{"id":15239,"date":"2011-02-16T17:08:55","date_gmt":"2011-02-16T22:08:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/danielschristian.com\/learning-ecosystems\/?p=15239"},"modified":"2011-02-16T17:22:10","modified_gmt":"2011-02-16T22:22:10","slug":"focusing-on-strengths-following-ones-passions-creating-winwin-situations-other-reflections-re-stem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/danielschristian.com\/learning-ecosystems\/2011\/02\/16\/focusing-on-strengths-following-ones-passions-creating-winwin-situations-other-reflections-re-stem\/","title":{"rendered":"Focusing on strengths; following one’s passions; creating Win\/Win situations; other reflections re: STEM"},"content":{"rendered":"

From DSC:<\/strong><\/span>
\nThe first portions of Kelly Tenkely’s solid blog posting <\/span>— 17 ways to meet individual learning needs in the math classroom<\/a> <\/strong>— stirred up some thoughts\u00a0 from a training-related session I was in earlier today. Kelly writes:<\/span><\/p>\n

Differentiating instruction can be challenging. Student\u2019s educational strengths and weaknesses can be widely varied<\/span><\/strong>, making it a difficult task to meet each student\u2019s needs in any given lesson. Math is one such subject area where student skill levels can be very different.<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

For most students, math takes a lot of practice. Unfortunately, the students who need the most practice are the most reluctant to do so because they haven\u2019t been successful in the past. Many of these students have convinced themselves, through negative self-talk, that \u201cI\u2019m just not good at math.\u201d <\/em>What is a teacher to do with such a mix of skill and comfort levels in the math classroom?<\/p>\n

Though there could be several lines of thought that I could pursue here — such as the good and bad sides of self-efficacy<\/a>, personalized\/customized learning, 1:1 initiatives, other — my thought process was most influenced from a training session I had attended earlier today. That session featured a video from Marcus Buckingham’s short-film series entitled Trombone Player Wanted<\/em>.<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Trombone<\/a>
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Marcus asserts that there are several myths that many of us grow up with (such as our personalities change as we grow; we grow most in the areas of our weaknesses; our teams don’t need us to show up with our strengths, instead they need us to do ____). Marcus asserts that we should identify and develop our strengths<\/strong> (and manage around our weaknesses) — as we seek to create Win\/Win situations<\/strong>. This perspective is consistent with my economics training that states that everyone benefits when each one of us does what we do best.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

This made me reflect on the massive, systemic pressure most of our current educational environments\/policies\/curriculums put on students to get everyone to be at the same place. It seems like our systems stress conformity — in the goal of “level-setting” everyone.<\/span><\/p>\n

This made me wonder:<\/span><\/p>\n