We Can Do It! (but should we?)

"We Can Do It!" by US Department of State is licensed under CC PDM 1.0 

I love Austin Kleon's work. I own & love his books, I subscribe to his awesome newsletter, and I follow him on social media. If you want more info on him, you can check out his website.

I was reading his newsletter this morning, and was struck by number 10 on his list--- You are fine without advice and suggestions.. Go read it, because it is awesome.

Anyhow, THIS is something I ponder often in education. Make no mistake, I'm not blaming the kids here.  This is a grown-folk issue. Clearly not ALL kids, not ALL Millenials---but many of them---want to do things Right to the point of Perfection, which leads to Anxiety, which leads to Paralysis through Analysis because of grown folks good-intentioned helicoptering ways.

We don't want them to get dirty, so we don't allow them to play in the dirt.
But without playing in the dirt, they are robbed of making mud pies.
They are robbed of feeling the earth in their hands and between their toes.
They are robbed of simple joy.
They are robbed of play.
And play leads to figuring out so much of life.

I'm one of those boredom is good moms, and yet it is still a struggle for me with my own kids.
Sometimes it is just easier to do it myself.
Sometimes I don't want to hear the whining, because my tolerance level for it isn't all that great. My ability to tune it out isn't either.
My particular struggle isn't with over-scheduling or not allowing for free play time.
Nope, my struggle is with cleaning up and otherwise doing for yourself what you can do. 

I love my kids to the moon and back. They are smart and capable.
And I've sent them messages that I can do it all.
And then I'm frustrated when they allow me to do just that.
And then I fall into martyrdom or angry mom mode.

But this is how I've trained them. 

And I'm not saying this is great---but honestly, if I didn't recognize that sending the message that a woman and mother is to be completely self-sacrificing at the cost of her dreams in order that her family is always comfortable---to.my.daughters. will impact their future selves negatively----then I might not do anything to shift this mindset.

Because shifting mindsets is hard and sometimes painful even when you know it will be better on the other side. 

When you know better, you do better.
So, I'm trying.

How often do we do the very.same.thing. to our school kids?
How often do we forget that kids need time to ponder and wrestle with ideas?  They need time to try things, figure out why it isn't working, and how they might make some shifts to make it better. They need to not feel like they are dangling over the shark tank without a net-----but we need to make sure the net we are providing isn't so thick and cumbersome that it totally obscures their ability to work through things to figure stuff out ON THEIR OWN. 

When they figure things out they own that knowledge.
They carry it with them.
It is THEIRS.

Working hard to shift my library classroom more and more into this space that allows them to do the things---with minimal scaffolding, as needed---and a Socratic voice asking questions that allows them to do their thinking.

I'm lucky in the library because grading isn't at thing.
I firmly believe we need to do better at setting up a grading system that allows kids to take more ownership of their own learning.  It can't reward not doing, but it can't reward success-at-any-cost-so-I'll-cheat-and-actually-learn-nothing-so-that-my-class-rank-isn't-damaged-and-my-parents-don't-freak-and-I-can-still-play-ball.

I don't have those answers, but I have so many questions!