Warm Demanders and Bird Courses
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
September 2011
I read recently about a study done at George Mason University that reminded me of one of the first lessons I learned as an adult educator—that teachers in adult education need to be “Warm Demanders”.*
What do I mean by that term?
Well, adults often come into adult education with mixed feelings about going back to school, especially if they’ve had negative experiences in the past. So, besides dealing with family, work and other adult responsibilities that compete with education, they can be carrying a lot of emotional baggage. To get the best from their adult students, teachers need to be both warm and demanding. If they are only warm and welcoming but never require anything of substance, students pay the price. Either they realize then and there that they aren’t learning anything, or they’ll find out at the next level that they didn’t learn anything. If teachers are only demanding and go all hard core on their students, they will intimidate and discourage their students to the point where they’ll quit.
The term “Warm Demanders” was coined by Dr. James Banks in response to the “Don’t Smile Until Christmas” approach to teaching. Teachers, he said, will get a lot more out of their students if they show they care first and then make academic demands.
Adult education is full of tensions. Among other things, teachers need to balance the needs of their students with the demands of the curriculum. Teachers want to be teaching courses of substance that enable students to acquire genuine skills, which can equip them for the next step. On the other hand, students may have rusty skills or gaps in knowledge that make the learning more difficult than it might be in the K-12 system. (Although, trust me—the same issues often surface in K-12 as well.) As well, students may be flat-out fearful.
Most students know when they’re getting a ‘bird’ course, one that’s fluffy and useless, and, conversely, they know when they’re actually acquiring useful skills and relevant, interesting knowledge.
The George Mason University study I mentioned at the beginning of the article was able to describe the kind of teaching that works with difficult or problematic students, identifying three elements: emotional support, classroom organization, and instructional support.
Emotional support is more obvious, but not less necessary, than the other two. Effective teachers foster a positive classroom climate, try to meet individual needs, and promote choice and individuality. That’s the ‘warm’ part of the “Warm Demander.” Good teachers also have a well organized classroom, where there is always something useful to do and where there are opportunities to learn in a variety of ways. Finally, an effective teacher will promote deep thinking about the course material and provide the kind of constructive feedback that help students further engage their studies. That’s the ‘demander’ half of the “Warm Demander.”
At AEC, we even try to be “Warm Demanders” in our registration process. While we are friendly and receptive to new students, we do administer a mathematics and English assessment when students to register. These assessments allow us to place students in our program. Many times, we insist that students step back and do prep courses for Grade 12 Math and English. We feel that putting ill-prepared students into Grade 12 Math and English will force the teachers to water down the content. (Read: ‘bird course.”) So if you were wondering, that’s why we do it.
Last spring, our staff attended an adult education conference which featured a panel of graduates from various learning centres across the Winnipeg. One young woman from the Aboriginal Community Campus, in the last year of her education degree at the University of Winnipeg, made a very striking point. She had come up through CHARD’s literacy program after dropping out at a young age. She said one of the best things her teacher did for her was tell her the truth about her poor skill level at the time. She said it was hard to take, but done in such a way that it motivated her.
Now that teacher was a “Warm Demander” at work. Hopefully, the teachers you meet at AEC are “Warm Demanders” too.
*Dr. Robert Brooks, “A Therapeutic Environment Called School,”
http://www.drrobertbrooks.com/writings/articles/1107.html
Feel the Fear
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
May 2011
Although I’ve never read it, there is a publication called The Book of Lists, which contains, apparently, all kinds of lists. I’ve heard that one is a list of people’s fears. Number Two on the list of fears is the fear of death. Number One is the fear of public speaking. In other words, people would sooner die than speak in public!
I’ve just visited a number of our classes at AEC, and in some of those, students were making presentations in their English courses—lots of nervousness, of course, and procrastination.
What is it about speaking in public that causes so much anxiety? I’ve taught English to adolescents and adults most of my career, and nothing causes as much stress. Perhaps it’s having the spotlight on you, or a concern that you are being judged by your peers, or maybe it’s a fear that you’ll have nothing important or interesting to say.
My own journey has been interesting. I was painfully shy as a kid, big for my age and always picked last for any sports team. In Grade 8 History we had to write and memorize a lengthy history speech and present it in class. All I remember from that now was feeling humiliated when I bungled my lines. I joined high school drama productions deliberately to deal with my shyness. As an army cadet in high school, I gained experience teaching younger cadets things like map reading and first aid. As a young teacher and coach, I was of course front and centre in classes of adolescents. Still, I certainly never sought out opportunities to speak in public. Eventually as an experienced teacher and coach, I had opportunities to speak in front on and teach my peers. When I moved into adult education and administration, I was called upon to speak more often. So often, eventually, that I just grew tired of being nervous to the point where I can say that it really doesn’t bother me all that much anymore.
There should always be a normal amount of nervousness when you speak, but I just accept that as normal. All this is not to say, however, that it all comes naturally to me now. It does not.
