Support or Help? What do we supply?

Below is a representation of support!

This motor needed a new water pump. Right behind the middle pulley is the water pump.  
Was it help or support that aided in the replacement.

 

This broken engine, repaired by following the written instructions in the manual,  represents an example of the application of support.

The car broke down by the side of the highway with a sign that says, "send help," is an example of help!

SUPPORT IS...

Support is necessary to help others get through things.  "Getting through," is the key.  With support, a student can solve a problem.  Support lends itself to self-sufficiency.  Confidence and self esteem are also strengthened when support is offered, as opposed to help.

Support implies a bit more independence than help.  Help implies the situation is too dire to face alone and aid is required.  The broken down car, stranded by the side of the road is trapped and short of a long walk to help, nothing can be down!  An offer of help may imply dependency!   Consider a toddler trying and exploring a new skill or task.  Often times, they want to try it alone. 

HELP IS...

For instance, an overprotective guardian may actually weaken the youth by becoming the crutch.  Teachers continuously look for this line or sensitive cusp, ready to support, encourage and prompt into mastery.  The consummate educator understands and sets up opportunities just outside the comfort level or reach of students knowing students own success when it is authentic.  Students can read between the lines when looking for artificial concern.  They recognize true interest and care.

This "key lime pie" was made as a gift.  The recipiant did nothing but recieve it.  No help could have made it better.  (It might have even made it worse!)

Here is a picture that could represent help.  It was birthday gift from a chef who specializes in pies.  There were no contributions from me necessary to complete the task.  Her gift was helping me.

In our lives, how much help do we offer when support is all that's needed? 

When do we step in too early and eliminate the risks, as well as the value for our students? 

Our students want as little help as possible but as much support as needed to reach their goals.  They want us to use our experience to support them and step in to help, after their risk taking events failed them, without judgement or condemnation.

Provide support, and offer help, when only needed.

Where did you go to High School?

While reading Malcom Gladwells latest on underdogs and battling giants a few highlights jumped out implying Winfield Middle School was on the way to its rightful location #onthemap.

 

Big Fish in Small Pond or Small Fish in Big Pond

Not to steal any thunder from the book but the author poses the idea that a better bet may be a person familiar with success, regardless of the venue.  For instance, the scores at one school may all be better than all the scores of a different school, yet a top student at the mediocre school is often more effective and better suited for success.  To apply this to Winfield Middle School we know our district is not the biggest, yet that is exactly what makes it likely we might produce champions!  We study success, building champions and reaching goals.  Other schools may have more students try out for a sports team than we have in the entire class, yet was are competing on a level playing field?  Yes, the Big Fish from our small pond have likely success relative to the Small Fish in more successful pond.  Again, even though China has more honors students then we have students, where would we go to find ready and willing potential.

For example, the standard question floating many gatherings in St Louis starts with, “Where did you go to high school?” In St Louis, this question opens many introductions and social, professional and business meeting.  Of course, it supplies social clues leading to common connections, yet the hidden undertone often carries other connotations about the potential for success, growth or opportunity.  Almost like, “Are you from a Big Pond or Small Pond?”

What advantage is a disadvantage?

Gladwell continues his examination of underdogs considering the inordinate amount of CEOs and other business leaders with deficiencies like dyslexia.  His hypothesis addresses their overcoming the original obstacle by tuning other characteristics.  Similar to a blind person that tunes their hearing.  For instance, a successful trial lawyer overcame poor reading by hyper-sensitive hearing listening to the nuance with testimony supplied from the witness stand.  As underdogs, we often are overlooked following the formal and traditional channels.  It seemed the thing that these characters had to overcome, actually made them stronger and better suited to lead, connect with others and build from strength around a weakness.  Johnny Cash anecdotally described it in A Boy Named Sue.  Would you ever wish dyslexia on your children?

Don’t be afraid of being afraid.

Fight or Flight, Fear of Fear and the paralyzing results of some fears keep many of us back but build confidence in others.  The familiar quote:  What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger is actually articulated for better understanding and application.  Considering London during the bombing raids of Germany in WWII, we noticed three groups of people:  first, those that did not make it; second, those that suffered a near miss and finally those that made it through a remote miss!  Regretfully, the first group deserves complete respect. Then the near miss is just that, somebody fairly close to the impact.  This may be traumatic and even personally injurious but definitely different than a remote miss.  A victim of a near miss may so suffer a temporary negative setback.  Ironically the remote miss had the opposite effect on the citizens.  It brought them together.  Surviving a horrific bombing actually galvanized their unity.  The more bombings they survived, the more they believed they were invincible.  This made them stronger.  Anecdotally, some claimed they would rather stay in the city then flee to the countryside!

How does this apply to us? 

Are we a big pond struggling to succeed or small pond building fish ready for any pond? 

Do we let our perceived disadvantages give us a disadvantage, or do we just work around them?

Does our fear motivate us to fight, improve and get better or quit, submit and suffer setback?

http://gladwell.com/david-and-goliath/
@gladwell

Leaders leading leaders

Leadership for Leaders 

 Using a screenshot from Google, we planned a trip!  How to get from one spot to another? How can we all travel the path successfully?  How to garner momentum and support to keep the group together while accomplishing our goals?  What if there are disagreements?  What if there are challenges?  What about mistakes?  What do we do as individuals?  What do we do as a team?

