Determination

This is one powerful word. 

While involved in some PD on reading it was mentioned about making some of my readers more determined, which I agreed was the real need they have.  They can do it but too often as soon as they find a hard word or a sentence that they don’t understand they just give up.  They have no determination when it comes to know what they don’t know.  They just wait for someone to tell them or carry on like nothing is wrong.  I have thought about this a lot and wondered why they have this mind set; I came up with two ideas. 

Firstly that they have been trained to do this; the students that do this the most have always had troubles with reading and have had lots of support. All of these supports are great and I am definitely not saying anything negative about them.  I am just wondering if because they have had so much support they have come to rely on it.  In a way have we trained them out of thinking for themselves? 

The second is that they have never been explicitly taught to be determined.  This idea came up once I talked to one of my groups about their lack of determination.  Very quickly I realise it was all new thinking to them.  Out of this came a new focus for my class not just in reading but in learning.  The term “Determined Learners” is now commonly used in the class, both by students and me.  The students love it, it means less focus on getting things wrong and more on how to get things right.

I have found that in only two weeks the attitude of the students to new learning has really grown, they were getting good at new things as it was but now they really are determined.  They even ask each other if they are being determined, and use it when they are reflecting. 

I look forward to growing the culture of determination next term.

Determination + Questioning = Learning!!!