Now, there are some speakers who really do have a gift. I once heard former Winnipeg mayor Glen Murray present a 45-minutes keynote address without a single note. It was funny, coherent, detailed, riveting. How is someone able to do that? I suspect, however, that Glen Murray is the exception, not the rule.
I tried speaking with just a few notes once at Kildonan East when I was asked to be the guest speaker at the annual sports banquet. I had a key idea I wanted to get across, but I didn’t prepare ahead of time and just scribbled a few notes on a napkin during the meal. Never again! Within two or three minutes I felt I was babbling and talking in circles.
The key word in the previous paragraph is prepare. That’s what works for me. Although I said I don’t get that nervous anymore, I still prepare like crazy, so that I know exactly what I need to say. For me this often means writing out a full script and then presenting from that (without reading of course and all the while maintaining eye contact with the audience). You probably need to figure out what will work for you. No doubt there is plenty of how-to information on the internet and elsewhere.
Speaking in public is a skill well worth developing, despite the anxiety. As the saying goes, “Face the fear, and do it anyway.” It will stand you in good stead in the workplace and give you confidence in your personal life.
At a recent conference, a former student of mine named Mark from McLeod Adult Learning Centre was part of a panel talking about the transition from a learning centre to post-secondary, in this case Graphic Arts at Red River College. When asked what was one of the most useful experiences he’d had as an adult learner in high school, he recalled when he gave a presentation on painting in my Grade 12 English class. Mark actually completed an acrylic painting on canvas in front of our eyes. Somehow, out of all the experiences he’d had as an adult learner, he recalled that presentation, saying that it galvanized his passion for graphic arts and helped propel him through three years of college.
Interesting, eh? Feel the fear, and do it anyway.
The Skill, Not the Credit
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
March 2011
Having just completed another intake process, I’ve had lots of opportunity to explain to various students the credit in a given course is less important than the skill behind the credit.
When you register at AEC, we assess almost every one of you for skill levels in mathematics and English, especially if you’ve been out of school for a while. We don’t let you just leap into Grade 12 courses if you are not prepared. There are two reasons for this: basically, it’s not fair to you and it’s not fair to the teachers.
If we put you into courses for which you are not prepared, you can become overwhelmed, discouraged or disgruntled. Or worse—you drop out and don’t come back.
Even more of an issue for me as director is that if we put students into Grade 12 who aren’t ready, then the teacher is forced, by default, to water down the course, so that what you’re getting is not a true Grade 12. That, to me, is an unacceptable alternative.
There are skills to be acquired and they don’t fall out of trees. They need to be studied and learned. If you struggle with fractions and decimals and basic arithmetic, you’re not ready for Grade 12. It doesn’t mean you’re stupid; it just means you’ve never mastered those skills, or you need to re-learn them. When I took my Grade 12 provincial Mathematics exam in 1965 (worth 100% of your grade in those days), I scored 99%. If I took the same exam today, I would fail. So I doubt if I could walk into a Grade 12 pre-cal course and succeed without some preparation.
In English, if you struggle with grammar, spelling, sentence structure, and paragraphs, if you’ve never done a basic research paper or a persuasive essay, then there’s a lot to learn before you step into a Grade 12 English course.
We had students argue endlessly to be allowed into a Grade 12 course. “Just let me try.” “I need to get into college in the fall.” My brother-in-law (or partner, best friend, girlfriend’s mother) is really good in math and he’ll help.” “My best friend went to a school and they let her into Grade 12 and she only has Grade 9.” We even had a student offer a $400.00 bribe.
If you don’t acquire the skill behind the credit, it will come back to bite you sooner or later, especially if you’re planning to go on to post-secondary. I talked to one student who was admitted into university on the basis of her high school diploma, then suspended and put on probation because of her poor academic skills. “All we did in Grade 12 English,” she told me, “was fill out bursary applications.”
Most college and university courses now require entrance tests to assess your reading and writing skills. If you don’t score high enough, you don’t get in.
I’ve spoken to university representatives about their intake process. Interestingly, they know exactly which high schools and learning centres give away their credits and which places they can trust that student have the skill behind the credit. As a director, I want to run a centre that has a good reputation in the eyes of those places we send our students.
So…get the skill behind the credit—because, in the long run, it’s more important than the credit itself.
Think of Israel Idonijee
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
December 2010
I love football. It was the first sport I played that I was any good at. I can watch any game from peewee to professional and get engaged in it. I love the CFL, and I love the NFL even more, because the National Football League has arguably the biggest, fastest, most talented athletes of any sport in the world.
One of those athletes is 29-year-old Israel Idonijee. Who is he? If you don’t follow football, you may not know. Israel plays defensive end for the Chicago Bears. He stands 6 feet, six inches tall and weighs in at something like 270 pounds. He’s smart, fearless, fast like spit and on target to lead his team in quarterback sacks this year.
