Grit on Exhibition: Four Young Women and a Trail

Last test of the school year.  

1. What are you going to do the week after school ends?  

A.  Sleep late  
B.  Catch a movie with friends  
C.  Hang out at the pool  
D.  Hike 26 miles on one of the most difficult single-track trails in the US

Two days ago, I had the privilege of supporting four Carolina Day School women who chose “D.”  Emily, Elizabeth, Natalie, and Sydney arrived at campus at 7:30 AM last Thursday and began walking soon after.  Their course took them down the Mountains to Sea Trail from school, across the French Broad River, up the Shut-in Trail, and finally to the top Mt. Pisgah in a cool rain shower almost twelve hours later. With an elevation gain of around 3000 feet, this hike is a lot more than your average marathon.

Elizabeth, Emily, Sydney, and Natalie crossing the French Broad River

When I asked them why they would do such a thing, these are the responses from Emily, Sydney, and Elizabeth. "I love the challenge and the sense of achievement at the end of the hike. It is also a great time to appreciate the mountains and where we live." (Emily) I did it to challenge myself and I wanted the feeling of accomplishment after finishing. (Sydney)  "Although the Mount Pisgah Challenge was physically strenuous, it was spiritually and emotionally rejuvenating. Being out in nature and trying to complete the challenge made me feel really happy and energized. After I completed the challenge, I felt ready to embrace the coming changes in my life." (Elizabeth)  Okay, these are some deep girls.  While they all had a high level of intrinsic motivation, I contribute a lot of their success to grit -- the ability to persevere to do something really hard.

Over 4 million people have watched this short Ted Talk by Angela Duckworth on grit.  We know that what Duckworth describes as grit is a great predictor of success -- a better predictor than IQ or talent.  If you haven’t seen it or watched it in a while, take a few minutes:

In this talk, Duckworth references the work done by Dr. Carol Dweck on growth mindset as being aligned with developing grit.  Simply put, if you know and believe that you have the potential to grow, you are much more likely to work to grow.  All of our faculty will be reading Dweck’s book, Mindset:  The New Psychology of Success, over the summer, and we invite parents or anyone interested in this topic to engage in some discussions of the topic next fall.  

It is my belief that having a growth mindset is not only closely aligned to personal success but also institutional success.  As good as we are at Carolina Day School, we have a collective belief that we can and will grow.  We constantly look for new ways to teach, to engage, to inspire, to support, and to challenge our students.  As a school, we have grit: the long term motivation to do something of immense importance because there is nothing as important as helping our children grow into adults who will have meaningful lives.

I know that Emily, Elizabeth, Natalie, and Sydney will continue to challenge themselves to grow in meaningful ways.  They have grown up in an environment where this is an expectation, a natural part of their world.  Congratulations ladies. You are the grittiest girls I know.

Cupid Shuffle, Robots, Teamwork

To the right, to the right, to the right, to the right, 
to the left, to the left, to the left, to the left, 
now kick, now kick, now kick, now kick, 
now walk it by yourself . . ..”  

The music started jammin’; the dancers in their pastel tutus started groovin’; kids started clappin'.  No, this was not last month’s middle school dance, rather it was seventh-grade science class on Friday at 9:50 AM, rooms five and six.  The dancers involved, while directed by the seventh graders, were actually Lego Mindstorm robots.  The routines, expertly choreographed and programmed, were the culmination of a week’s worth or teamwork.  While programming is a valued skill that involves logical sequencing, problem solving, and some discreet knowledge about the language involved, the real value of last week’s “dance off” was in the work and lessons learned about collaboration and communication.  

About a week ago, I was touring the mother of a fifth-grade boy who was interested in how the middle school had changed in the short time that had passed since her daughter, a current ninth grader, first entered Stephens Hall.  We spent some time in my office talking about educational theory and then moved down the hall to see what was happening.  I love to give tours because it is a chance for me to show off what we do and who we are, something that is sometimes difficult to describe with words or numbers.  We entered Mr. McManus’s room at the end of the hall and found Meghan and Anna Kate standing in front of their seventh-grade classmates.  While the following is paraphrased, it is pretty close to what we heard:

Okay, everyone be quiet.  We've got to get rid of the chaos, so we decided to give everybody jobs.  If you don’t like your job, it doesn’t matter ‘cause you can switch.  We think Sydney should be leader.

As this was going on, Mr. McManus was sitting off to the side pretending to be disinterested.  The mom and I looked at each other, and I got a big smile on my face.  

Now I wasn’t in the classroom the previous day, but from what the girls told me, it was pretty ugly: people talking, no one listening, raised voices, frustration, nothing getting done -- sounds a little like Congress.  Mr. McManus, being a wise, experienced sage, let the situation play out. He trusted the process and didn’t jump in to fix things. This empowered the girls to take matters into their own hands and work it out.  Some girls became programmers, some costume designers, some DJ’s, some choreographers, and one a leader.  Some girls changed jobs as it became apparent that more work was needed in different areas.  They worked together.  They solved their own problems.

