During our recent class meeting Teacher Linda gave us, as parents and as teachers, homework; Think of someone who inspired you as a child and become that person to the children. Looking back I was fortunate enough to attend some wonderful boarding schools with many excellent teachers but only a handful of them resonated with me. In trying to narrow down what attributes made them "stick" an impression on me (as a very difficult/obstinate student..thus the attendance to said boarding schools) i was reminded of a study I read recently about the
Pygmalion effect. In short a teacher was told that five of his students (chosen randomly for the study) had scored exceptionally on their aptitude test. He was to treat them the same as all the other students and that the information was purely for his knowledge. At the end of the school year the 5 randomly selected students:
- scored 10 points higher on the final test.
- learned tasks in half the time.
- where selected by their peers as the most desirable to work with.
- and had a higher attendance rate.
What was the reason for this? Although the teacher swore he treated them the same he had held that positive vision of them in his mind. Holding a positive vision makes one smile more, give more positive feeedback, listen better, be more expressive and offer more interesteing and chalaging opportunities.
So, bringing this long winded post back around,
someone who is inspirational is someone who sees potential in you. They may not say "I see your potential" but if they truly see in you potential and treat you as such it becomes a self fulfilled prophecy. My goal this week is to see the potential (positive perspective) in every child and treat them like they have something amazing to give each day.
Stay tuned for this thought process in action as i apply it to the petri dish we call pre-school.
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