What does this have to do with adult education? Well, first, Israel is a local story. He is a Nigerian immigrant who comes from Brandon, Manitoba, and, as far as I know, is the only Manitoban to have made the NFL. Second, while Israel has undeniable athletic ability, his success is really a story of remarkable persistence in the face of overwhelming odds. He really shouldn’t be where he is today.
First, Israel didn’t even play football until Grade 12 in high school, and that was in a nine-man rural league, hardly a breeding ground for professional athletes. The coaches just told him to chase the guy with the ball. Probably because of his size, he was invited out to the Manitoba Bisons where he sat on the bench until the final game of his third season. Did he ever want to quit? You bet he did. He played his next and last year with U of M, was selected all-Canadian and invited to play in the East-West Shrine bowl with American players. It was here he really began to believe in his abilities. He was signed by Cleveland, injured, and then picked up by Chicago. He has worked his way from special teams, to a rotation on the defensive line, to starter.
Israel is a testimony to what can happen once you believe in yourself. Many football players with equal skills and better training and opportunities never make it because they never learn to believe they can. “If you can’t see it, that’s your No. 1 hindrance,” Israel says. “Fortunately for me, I was able to break out of that and say, ‘You know what? I can play in the NFL. I belong in the NFL.’”
Have a goal? Think it’s beyond your reach? Think of Israel Idonijee.
[Source: “Prairie football project proves sky’s the limit” by Stephen Brunt, The Globe and Mail, Nov. 6, 2010]
Passing the Marshmallow Test
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
November 2010
Daniel Goleman in his book Emotional Intelligence makes reference to a famous experiment conducted by researchers involving children and marshmallows.
Children, roughly kindergarten age, were brought into a room by themselves and given a single marshmallow. They were told they could eat it immediately, or, if they were willing to wait, they could receive a second marshmallow. The researcher then left the children alone for a period of time.
The experiment was meant to test impulse control or the ability of children to delay their gratification. Some children ate the marshmallow immediately, some waited then eventually succumbed, and some, by developing various strategies like avoiding eye contact with the marshmallow, were able to wait it out and receive a second treat.
The really interest aspect of this experiment, however, is that it was longitudinal, that is, they followed up the original children into their late teens and found those who were able to wait for their second marshmallow were more successful—better marks, better jobs, higher salaries, higher acceptance into post-secondary, more leadership skills and so on.
Scary to think that your life’s path is set at age four or five!
But I don’t think it has to be. Self-awareness is the key. How is your impulse control, or your ability to delay gratification? To what extent have you ‘tamed the elephant” (See previous blog.)? We are all capable of changing if we want something bad enough.
Taming the Elephant
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
October 2010
If you’ve ever tried to go on a diet and failed, or tried to get into an exercise routine and failed, you’ve failed at taming the elephant.
In a recent Globe and Mail column, Margaret Wente talks about the idea that people are riders of elephants, a concept she first heard of in the a book called The Happiness Hypothesis by psychologist Jonathan Haidt.
The key to life, it seems, is impulse control, and the better we get at it, the more successful and happy we’ll be. We are riders of elephants—the rational side of us is the rider and the side of us that’s wired for pleasure (including, unfortunately, gluttony, lust, sloth and the rest of the seven deadly sins) is the elephant.
The problem is, of course, the elephant is way stronger than the rider, so much so that, more often than not, the elephant just does what it wants despite the rider’s best efforts. That’s why the road to hell is, as they say, paved with good intentions. People want to do good and want to do well—at least the rider does—but the elephant just has its way.
Diets fail—the food’s just too tasty.
Exercise regimes collapse—it’s way more comfortable just to stay in bed.
Crime runs rampant—the money’s too easily and working is too boring.
I bet even many of the people who litter probably want to be recyclers—it’s just too much work and much easier just to roll down the window and pitch the empty Tim Horton’s cup for the litter fairy to pick up.
Coming back to school will require you to tame your elephant. It would probably be much more fun to stay home and watch Jersey Shore than to get your butt off the couch and get to Physics class. The elephant likes to do the NOW things—eat hose fries, lie on that couch, watch that TV show. The rider has concerns about the future—if I finish high school I can qualify for that job, or if I get that Chemistry credit I can maybe become a paramedic.
As I once said to one of my daughter’s when she was struggling with what to do with her life, “Sooner or later you’re going to have to do something difficult.” Doing something difficult with involve taming your elephant, controlling your impulses. The rewards, however, will be worth it.
Burton Cummings and You
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
June 2010
There was a very interesting column in this month’s Free Press by Gordon Sinclair about Burton Cummings. St. John’s High School had just had its 100th reunion. It was a huge event with a gala dinner, dance and concert where Burton Cummings and his touring band performed. A big deal and a huge success by all accounts. And as well as all the success and money record sales, Burton Cummings has received a Juno Award, has had two buildings named after him, and was recently awarded the Order of Canada by Governor-General Michaelle Jean. So it was only fitting that St. John’s High School showcase Burton Cummings along with other famous grads, such as Ken Kostick, Monty Hall and Chris Walby. If a school is a hundred years old and as big as St. John’s, you’re bound to have a few famous grads.
