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Focusing on the Negative - How Schooling Conditions an Abusive Inner Voice

The current approach in many schools is to focus on the negative. When something goes wrong, such as missing assignments, incorrect answers, or avoidant behaviors, students are often punished with detentions, criticism, demerits and poor marks. In fact, it is difficult to see where we teach students how to build positive character strengths such as resilience, grit, confidence, self-control, curiosity and social intelligence. This overarching focus on the negative can take a toll on student motivation and many learners are also harassed with a negative inner voice that constantly undermines stamina as well as the learning process. What Have I Been Witnessing in my Practice? Over the past 15 years in my private practice as a learning specialist, I have witnessed an increase of depression, anxiety, and learned helplessness in my students. Many of these discouraged learners have identified with and integrated negative labels to describe themselves such as “careless,” “lazy,” “...

Eradicating Errors and Mistakes and Embracing Oopsy Doodles

Have you ever made a mistake or error? Were you ever wrong? Were you ever told that you were careless, lazy or umotivated? How did that make you feel? Were you embarrassed? Were you ashamed? Were you angry? Were you sad? Now, I want you to imagine a giant eraser, because were are going to erase all mistakes. We are going to erase errors. We are going to erase anything and everything wrong or careless. And, as we mindfully delete all those negative words and memories while holding onto any valuable lessons, all those bad feelings disappear too. Imagine that you travel around the world and erase every careless mistake - every single error - everything that is wrong. All those bad feelings leave everyone and float up into the sky and disappear. All that remains is a perfect, deep blue sky with wispy clouds. Now, imagine that in the sky, appears the words Oopsy Doodles in colorful swirly letters. Oopsy Doodles are wonderful, because they help us to grow. Oopsy Doodles ...

Embracing Positive Learning Environments

Part of the learning process is making mistakes. However, inadvertently teachers and parents often correct young learners with negative remarks. Kids continually hear the words "no," "incorrect" and "wrong." What’s more, in moments of frustration, many children must withstand cutting, belittling names such as careless, lazy and unmotivated. I think we have all been called these names at some time in our life, and I can promise you, these negative labels never help the situation. It only breeds frustration and disempowerment. In fact, if teachers or parents get too critical, students can feel dejected and even develop a sense of learned helplessness. Stop the Negative Labels: Have you seen Dan Siegal speak about the psychological impact of the word, “no?” Here is a link to a YouTube Video where he shows an audience the difference between “no” and “yes” responses ( Click Here ). I hope you have a moment to view it. Replace Negativity with Words ...

Motivating Students - 3 Misconceptions and 10 Strategies for Success

Motivation is purported to be a common obstacle that obstructs academic success, however this is a misconception. As Rick Lavoie said, "It is not that students become unmotivated, because all human behavior is motivated." Instead, other core factors such as depression, anxiety, a poor self concept, and learning disabilities are the source that affect learning and appear to impact motivation. Assisting Students that Appear Unmotivated? To help students that appear unmotivated, first we must investigate the cause of the academic struggle or unwanted behavior. One can attempt to uncover these stumbling blocks through mindful discussions, but it may be best to pursue additional assistance from a therapist, educational therapist or learning specialist that has some training in psychology. In addition, if the student’s difficulties manifest as poor grades, a comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation can help to uncover the core problem. Once the underlying causes h...

Nurturing Grit and Resilience: Classroom Strategies for Success

Resilience and grit are two popular terms in education that are associated with student happiness, motivation, and academic success. These are learnable behaviors, thoughts, and actions that help learners cope with stress, face adversity or trauma, and bounce back from challenging experiences. Angela Duckworth proposes that the development of grit is an important skill to teach our students. In fact, Duckworth shows in her research that grit is a better gauge of academic achievement and success than one's IQ! What is Resilience? Resilience is an attribute or skill that helps us recover from negative events or feelings, cope with challenges and adversity, and take care of ourselves. What is Grit? Grit is the ability to maintain passion, motivation, and effort when developing a mastery or an expertise. Some of the Most Important Characteristics of Grit and Resilience Include: Managing Emotions - being open to one’s feelings and able to modulate them in oneself. A...

A Learning Disability Diagnosis: Should I Tell My Child?

I find that a lot of parents decide to hide the fact that their child has a learning disability. They want to protect them from negative associations with the label. Most of all, they don't want their child to feel disabled or experience any bullying from his or her peers. Although there might be some short-lived uncertainties and uneasiness associated with learning about one's diagnosis, the research shows that has lasting beneficial outcomes. How Can Learning about One's Learning Disability Diagnosis Help? Learning about one's diagnosis can help in a number of ways. Whether the child is in elementary school or even approaching college, learning about one's learning disability: shows there is a reason for academic struggles and that the child can receive support and reasonable accommodations that will help them to succeed. helps define the type of assistance that a child needs so that remediation can be tailored. enables children to shed negative labels s...