These are questions we were faced with during a leadership experience where leaders were given the task of leading! Do we lead by mandate?  Does dictating work?  Can we force others into submission?  Does a leader just say the word and expect others to follow?  Where does gaining trust and establishing relationships fit into the equation?

     Away from the challenges, we all sit and talk great things about leadership.  We ponder the impact of our actions.  We pose theories that seem to make perfect sense in our minds and even in speech, but then we have to actually lead!  Then what happens?   How do people persuade others and prompt them into action?

Lesson 1

Success is not always the best teacher.  Sometimes, in fact often, it seems we learn more from our mistakes and our failures.  We glean the most effective methods, means or techniques for specific situations. For instance, when we continued doing what was working, we continued with our success.   We tried something else and faced an even greater challenge.  Then, we learned more about how our earlier successes had components of luck or fortune!

Lesson 2

Another “take-away” from the experience came from watching leaders lead leaders.  Every one of the participants was an obvious leader, each with their own characteristics, traits and methods that resulted in vast teams of talents, abilities and experiences.  Noticeable by any casual or outside observer were the strengths and attributes brought by every person.  Like a who’s who, each person’s presence influenced the dynamic of the entire project contributing insights, perspectives and understandings unique and cherished by the remaining team.  This diversity and variety allowed teams to focus on goals, tasks and accomplishments while applying discernment and tolerance while working within the given parameters.  Success became both the work and the togetherness!  Working together!  A true understanding of working with others was a favorite unforeseen outcome.

Lesson 3

Those of us that struggle with something often times seem to have a better grasp of the learning process surrounding the concept.  Someone naturally talented has to exert effort to understand another that needs extra effort to master the same skill.  The ability to teach or share seems to rise out of the intimacy with struggles, battles and mastery.  The trite exclamation “those that can, do and those that can’t, teach” ignores the experiences, motives and desires of the master teacher.  It could proclaim, “those who can’t teach it, can only do it!”

Looking at only these three highlights leaves many other nuances left hidden with the actual participants.  Many lessons, insights and applications to real jobs back home were learned in the crucible of challenge.  These shallow descriptions are only rough bearings pointing in a casual direction.  Remembering the night activities, directions, phantom rules, lake, sunsets, group activities, initiatives, sacrifice, meals, pain, expressions, journals, camp fire stories and even fun are personal, individual and intimate to only a few others laying a foundation for future adventures and deeper influences or wasted opportunity.

Two of our staff back to school activities are...

This year we have opened with a puzzle theme!  Two lessons were stressed.

 Our back to school activities for teachers:

1.       Instead of sharing with a shoulder partner a few pictures of the summer everyone submitted a few pictures via email and a movie was made, set to the Beethoven’s 9^th Symphony! Each picture was shown for 10 seconds and we all shared a verbal vine about the scene.  The variety of all the submitted pictures ranged from Spain to Florida, to family and friends, beaches and mountains, with and without people!  To conclude, we pondered how our experiences in this room, over one summer were far more than those of most of our students, maybe even over a life time!  We did more in one summer than they may accomplish in their lifetimes.  This granted us the permission to begin our academic adventure painting a picture of a physical adventure, traveling from a place of sure footing to uncertainty.  We connected the educational risks with those geographical risks surrounding travel, adventures and summer trips!  We thought of the joy these adventures brought to our own children and how their eyes lightened and memories were etched in their minds.  We wondered what it would take to being that same passion and enthusiasm into the classroom.

2.       Additionally, later that same day, we built a puzzle with pieces we received earlier that day.  However, one piece was deliberately withheld.  When asked to assemble the puzzle, things were progressing smoothly.  We got to the end and noticed the missing part.  Many applications to this missing piece were discussed.  We talked about the contributions each of us makes to the students’ lives.  Additionally we wondered if our students were feeling these same feelings of frustration when they almost finished their projects but were not equipped to reach the final conclusion.  Often, they could not reach the mark due to circumstances beyond their control.  This only reinforced the student’s perception that the true locus of control was outside their influence.  According to the students, success is unattainable and extenuating circumstances always prevent them from reaching the finish line. 

Therein lays the issue.  Students often follow this thought process:

With no opportunity for success, why even try? 

If I can’t win, why would I even play? 

If the chances of success are so slim, I won’t even risk it!

Our answer is simple.  We deliberately reach out to students, even if they push us away, especially if they push away.  They need healthy relationships even more!  A student must learn self-affirmation and positive self-talk!  A student must believe in himself or her own value, regardless of the situation.  A student must have a positive example, role model, caring adult or some support team that breaks the negative cycle.  This comes through a concerned adult, caring enough to share their lives with the student’s lives and willing to follow the green eggs and ham example. 

How do we help foster success?  Build a relationship.  Make a connection.  These simple actions begin to act as bridges or pathways or routes out of the negative cycles and allow students to court with success.  This lays out a foundation for a future attempt, and sets up an exit strategy for those attempts that fall short.  A pattern of persistence and determination becomes the norm.  The illusive success becomes attainable and reachable becasue the pupil learns how to win and how to fail!