Problem is, Burton Cummings is not a St. John’s grad. He was kicked out when he was 16 years old. Not only was he kicked out, but according to his blog, the principal kind of mocked his goal to be a musician.
So the rest is Canadian music history, first with the Guess Who and then as a solo artist, Burton Cummings achieved the kind of star status very few achieve. As the saying goes, the road to rock stardom is paved with the bones of wannabe musicians.
For someone like Burton Cummings, who needs a high school diploma, right? Well actually, wrong. According to Sinclair’s column, Linda Bulka, the current principal at St. John’s High School found out last week that Burton had never graduated, and is hoping to grant him some legitimate credits based on his accomplishments and have him wear a hat and gown, and walk across the stage to receive his diploma from St. John’s High School.
What a great story, right? But, the most interesting thing about Sinclair’s column was how Cummings felt about being kicked out of school. Apparently, when Linda Bulka asked him to come into the same office he’d been in when he was expelled from school, he wouldn’t do it and his eyes welled up with tears—it was that painful a memory.
Here’s how Gordon Sinclair ended his column:
“I think there’s more than one lesson learned from Burton Cummings’ time in high school. There’s the one students can learn about the rewards of doing what you do best to the best of your ability. And then there’s the one principals and teachers can learn about how not treating students as individuals, and inflicting harsh punishment, can leave people with the kind of life-long pain that never goes away. No matter how rich and famous one becomes. And no matter how many prestigious awards one wins. As for finally being awarded a high school diploma, it might not be as prestigious as the Order of Canada or as lucrative as all those gold records. But it’s gotta be the sweetest of them all.”
Over the years of my involvement in adult-education, I’ve seen this same scenario a number of times. I think it’s called “Unfinished Business.”
I’ve had more than a few very accomplished adults see me about getting a high school diplomas. These have included the head of safety training for a major Manitoba utility, an accountant who worked for a large municipality, a registered nurse, a psychology graduate from U of W, a retired police officer in his fourth career, and—my favorite—an MBA graduate who received his high school diploma from AEC and his PhD in the same year. Each well past high school age, some well-established in their careers, into their second or third career or even retired. Each accomplished. Each without a high school diploma and wanting to deal with that unfinished business of a high school education.
So what you accomplish at AEC is important; and in some ways it’s a lot more difficult to come to school as an adult who has others priorities beyond school—families, jobs and other obligation that you don’t have a teenager. But you may also have found that high school education means more this time around. And you can use it to be successful in your next step, whatever step that may be.
[For the Winnipeg Free Press story of Burton Cumming's graduation, click here.]
How To Be An Imposter
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
April 2010
An imposter? Yes, and in fact it may be the only way to learn.
Imposters are pretenders or fakes, something usually not associated with the noble enterprise of learning.
But think back to the last time you learned something new, and maybe not school learning. How did you feel at first?
Back in the day, I was asked to take over the coaching duties of a high school wrestling team. Did I have any experience as an athlete in the sport? None. Had I any experience as a coach? Again, none. Did I know what I was doing? Not really. I’d played football when I was in high school and I was fit. That was about it.
Did I feel like a fake the first time I stepped into the gym with a whistle around my neck? You bet I did. I also felt confused, insecure, foolish and frightened. Who was I to be coaching this sport anyway? I wasn’t a real coach—I was an imposter.
I am guessing this is how most of us feel when we take on the enterprise of learning something unfamiliar. Everybody else knows more than you, they are smarter than you and they are going to do better than you. They are real students, and you are an imposter.
As it turned out, I got fairly good at coaching. Despite my initial bumbling and lack of knowledge, I eventually acquired the needed skills—by reading books, attending workshops, observing successful athletes, and talking to other coaches. I also got on the mat with my students and took some beatings just so I could learn more. Within a few years, some of my athletes were winning medals at national championships. One even became an Olympian. What it took on my part, though, was two important things. The second most important thing was persistence. I have the kind of temperament that makes me stick to something until I get it.
But I’m convinced the most important thing is the ability to push through the feeling of being an imposter—all those feelings of insecurity and anxiety and incompetence. You see, almost everybody feels the same way when they set out to learn something new. I think it’s part of the natural cycle of learning. The trouble is, of course, those feelings can make us to want to quit. But if you can tolerate them, and push through them, you can be successful at anything you try.
The alternative is not really very pleasant—you will be reluctant to try anything new for fear of looking or feeling foolish. Then you’re stuck, and that’s probably not the way to live your life.
Butt Time and Other Keys to Post-Secondary
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
March 2010
Recently a former student named Meghann participated on a panel that came to AEC to talk about the transition from our centre to post-secondary. Meghann is now in third year at the University of Winnipeg with a double major in Sociology and Criminal Justice.