I spent a few minutes talking to Anna Kate and Meghan who had stood in front of their peers to attempt to make order out of chaos, and asked them what I thought was going to be a tough question:  “Why didn’t appoint yourselves leaders?”  They didn’t miss a beat and said that they chose Sydney because she is really good at being a leader.  They said that she listens well and can organize things.  Nice!  

The three other seventh-grade core groups also struggled through the process of how to get a large group to work together to reach a goal. Some were not particularly pleased with the outcome; however, if each groups' performance didn't come off perfectly, they all persevered and brought something worthwhile to the dance floor. So, as Cupid says, ". . . do your dance, do your dance."

On David Brooks and Emotion

A couple of weeks ago, David Brooks wrote an op-ed piece, “What Machines Can’t Do,” in the NY Times that describes human traits that should be valued now and in the future as these traits cannot be replicated by computers.  While Brooks is a political commentator, he is also a thoughtful observer of human nature.  In this article, Brooks writes that “The role of the human is not to be dispassionate, depersonalized or neutral. It is precisely the emotive traits that are rewarded: the voracious lust for understanding, the enthusiasm for work, the ability to grasp the gist, the empathetic sensitivity to what will attract attention and linger in the mind.”  If Brooks is right, and I believe he is, then as educators we must examine how schools can help these traits to flourish.

Voracious lust for anything sounds pretty scary to a middle school principal.  Do we really want a bunch of limit-pushing, hormone-pumped twelve-year-olds unleashing their Freudian ids into our orderly classrooms?  Well, maybe not all of teenage passion should be on display in schools, but Brooks isn’t talking about sexting or sticking it to the man; the passion that he describes is the passion of engagement, the passion of inquiry -- an unyielding desire to figure things out.

Most schools squelch this passion, the very thing that should be driving our youth.  School has become ruled by graphite-filled ovals on Scantrons, by squealing bells that signal the end to learning, by curriculum written by who-knows-who a jillion miles removed from any teenager’s first pimple.  Most folks would have loved to have Robin Williams’ character in Dead Poet’s Society as their teacher; however, a teacher like that, one who seeks to connect students with their own passion, will not last long in America’s controlled, assembly-line schools that have been cleverly and frighteningly described in this RSA talk by Sir Ken Robinson.

Schools that support passion are schools that have deliberately created a culture around passion.  It doesn’t happen by accident. These schools offer students a chance to plunge deeply into learning. They know that not everything in a standard course can be “covered” so they choose particular elements to examine thoroughly.  They frequently offer students the opportunity to choose what they want to read and write.  They serve up problems that make students’ brains wrinkle, problems that cause students to mentally engage because whatever they have seen or heard just doesn’t quite fit with their current understanding.  They require students to discuss and argue over big, meaningful topics like justice, love, revolution, and peace.  They ask them to solve difficult problems that take weeks or months of planning and trials.  They realize that passion doesn’t come from chasing the currency of school -- grades -- but that it comes from within each individual, so teachers offer formative feedback so students are supported in their attempt to try something different rather than thwarted by the prospects of getting a bad grade.  They offer students chances to let their spirits flow by asking them to paint, design, make films, take photos, sing, dance, and perform.  They give every student an opportunity to participate and grow in sports.  They require students to think about how they think and learn, so that they can more deeply understand their own passions and how best to explore them.

These schools are out there; in fact, I work in one.  However, schools that are grounded in passion will only flourish as long as educators are given the opportunity to display the passion that drew them to their life’s work.

Group Foresight and Action -- Mt. Fuji

What thirteen-year-old boy would voluntarily give up control and power to one of his classmates for the good of his group? I know three who did, as well as the one who accepted the others’ nomination and worked to govern the group judiciously.

Yesterday, I interviewed a group of seventh-grade boys who were asked to work together on a project that involved figuring out how long it would take to move Mr. Fuji.  Yes, it is an intriguing math problem, but for these boys it became a greater exercise in learning to work together.  Putting strong-willed, opinionated students together in a group is often a recipe for disaster.  Arguments, frustration, sarcasm, and hurt feelings are common outcomes.  Frequently the groups become so dysfunctional that one or two group members leave the group because they can’t control the outcome. 

This group of boys was different.  This group of boys recognized that they had a problem from the start.  They are all high achievers, willing to do the work of those who are less motivated to make the final outcome something that meets their own ambitions.  They are all willing to motivate others using leadership skills they possess in order to succeed.  Grouped as they were, they realized right away that they all were inclined to lead.  So, instead of fighting it out, undermining others, or giving up, they reached a pivotal decision.  They decided to give up control and choose one of the four to lead them.  What is amazing is that the leader didn’t simply emerge or usurp the power -- but rather he was unanimously selected by the others.  Truthfully, the leader probably could have been any of them -- what is significant is the foresight and collaboration that they exercised.

Sublimating one’s own will and voice for the benefit of achieving something worthwhile does not happen by chance.  I believe that these boys were able to foresee and remedy the potential problem because they have been asked to work together in groups with others since they were little kids.  Our students work together every day; it is an expectation.  I’m pleased that my school and faculty recognize that the skills needed to be successful and happy are just as important, if not more important, than content that usually reigns king.  I’m not sure how long it takes to move Mr. Fuji, but I do know that these boys have developed skills that are more important than moving a mountain.