounter stress?  What is your stress temperament?

You probably know someone who lives in the eye of a crisis storm; their life is a series of minor dramas, which replay over and over.  You also probably know another person who weathers all kinds of storms yet seems to be happy. Scientific studies have discovered a link between personality, temperament and the ability to deal with stress.  Individual responses to life situations vary greatly.  Instead of beating yourself up for your inherent temperament become aware of how you respond to changes.   This awareness can lead you to develop new habits and promote healthy hormones and neurochemicals.

Once you become aware of the language spoken by your autonomic nervous system you will discover the power you have to create joy, abundance and health the same way you create stress, fatigue and disease. 

The implication of using this information in teaching children in school is powerful.  Every teacher creates their own classroom environment and students respond in different degrees based on their own stress temperament.   The first step in creating a healthy environment is to recognize your own stress temperament.  Ask: how do you respond to periods of high activity and inattentiveness with your students and what methods do you use to calm and discipline disrupting students?  

One way to establish a healthy classroom environment is to factor in de-stressors every day.   Educate yourself about the practice of mindfulness.  The practice of mindfulness is an effective tool to enhance academic performance while promoting emotional and social well being.   Its focuses on developing a student’s capacity for attention and awareness. 

Begin every day with three minutes of silence.  Instruct your students to close their eyes and simply notice their breathing as they focus on the space between their nose and upper lip.  As your students get into this habit they will become more aware of their emotions.  This technique is a system that allows the mind to settle down and focus.  You can develop and expand this practice during the school year by adding more mindful minutes including the practice of loving kindness (sending loving kind thoughts to another person while you are silent).   You don’t have to become an expert to create a different kind of calm for your students you only have to be willing to experiment and create this peaceful space.  

The benefit is not just to your students but also to yourself.  It allows you to be the best kind of teacher; one who is truly present in the classroom engaged with students and subject making the connections that open the mind to real learning.

How much fuel are you putting into your refrigerator?

It’s hard to imagine putting fuel into your refrigerator but that’s exactly what happens every time we buy food.  The average American puts 400 gallons of oil into their refrigerator every year.  This number is calculated by adding up the distance that food travels from farm to plate and the amount of petroleum-based fertilizer used to grow the food.   If every American ate just one meal a week from locally organic produced food oil consumption would be reduced by 1.1 billion barrels of oil per week. 

This one small change in consumption could make a big difference.   But for many of Americans the sentiment is why bother?  For many it seems hopeless to imagine much less attempt a different sort of life.  The inclination is to put faith in market based solutions.  But much more needs to be done and right now.

All across America a quite revolution has already begun and the 1000 students at Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School in Berkeley California are part of it.  This school is home to the Edible Schoolyard Project.   An idea that started with a vacant lot has evolved into a one-acre organic garden and kitchen classroom.  In this program children grow and prepare the whole foods they will eat.   Not only are these students gaining nutrition and ecological knowledge they could be the key to our future.   This systems approach addresses the crisis of childhood obesity while making food production truly sustainable. 

If this urban school of 1000 students can feed itself than the possibility of every American either growing or purchasing locally produced food is not just a talking a point.  

Here are some things to consider:

·      Growing some of your own food sets an example for others. If enough people bother, each one influences the other.  Consciousness is raised, maybe even changed.

·      Planting a garden is one of the most powerful things an individual can do.  It reduces your carbon footprint but it also reduces your sense of dependence.

·      Growing your own food begets a new set of solutions and changes other habits; you learn to provide other things for yourself.

·      The single greatest lesson the garden teaches is it changes your relationship to the planet.  It’s a long season from seed to vegetable and you get to experience it all.

Schools can introduce and nurture this concept with their students.  For many students school is the only way  to experience this lesson.  Every teacher can begin this simply by starting seeds in paper cups.  Start with popular and easy to grow vegetables, tomatoes plants, cucumbers, carrots, radishes are just a few.   Students can be encouraged to take these pots home to plant in the ground or a bigger pot.   Teachers can also introduce students to local produce by taking field trips to farmers markets and local farms.  With a little imagination and planning every classroom can begin to teach sustainability.   Students will discover a new way to provide for themselves without diminishing the planet.  Our future relies more on action than hope.