The transformation in Meghann over the last three years has been astonishing. This past year she was published and credited in her professor’s new text book. This was Meghann? The single mother of two who dropped out of school and came to AEC to finish up? The high school drop-out who worked at a series of dead-end jobs until she got tired of where she was headed? The same Meghann who went to university to be a lawyer based on the thought that important people are doctors or lawyers? “Well, I don’t like science,” she said to herself, “so I guess I’ll be a lawyer then.” The same Meghann whose first couple of essays I edited to help her with her faulty grammar and organization?
If you talk to Meghann today, she’ll tell you about how university is more than marks and credits, and worth all the hard work, just because it opens up a whole new world of thinking and possibilities. Meghann is in a different space now than she was when she first walked through our doors.
One thing she said really stuck with me. “You don’t have to be that smart,” she said, “You just need some ‘butt’ time.” Well, she actually used a ruder term. But basically, there are times you just need to apply the seat of your pants to the seat of the chair and “Get ‘er done,” as Manitoba’s own John Montgomery might say. It’s not that you need to be fantastically smart to do well at university; you just need to recognize when to apply yourself, and then simply apply yourself.
I have kept a file, as I am in the habit of doing about topics that interest me, on the transition from high school to post-secondary. Several articles ask students for first-year survival tips. So besides Meghann’s ‘butt’ time, here are a few others:
University is nothing to be afraid of—Professors provide summaries, reading schedules, online notes and PowerPoint slides. The trick is, of course, to pay attention to them. As Meghann said, you don’t have to be a genius; you just have to apply yourself.
Get lots of sleep—you need to be alert in class. Doing a slack-jawed head bob during a slow-moving lecture will not do much for your learning.
Get to class early—so you can…
Sit in the front row—Not heard of the famous “Magic T”? Statistically, studies have shown that students sitting across the front and down the middle of classes get higher marks. No why would that be? Besides, why fight the statistical odds?
Read your syllabus—Professor will hand out a detailed course outline on the first day. Read it, mark dates for assignments in your calendar, and check your schedule of readings in order to…
Stay on top of readings—Most courses have scheduled readings with dates attached to them. Keep up. Even better, prepare for classes by doing the assigned readings ahead of time. Study up on how to take notes on what you’re reading by googling one of the many websites that explain methods and tips.
Talk to your professors—especially if you are unclear about the parameters of an assignment or where you stand in the course. All professors hold office hours. Make an appointment.
Plan your time—You will find yourself with all kinds of unstructured time in university, which has undone many a student. Get a planner. Read up on time management if you lack that skill.
Check the rules—Especially about citing sources, bibliographies and the like. Do you know the difference between MLA, APA and Chicago, and do you know which style your professor prefers? And also when you don’t understand an assignment, you need to learn to be assertive as a post-secondary student. Therefore…
Ask questions—Of course, you can’t ask questions if you don’t attend class, so that’s another issue. (“Did anything happen in class during the last two weeks?” is not a question you want to be asking.) When you’re in tutorials and lectures, stay engaged by probing when you need understanding. And take advantage of office hours, mentioned above.
I could go on here, but that’s enough for now. Drop-out rates at post-secondary are notoriously high, but I’m convinced that attending with at least some knowledge of the transition from high school will serve you well, and keep you from wasting your time and money.
Thinking & Nursing
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
February 2010
Thinking & Nursing. You might think this a strange title for blog. Well, “Thinking” is the name of a poem I recently came across—not a great poem, but it has some truth in it. The first verse goes like this:
If you think you are beaten, you are;
If you think you dare not, you don’t;
If you like to win but think you can’t
It’s almost a given you won’t.
It’s a poem about the penalties of being timid, being afraid to fail, not believing in yourself.
And “Nursing”? Well, nursing is a profession that many of adult students aspire to. But there are several things you need to know about nursing. One—it’s very difficult to get into–there are often waiting lists several years long, for example, and so your marks also need to be really high. Two—once you’re in the nursing program, you’ll find it a very challenging program—fast-paced, volumes of reading, hours of studying. It’s a program that seems to deliberately apply pressure on its students to weed them out.
I want to talk about three adult students I’ve come across who finished nursing. They’re unique, because they weren’t the best students in the world, and they certainly didn’t perceive themselves that way either. Remember the first verse of that poem:
If you like to win but think you can’t
It’s almost a given you won’t.
These students each struggled in their own way with those demons that haunt many of us at times in our lives—low self-esteem, fears, inadequacies.
Judy
I’ll talk first about Judy. Judy was in her late thirties when she came to one of Manitoba’s adult learning centres. She was bright, articulate, and yes, no doubt about it, she wanted to be a nurse and take the accelerated diploma program offered by Red Rive College. She did very well in her high school courses, and scored in the nineties on the provincial English exam. When she aced the entrance exam at Red River, they moved her off the waiting lists and made a way for her to enter that September. Yet Judy had her demons and skeletons. She was from a horrifically abusive home. She was a single mom whose partner had abandoned her. She had dropped out of school. When I phoned her a year after graduation, she said had an okay job, and going back to school was not a priority any longer.
