"Downward spiral talk is based on the fear that we will be stopped in our tracks and fall short in the race, and it is wholly reactive to circumstances, circumstances that appear to be wrong, problematic, and in need of fixing....The more attention you shine on a particular subject, the more evidence of it will grow."
-Benjamin Zander
The Art of Possibility
This is a powerful concept. This describes what happens in many teacher lounges across America. It is very easy to get sucked in by downward spiral talk. Statements like: "It's about time they made some changes around here. It won't matter anyway though. Nothing will ever work out in our favor."; or "They will never make that improvement. It would be too much like right."; or worse "They will never learn. Don't even bother teaching them higher order thinking skills. Stick to direct instruction and remedial practice, they will never be more than remedial. As soon as you turn in the lesson plan with the proposal to use that game the prinicpal will shut you down. No one should ever try that again." On and on and on the negative talk goes, extolling on the negative aspects of teaching, from policies to student achievement, nothing is going to ever work out right. There are so many problems in education today that it is often hard not to get sucked down into the doldrums of the defeatist attitude that nothing will ever improve but only get worse. I have to deliberately force myself out of this thinking sometimes. The day that I am unable to avoid the spiral is the day that I will lose all love for teaching.
No comments:
Post a Comment