Schools in America are in crisis.   Is this a system failure or a response to the overall moral failure of our culture?

The history of civilization shows that every golden age is followed by a descent.  Throughout time this descent has taken on different withering forms: susperstition, prejudice, greed.  Perhaps our descent is apathy.  Too many children are at risk.  Neglected in the kind of nurturing that gives them the ability to believe in their own innate goodness.  Every child has the potential to be amazing.  The problem is our definition of amazing is limited.  Amazing has an infinite number of possibilities.  Amazing is not what we do but who we are.   Our children have not been given the right paradigm.   If one generation of children were taught loving kindness, first to love themselves and then to share it the larger problems we face would disappear.   Practicing this would diminish the attraction of competing and comparing because the only measurement needed would be: am I better than I used to be and not am I better than you.

The blame cannot be placed only on schools.  The blame has to be shared by all of us, all of us who have embraced the culture of materialism.   The demands of this culture are huge.  Children are vulnerable to the ideas of looking a certain way, dressing a certain way and having certain things.  The attachment to all of this diminishes our collective goodness.  Instead of cultivating what’s already there, we seek what’s outside of us.

Schools could become the leaders in changing this thinking because what children see and hear everyday shapes them.  Everyday the message in schools can be one of loving-kindness and like a drop in a bucket these drops will eventually fill the minds of our children. 

The challenge is not in doing this but in convincing everyone who is associated with schools to embrace this thinking.   It’s easy to mandate a program what’s harder is to grow it.   Schools are a human endeavor.  There is no product except in evolving the thinking minds of children. This is the ultimate product anyone can hope to be part of. 

So how can this be accomplished? 

Simple  - one day at a time.  Schools can begin by cultivating the spirit of gratitude  Establish daily goals for everyone.  Begin with the law of giving.   It is important to give something to everyone you come into contact with during the day.  This gift does not have to be material; it can be a smile, a kind word, encouragement, understanding, or friendship.  The beauty is this plan includes everyone, adults and students both.   And it is contagious.  The more it is practiced the easier it becomes.

It’s easy to become optimistic about our future by looking at the possibilities.   History shows us that we can find ourselves, in a new renaissance and a new enlightenment that can become a profound shift for a better world.

Gifted or learning disabled?   Can a child be both?

Inside the human brain are one hundred trillion connections most of which are still unmapped.  Mapping the human brain has been the domain of scientists except in the case of one extraordinary woman.   Barbara Young born with an asymmetrical brain made the discovery that allowed her to invent the treatment that transformed her life.     Today she runs the Arrowsmith School in Toronto where children with learning disabilities are literally building themselves a better brain.   Incredible as it sounds the human brain can change itself. 

Children at this school who were formerly taught using compensations are engaged in a form of mental olympics where exercises strengthen the weak areas of the brain as if it were a muscle.   After completing the program they are reintegrated into their public or private school at the appropriate grade level.

This astonishing discovery that the brain changes its own structure and function through thoughts and activity is called neuroplasticity.  The brain can change its own structure and perfect new circuits, when one part fails other parts take over.  Understanding neuroplasticity allows us to change the thinking that limitations and disabilities need not be lifelong handicaps.

Imagine the possibilities in applying this thinking for schools.  Rather than labeling children as learning disabled assessments like those used at the Arrowshmith School could be utilized to look for weak areas of the brain. Learning disabled and gifted do not have to be on opposite sides of the continuum.   The paradox is many children have both, creative talents alongside weak areas of the brain. 

Evidence like this will continue to improve society.  Scientists believe we will learn more about the human condition in the next two decades than was learned in the past millennia.  Developing evidence-based teaching will require a paradigm shift for schools.   Educators need to raise new questions, consider new possibilities, and to look at old problems from a new angle.   We all need to push harder for a system that can adapt and apply this new information. 

The Priaha are a tiny tribe of Amazon natives that live on the banks of the Marci River in Brazil.   This tribe of 360 is in danger of extinction.  By our standards they are undeveloped and primitive.  They have no real language, members of the tribe whistle to communicate.  Although they have one of the strangest languages in the world the Priaha have mastered the essence of cooperation.  To survive this small group must cooperate with each other.  