I’m delighted to tell you,however, that as of today she is a charge nurse in one of Winnipeg’s hospitals. What happened? She said she got tired of listening to people tell her she couldn’t do it—too dumb, too old—and she just did it. Got some student aid and students loans and credit and just did it.
Eileen
Eileen was a high school graduate who came to an adult learning centre to pick up her Chemistry and her second credit in English so she could apply for nursing. Her case was different from Judy’s. She finished high school. But although she finished it, she took general courses rather than university entrance, and graduated with minimal credits. You see, Eileen was pigeon-holed by the school system way back in Junior High. For reasons that were never made clear to her or her parents, she was put into Remedial Math and English, and the effect on her self-esteem left her feeling stupid and incapable of doing higher level work. So when high school came, she never had the confidence to try harder courses.
Our struggles are more often in the head and the heart. It’s not that we can’t learn the skills; it’s more that we don’t think we can learn them. That’s what really stops us.
So later, as an adult, when Eileen realized she wanted to be a nurse, she had to return to an adult learning centre to take those credits she needed. Today, I’m happy to say, she has completed her Bachelor of Nursing from the University of Manitoba and is employed in a major hospital.
Jon
Jon graduated with his mature Student Diploma in 2003. If you saw his high school transcript, you’d see two of his credits read English 30M and Mathematics 30M. Now you know that 30 means Grade 11 or Senior, but what does the ‘M’ mean. ‘M’ means modified. Now there may often be good reasons for modifying a given student’s program to allow them to graduate, but the ‘M’ credit is a dead end as far as post-secondary programs. But Jon came to an adult learning centre and got his Grade 12. He stated straight up that he wanted to go into Nursing. And he’s accomplished that. The last time I talked to him, he was half way through his Bachelor of Nursing and doing very well, thank you.
I think in each of these cases, these people simply got angry at the limitations others had placed on them, and the limitations they had placed on themselves, and then they got determined—very determined.
When I first interviewed for my first job in adult education, I was asked a question: “What is the key to teaching adults?” From my limited experience teaching writing to adults, I said without hesitating, “Confidence.” They need to have the confidence that they can do it, whatever ‘it’ is. I think that is still true.
A few years ago, I coached a team of 14-year-old girls all the way to the city basketball championships. (Now I don’t know if you’ve even coached a group of Grade 8 girls, but I can tell you their listening skills really suck.) Our opponent in the final game had already beaten us twice, and although I had suggested some adjustments to help us, I wasn’t at all sure we could do it. But I did know they had the ability to win. Just before the game started, we huddled up and I got them to be quiet for a few seconds. Then I said, “Girls, you have all the ability and all the talent you need to win this, you just need to play from here…” and I gestured to my heart.” Remember what the poem said: “If you think you are beaten, you are…”
The last first of the poem goes like this:
Life’s battles don’t always go
To the stronger or faster man;
But sooner or later the person who wins
Is the person who thinks she can.
Richard’s Red Corvette
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
December 2009
Richard is a fellow adult educator I had the pleasure of working with a few years ago. He liked to challenge students who make excuses for not showing up to class or not handing in assignments.
Richard would ask, ”Why are you here?”
His student would say, “Well, I really want to get this credit.”
Then Richard would say, “I really want a red Corvette.”
Or a student would say, “I really want to graduate,” and Richard would say, “I really want a red Corvette.”
Richard’s comment usually drew blank stares. Until he explained himself. More of that later.
In Pursuit of Happiness
A recent W5 Documentary, called In Pursuit of Happiness, ran a few years ago on TV. The program sought to find out what made people happy. Their approach was simple—visit different parts of Canada, find people who are genuinely happy with their lives, and try to figure out what makes them tick.
The filmmakers discovered what we have heard often enough—that wealth and money do not necessarily mean happiness, and quoted Robert Kennedy: “The gross national product,” Kennedy said, ”does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debates or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country. It measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile.” Not long ago, the Winnipeg Free Press ran the story of a North Kildonan man who had won millions of dollars in a lottery, and ended up hanging himself in his garage. So if millions of dollars won’t make us happy, what will?
The documentary did determine seven traits of genuinely happy people. Happy people:
–Are optimistic
–Savor life
–Value friends & family
–Are helpful
–Are grateful
–Have goals
I want to focus on one of these traits.
Happy People Have Goals
Maybe I’m just slow to learn, but I didn’t fully realize when I first became an adult educator just how important goals were for adult students returning to finish high school. To propel you through the homework, the stress, the competing demands of work and family, and sometimes the boredom, you need a goal. And the clearer the goal the better.
Because what happens in adult education if your goal isn’t compelling enough? You know what happens. People quit..
And it has to be your goal. It can’t be your girlfriend’s goal, or your husband’s goal, your father’s goal or your mother-in-law’s goal. This may sound obvious, but I can’t count the number of times adult students are dragged in to our centre by other people. Frankly, it will never happen for those students until they get it. It has to be your goal.