Careless, Lazy and Unmotivated are Three Labels that Should be Banned from Education

Kids never strive to be careless, lazy or unmotivated and referring to a student in this way never helps a situation. In fact, many kids that hear these labels again and again can develop a sense of learned helplessness. I’ll never forget a student of mine coming into one of our sessions in a terrible frame exclaimed, “I’m careless and unmotivated!” He slid a graded assignment across the table in front of me. Red marks cut across his work and in bold, scarring letters and exclamation points the teacher had told Jake that he had made many careless errors. Even though Jake’s grade was an 88, it took me almost an hour to convince him that he was not careless and unmotivated. Jake had learning disabilities as well as ADHD and I knew the errors that he had made had nothing to do with care or effort. The poor guy was so detached and dejected, he hadn’t even evaluated the mishaps, and when he finally looked at them, he could see that they were all unintentional...

The Secret to Motivating Students

Motivation is thought to be a common culprit that plagues students, however this couldn't be further from the truth. As Rick Lavoie said, "It is not that students become unmotivated, because all human behavior is motivated." Instead, other factors such as anxiety, a poor self-esteem, learned helplessness, depression, and learning disabilities are just a few real causes that impact learning and appear to impact motivation. How Can We Help Students that Appear to be Unmotivated? First, we must try to understand the root causes of the unwanted behaviors. One can try to uncover these blockades through discussion, but it may be best to pursue help from a therapist, seek a comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation or find an excellent educational therapist or learning specialist that has some training in psychology. Once the underlying causes have been uncovered, one must provide the structure and support that will help to guide the student to better habits and...

10 Ways to Teach Planning, Time Management and Organization

Teaching students planning, time management and organizational skills is necessary in education. Although some find executive functioning to be quite obvious, there are those that need to learn the process. Here are 10 recommendations: Provide an organized environment. Set an example. Use a planner and create a structured routine for yourself and use labeled boxes, shelves and filing systems so that everything has it's place. Praise self initiation. In the beginning, rewarding kids for executive functioning skills will provide greater motivation. Organize time and post schedule around the house or classroom so that a daily routine can be established. Provide structure by offering a lot of support in the beginning. Do the process together and slowly pull away as the needed skills are acquired independently. Give reminders and help students come up with systems so that they can remind others as well as themselves. Use calendars. Show the different calendar options to s...

Do I have dyslexia - Explaining Symptoms and Myths for Kids

What do you do when you learn that your child has dyslexia? Should you hide this diagnosis to protect them from labels and misunderstandings, or should you tell them? If you do decide to tell them, how do you do this? Can you help them to overcome any potential fears or misunderstandings? These are the questions that I will answer in this blog that includes kid-friendly graphics. What are the Benefits of Telling Your Child That He or She Has Dyslexia? Educating your child with dyslexia about the common signs and misconceptions can help them to: understand that they learn in a different way than other kids that don’t have dyslexia. shed negative labels such as stupid, careless, unmotivated and lazy. correct any misunderstandings. identify with other successful people that have or had dyslexia. acquire the needed intervention and instruction in school. learn that many people with dyslexia have strengths that others do not have. Individuals with dyslexia are often: g...

10 Easy Steps to Accommodate Students with Executive Functioning Weaknesses

Students with executive functioning problems are often a challenge for teachers. So what can teacher and parents do to help? 1. Provide a consistent and structured environment: At home: Create a structured routine and try to schedule activities that are always on the same days and at the same times. You can even schedule unstructured, free times. In school: All teachers should communicate and post homework assignments in the same way and at an expected time daily. Home work should also be collected in a reliable, routine manner. Finally, the classroom need to be managed in a consistent way with clear and concise expectations. 2. Provide reminders: Use smart phones, ipods, watches with alarms, and PDAs to provide auditory and visual reminders of important dates, activities, and things that need to be done. 3. Use a large month or two month at a glance calendar to schedule events and post it in a high traffic location. Review the calendar weekl...

12 Executive Functioning Strategies for Student Success

Gearing up for the fall, teachers and parents often scour for strategies that can help learners maximize their learning potential, complete assignments on time, and manage their workload. Although, executive functioning is a no brainer for many, planning, time management and organization can be troublesome and bewildering for others. In fact, I work with many bright and capable students that have the intellect, test taking capabilities and desire to acquire top marks, yet missing assignments, lost materials, avoidant behavior and messy backpacks wreck their GPA. Each academic year offers students a fresh start, so providing them the needed resources and support is key! Students that struggle with executive functioning are often categorized as lazy, unmotivated, and careless. These misnomers couldn't be farther from the truth. Rather, executive functioning skills are not fully developed in the brain until one reaches his or her early twenties, and expecting students to indepen...

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