Excuses (or making soup)

A man went to his neighbor to enquire about borrowing a tool and was told he couldn't use it. When the man asked why, the neighbor told him, "I'm making soup."  "What does making soup have to do with my borrowing a tool?" the man asked. "When it comes to excuses," the neighbor replied, "one is as good any."  

As educators, we have to be wary about making excuses, especially regarding student achievement. While there are multiple reasons why students do poorly, many of which are out of our control, we can't afford to use these as excuses.  Instead, we need to focus on those factors that we can control.  

In a recent conversation with a teacher, we were discussing what can be done to increase student success.  The point kept arising, "But these kids come to us...." (fill in the blank) and "But, we have to ....." (fill in the blank). The blanks include hungry and tired, little parental support, raising themselves, three grades behind, lacking social skills, give too many tests, complete too much paperwork, etc.  Sadly, we have no control over most of these "but" factors.  They are issues that are out of our hands.  We can't ignore them, but we also can't afford to use them as excuses.  

Instead, we need to focus on improving and changing what is within our control.  We don't have much control over what happens outside the school or what mandates come from the state, "but" we do have control over what occurs within the classroom and the school.  For example, if students are hungry, feed them.  If they are behind, identify gaps and find creative ways to fill them.  If they have few social skills, teach them and give opportunity to practice.  Create a classroom and school culture that shouts, "This is a safe place to learn."  Teach engaging lessons. Give students opportunity to serve and lead.  Develop positive relationships with students and parents. Differentiate.  Work together with and learn from other educators.  Act as a parent, if necessary. The list goes on and on. 

 In Alcoholics Anonymous, they start each meeting with the Serenity Prayer: "God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference."  It might serve us well to adopt this prayer as we seek to serve students amidst so many issues that are beyond our control.  

I'm as guilty as any of making excuses.  It is the path of least resistance.  However, as educators, when we make excuses, we disempower ourselves and do a disservice to our students. Instead of excuses, we need to recognize the factors that are within our control and focus on doing these to the best of our ability and in a way that will be in the best interest of students. No more making soup.  

Getting Things Done

"Procrastination is attitude's natural assassin. There's nothing so fatiguing as an uncompleted task." - William James

I don't know about you, but I tend to be a natural procrastinator.  Thankfully, I've gotten better over the last few years, but summer seems to bring the procrastination monster back to rear it's ugly head.  In this post, I plan on covering a few strategies I've learned for fighting procrastination and getting more done. 

1) Eat that frog!*  - "If the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning is eat a live frog, then nothing worse can happen for the rest of the day." - Mark Twain.  Basically, "eat that frog" means tackle the most important or difficult task of the day first thing in the morning. Get it out of the way.  If you do this, you build momentum and everything else seems simple. You will tend to be more energetic and focused on your other tasks. If you don't, then this most difficult task will lie just beneath the surface, haunting you and draining your energy as you work on less important items. 

* Brian Tracy wrote a book by the same title.  Great read!

2) Prioritize - How do you know what is the most important task of the day? My system is simple. At the end of each day, I make a list of the things that I need to accomplish and transfer it to a notecard (So 20th century, right?).  I then number each task in order of importance.  At the start of each day, I work on task number 1 until I get it done.  Then, I move on to task number 2, and so on. At the end of the day, I rewrite the list and change/add items as necessary.  It is said that you should make the list right before bed so your brain will work on it as you sleep.  Don't know if that's true, but doing it the night before saves time in the morning.  (I have to add a disclaimer to this one: As a school administrator, there are so many distractions during the course of the day, it is often to hard to focus on one thing for an extended time.  In this case, either find a time to close your door and remain undisturbed except for emergencies or discipline yourself to return to the list immediately after dealing with other situations.)

3) Use five minutes wisely - This has been one of the greatest tools I have found to help get things accomplished. Distractions are common in education. There can be a lot of waiting for students, teachers, parents, etc.  I try to use the intervals while I'm waiting to complete productive tasks. For example, while waiting for a student to arrive in my office, I will spend a few minutes working on one of the tasks on my list. When I was teaching, I would grade papers at odd times, such as while waiting for my car to get fixed. I might not get a lot accomplished in these short intervals, but by the end of the day, each of these short intervals will have added up.

4) Piggyback (success begets success) - Sometimes, it is possible to get bogged down in a task and feel like nothing is being accomplished.  This often happens when I am working on new projects that require creative thinking.  When I get bogged down, instead of trying to plow through, I'll stop and do something I know I can be successful at. For example, at home, I may mow the lawn.  This is simple enough and it allows my mind to think more clearly.  At work, I may do a few walk throughs.  This gets me out of the office and also lets me see good things happening in the building.  With a success under my belt, I can return to the initial task with renewed vigor. 

5) Calendar/timer - "Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion." -Parkinson's Law.  Writing things on a daily calendar has a magical quality about it. For some reason, putting things on a calendar and setting a specific time frame to work on them helps with focus.  I will also set a timer for the amount of time to work on one task.  In this way, I know that during this one specific time, I will focus on this one task and, when the timer goes off, I can move to something else.  Often, I will finish during the allotted time.  

  

6) Get up early - I've found I can accomplish more between five and seven AM than during the rest of the day combined.  Part of this is because I'm fresh and part is because of the lack of distractions.  It takes some discipline (and summer has not helped), but the reward is worth it.  

These are just a few of the strategies I've used to beat procrastination and accomplish more.  Please feel free to add others that have worked for you.