Happy people have goals.
And your goal has to be specific. Adult students often come to here with the general goal of getting their Grade 12. When we ask what they want to do beyond that, many times their answers are vague. I once had a student who said he wanted to go to university because of the frat parties he’d seen in movies. Come to think of it, his mother also brought him in. Needless to say, he did not succeed. One of our challenges as adult educators here is to help students clarify their goals. I would go so far as to say it’s perhaps the most important task we have, because I think goals underpin everything.
The NA Factor
One of the statistics I paid attention to at a previous centre was whether or not potential grads thought the grad ceremony was important—what I call the NA (Not Attending) Factor. At registration one September, we asked potential grads if they wanted to attend our graduation ceremony. If they did, we checked ‘yes’ on their registration forms and recorded their heights so we would be able to order the right size gown. Most of our potential graduates wanted to attend the ceremony, and some even said how important it was to wear the cap and gown. Always, though, there were a handful of students who rejected the grad ceremony outright, as unimportant, irrelevant, even kind of adolescent. Just before the Christmas break, I prepared a list of graduates, recording the heights of those who wanted to come to grad and the letters NA (for Not Attending) by those who’d told me they weren’t interested. Then I maintained the list, tracking courses for each of them and making sure everyone had the required credits by June. The funny thing was, that year the majority of the NAs didn’t make it. Only 9% of those who said they would attend grad didn’t make it, as compared to a whopping 63% of the NAs.
What’s The Best Time to Plant a Tree?
Adults coming back to school have great hopes and dreams. But it’s one thing to have a goal, and quite another to understand how to act on that goal. I came across a question. “What’s the best time to plant a tree?” Think about that. Were you thinking seasons? Spring? Fall? Here’s the answer: “The best time to plant a tree is 25 years ago. The second best time is today.”
Author John Maxwell said this: “You may not be where you’re supposed to be. You may not be what you want to be. You don’t have to be what you used to be. And you don’t have to ever arrive. You just need to learn to be the best you can be right now.”
Be the best you can be right now. In fact all you have is now. You can’t change the past, and you can’t control the future.
That’s what Richard is getting at when he said, “I really want a red Corvette” to students who don’t attend or don’t hand in work. When these students gave him blank looks, he explained: “Will someone sell me a red Corvette? Yes. Can I afford one? Probably, if I make a few sacrifices. But the reason I don’t have one is that I don’t want it badly enough to change anything.”
What’s you next goal. How badly do you want to achieve it?
Some of you, I know, think it may be too late, you’re too old (You’ll be the same age in a year or ten years no matter what you do!).
Here’s something to think about that I came across:
So stop waiting…
Until your car is paid off
Until you get a new car or home.
Until your kids leave the house.
Until you go back to school.
Until you finish school.
Until you lose ten pounds.
Until you gain ten pounds.
Until you get married.
Until you get a divorce.
Until you have kids.
Until you retire.
Until summer.
Until spring.
Until winter.
Until fall.
Until you die.
What’s your red Corvette? Do you want it badly enough? Can you figure out what you need to do now to give yourself the best chance of achieving it?
Boys to Men
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
November 2009
For several years now, I have been clipping articles about what happens to boys in the education system. As a high school teacher, I didn’t notice the problem so much, but I really started to notice it when I became an adult educator.
What’s the problem, you ask? The problem is that boys may be dropping out of their own education, leaving an important segment of the population and our social fabric marginalized and alienated.
When I became involved in adult education at McLeod Adult Learning Centre in 1999, I thought it interesting that the ratio of female to male students was always higher. This remains true at AEC, and at most centres I am aware of.
Boys in general, the media tell us, are at much greater risk than girls of being diagnosed with ADHD, dropping out, committing suicide, committing crime and so on.
Just look at the headlines of the articles I’ve collected:
–“Ontario board pushes for ‘boy-friendly school”, Globe & Mail, Oct. 21/09
–“Closing the gender gap”, Wpg. Free Press, Aug. 18/09
–“All girls – better grades”, Globe & Mail, Apr. 21/09
–“How to fix boys”, Maclean’s Jan. 21/08
–“Universities balk at steps to attract men”, National Post, Dec. 3/07
–“Looking for Mr. Chips: Some experts contend that boys suffer from the lack of male teachers”, Maclean’s, Mar. 7/05
–“Women filling universities as schools fail to teach boys”, Wpg. Free Press, 2004
Christine Burrows, in “Jobs for the boys? Learn from the pros” (Wpg. Free Press, Jan. 28/08) describes the trajectory for many boys, especially in Winnipeg’s inner city, of, first, failure at school, then indifference to it, making them prime candidates for gang recruitment. No need to mention the social costs of that scenario.
Theories abound as to why. Is it the lack of male teachers? Has the educational system been feminized to the extent that unique learning needs of males are ignored? Has the traditional male role in society of, as one writer put, “using your strength in the service of others”, been attacked and devalued?