In this tiny society there is no competition.  Anthropologists who lived with this group attempted to organize a field day, but the Piraha upset the games.  In a footrace when one fellow would get ahead of everyone else he would stop and wait until the other runners could catch up.  The idea of winning was not only novel but also unappealing.  For the Piraha it’s we cross the line together or we don’t cross it at all.  To have a great time everyone had to win.

Unselfish cooperation might be the key to our future. Schools can be the best place to promote this type of cooperation.  Cooperation that not only feels good but also is good because it fosters the best environment for learning.  Cooperative learning results show that students who are given a chance to work collaboratively learn faster and feel more positive about school.   In a cooperative group every student has a specific task, everyone must be involved in the learning project.  The success of the group depends on the successful work of everyone.

There are five elements of cooperative learning.

1. Positive Interdependence (sink or swim together)

·      Each member’s efforts are required for success

·      Each member has a unique contribution to make

2. Fact to Face Interaction (promote each other’s success)

·      Teach each other

·      Discuss concepts being learned

·      Checking for Understanding

3. Individual and Group Accountability (no loafing)

·      Keep the group small

·      Give individual test to each student

·      Observe the group

·      Students must teach what they learned

4. Interpersonal and Small Group Skills- Students learn

·      Leadership

·      Decision-making

·      Communication

·      Conflict-management skills

5. Group Processing

·      Students learn to evaluate and access themselves

Every classroom is its own tiny society with its own culture.   Creating a culture of trust and respect can be achieved with cooperative learning. The greatest purpose of school is to unlock, release, and foster this wonderful capability.

In the news recently there was a very unsettling report about six high school cheerleaders who filmed the beating of another girl.  The beating took place in a private home and lasted thirty minutes.  At one point in the film the victim was knocked unconscious.  This beating was posted on You Tube for the sole purpose of entertainment. The six girls were arrested and could possibly be tried as adults (all are under the age of 16).   None showed any remorse at the time of their arrest instead expressing frustration at missing a cheerleading practice.

As unsettling as the story was a psychologist made an even more disturbing comment.  She suggested that the six teenage girls who did the beating are typical, claiming any teen is capable of crossing this line.  One has to worry if this is true or just speculation.  Our culture has a powerful impact on young people.  The most influential people in their lives are not their parents; it’s their peers, their neighborhood, their school, and the media. The standard is a high stakes quest for popularity and acceptance and the result is a loss of innocence.   It’s in this destructive atmosphere of compete, compare and win at all costs that educators are striving to provide some type of character education, some framework to teach core ethical values.

Character education must be done well and early to put students on the right path, to give them the moral courage to know how and when to walk away from risky and dangerous behaviors.  But not just walk away become the model that others strive to be.  Become better.

Teaching character requires a holistic approach.  You can’t just talk about character you have to model it so that it reflects back and creates the kind of attraction that is impossible to ignore.   Public schools were founded not just to educate but also to create citizens capable of contributing to the common good.  It’s a greater challenge now.    Teachers have a powerful role they can promote this positive development in several ways.

·       Build caring and supportive relationships in the classroom.  The environment should show safety, trust, respect and concern for the welfare of others.  This is the essential foundation

·       Model positive behavior.   Walk the walk just don’t talk the talk.  Students are attuned to their teacher’s behavior and will reflect what they observe.

·       Become a democratic environment where students can make decisions, act on them and reflect on their results.

·       Teach essential social and emotional skills like listening, recognizing and managing emotions, disagreeing respectfully, and resolving conflicts.

·       Involve students in moral discourse.  Discussion about morals is the essence of educating children to be moral individuals.  Teachers can further this understanding with teachable moments, themes in literature and the media to create a dialog.

·       Make learning meaningful and relevant.  Look for ways to show how learning particular subjects is important to helping them achieve their personal goals.

This approach can be part of preventing the occurrence of a wide range of social problems among our youth helping them avoid the pitfalls of life and develop into caring and responsible citizens.