Some educational programs are attempting to have all male classes or schools where boys, who have normally been told to sit down and be quiet, are taught in ways that allow them to get up and move as they learn. The Winnipeg Sun recently ran an article about a high school in Germany that brought its drop-out rate down to almost zero by having a male and female teacher work with the same class of students throughout high school years.
At AEC, teachers try to use ‘active learning’ strategies in their classrooms to help engage students in their learning, moving them from the idea that learning is “sitting and getting.” Adults do learn differently and are less likely to tolerate “sitting and getting.” The stakes are high in adult education, and adults, male or female, taking the time to return to school either want to know how they will benefit from it or want a different experience than they may have had in previous schooling.
In Praise of Dead-End Jobs
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
October 2009
We tend to turn up our noses at the thought of working in the service industry at places like McDonald’s. Service industry jobs have been portrayed as unfulfilling, repetitive, requiring little skill or thought.
However, Maclean’s magazine ran an interesting article by Stephanie Findlay in its August 31, 2009 edition, suggesting there is much to be gained from these jobs. “In Praise of Dead–End Jobs” features interviews with a number of successful people describing what they learned serving food, stocking shelves, picking fruit, sweeping floors and so on.
Not surprisingly, so-called McJobs have taught people to appreciate their opportunity to get an education and to recognize, by comparison, what a fulfilling job actually is.
More surprising is the revelation that such jobs can actually help workers gain valuable life and work skills, which can then help them advance in their careers. One person learned to cope at his dead-end job by developing his people skills, which in turn gave him direction and a huge leg up in what he eventually chose to do. Another came to the realization that we shouldn’t derive all our self-worth from our work. Retail and service jobs can also teach how to deal with difficult and demanding people, a invaluable skill in any career.
Employers are now looking at resumes for past work in the service industry, because they know if someone can stick it out at, say, as a cook in a fast-food place or as a waiter in a restaurant, chances are they have developed employability skills that make them valuable in any job and any level.
So maybe it’s time to re-assess the role of all those dead-end jobs. One of he quotes we’ve put up on our bulletin board at AEC is poet Maya Angelou’s: “If you don’t like something change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” Don’t like your lousy job? Change your attitude. You might be in for a surprise.
Sudoku, Gretzky & Other Thoughts
by Phil McBurney, Director, AEC
June 2009
I was pretty good in high school math. English—not so much. Final marks: Math-99%, English 63%.
So what did I do after high school? Naturally, I went on to take English at university—choosing to major in my worst high school subject. Now, I liked English; I just wasn’t very good at it. The very first essay I handed in to my freshman English prof scored a 50%. How did that make me feel—well, I felt like an imposter. All the other people were way smarter than I was—they were real English students. I was a fake. In fact, I didn’t get a ‘B’ until third year.
To make a long story short, I eventually got the hang of it, but it was a bit of a journey for me.
I still think about Math and how my life might be different if I’d gone the math route. My name might be Louise, for example. I think about math so much I started taking up Sudoku puzzles. I tell myself: “I’m a math guy. I can so Sudokus, no problem.” But more about that later.
In addition to Sudokus, I can be a reno TV junkie. One of my favourites is Disaster DIY. Do you know it? Typically, the show features a couple where the husband has started some kind of reno project, then is either overwhelmed or loses interest, or both. The wife then calls Brian Baumler, an expert handyman, to come and clean up the mess, correct the mistakes, teach some skills and get the wayward husband back on track. Inevitably, the husband learns, gains confidence and is able to tackle a project on his own.
Let me guess how those husbands first felt—they felt like imposters.. All other husbands were way smarter and more skilled than they were. They weren’t real handimen. They were fakes. Are you seeing a pattern here?
This is the first part of a learning cycle. We are fakes. Everyone else is way smarter than we are. Everyone else has it together and we don’t. Just think of any time you stepped or were pushed out of your comfort zone. Maybe you’ve coached your kid or taken up a new sport or activity, taken some kind of course, or started a new job. And most likely, you’re at a point now—with your graduation about to be behind you—where you may well be on to something new, something unfamiliar, something likely to challenge your skills and your confidence. Some next step for you.
If that’s the case, just be ready for how you’re liable to feel—like an imposter, like you’re in overwhelm, like everyone else has it together and you don’t—and put it in perspective.
When I did a Sudoku on line—I’m a math guy, remember—it gave me an evaluation. I came in the first percentile. Do you know what that means? That means that 99% of the other people who’ve done the same puzzle were faster than I was and didn’t make any mistakes. In other words, in the Sudoku world, I’m a big loser. But with Sudoku—the stakes are pretty low, after all—I can put it in perspective. I know that, if I persist, I’ll eventually get the hang of it.
So let me encourage you, whatever your next step is, to persist when it’s uncomfortable, to keep the faith in yourself, to realize you will eventually get the hang of it. Otherwise, you rob yourself of the chance to rise to the challenge.
Like Wayne Gretzky says, “100 % of the shots you don’t take will not go in the net.”
