One of our faculty
members is a close, personal friend of David Epstein (The Sports Gene) and this teacher is extremely enthusiastic (as he
should be) about Epstein’s latest non-fiction work: RANGE: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World. Epstein is
an engaging writer who begins by contrasting the stories of Tiger and Roger –
showing that Woods (the early specialist) and Federer (a generalist) achieved
dominance in their sports through different philosophies.Epstein continues by citing examples and
academic studies involving music, mathematics, education, science and medicine –
essentially giving his readers some broad and general exposure to his thesis. He
describes participants of one study who “were perfectly capable of learning
from experience, but failed at learning without experience. And [yet] that is
what a rapidly changing, wicked world demands – conceptual reasoning skills
that can connect new ideas and work across contexts.” Epstein repeatedly points
out that frustration actually means that you are learning. RANGE has been favorably
reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Guardian and The Atlantic. I highly recommend
that you add it to your reading list. Epstein has made me want to do some more
exploring of the concepts (like Fermi thinking) and
resources (like University of Washington’s course on Calling Bullshit) that he
mentions, particularly in regards to the application for our students’ Junior
Theme research. If you are looking for more ideas to stretch your mind, consider
also the recent list of summer reads for educators recommended on Edutopia.
“The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early
Achievement” is the subtitle for LATE BLOOMERS by Rich Karlgaard which
one of our administrators has been strongly recommending. There is a great deal
to discover in Karlgaard’s writing and beyond; he shares numerous anecdotes and
devotes roughly a quarter of the text to notes and sources. He begins by looking
at the potential consequences of how we measure and focus on achievement,
especially for young people: “when so many people believe they are inferior
based on a few narrow measurements made when they were children, society as a
whole suffers.” Karlgaard then shifts to a chapter on the strengths of Late Bloomers:
curiosity, compassion, resilience, equanimity, insight, and wisdom are all illustrated
with numerous inspirational examples. One memorable quote comes from a global
consultant named Don Peppers who says, “Not being curious is not only
intellectually lazy, but it shows a willful contempt for the facts. If you don’t
want to know the truth about something, then how moral can you claim to be?” Karlgaard
also mused about the idea that almost everyone seemed to self-identify as a
late bloomer and that perhaps some of the current, painful political discourse
is a result of people feeling “unacknowledged, unappreciated and disrespected.”
He encourages employers to take advantage of that potential, parents to “enjoy
your children as they are” and for educators to better meet the needs of late
bloomers. This past May, Karlgaard wrote a feature essay (adapted from his
book) called “It’s Never Too Late to Start a Brilliant Career” in The Wall Street Journal where he cited many examples including the recently deceased Toni
Morrison who “published her first novel, The
Bluest Eye, at 39 and won a Pulitzer Prize for Beloved at 56 and the Nobel Prize in Literature five years later.” Reading
LATE
BLOOMERS may cause you to re-evaluate the path to long-term happiness
for yourself and others.
LIMITLESS MIND by Jo Boaler encourages us to “Learn, Lead, and
Live Without Barriers.” Boaler is the Nomellini-Olivier Professor of
Mathematics Education at Stanford University, and the faculty director of youcubed.As you can see from that website, much of her work has focused on
mathematics and students in the K-8 range. However, the soon to be released LIMITLESS
MIND has application across ages. Boaler first debunks damaging
assumptions that limit confidence and willingness to try new things. Using a
fairly academic tone, she discusses neuroplasticity and then outlines six keys that
deal with our growth journey, the value of mistakes, relationships between
beliefs and health, multiple ways of learning, importance of creativity and
flexibility over speed, and importance of connections. I especially liked this
last section where she discusses how “part of the reason students give up on
learning is because they find it difficult and think they are alone in their
struggle.” Boaler stresses the importance of working together so that student
realize that “for everyone learning is a process and that obstacles are common.”
Just as I encourage my student researchers to be sure they use a variety of
sources (who will they invite to that metaphorical dinner party?), Boaler also notes
that “connecting with another person’s idea both requires and develops a higher
level of understanding.” Her examples for schools to encourage community involvement
are practical, including a profile of Shane Feldman, founder of Count Me In movement. LIMITLESS
MIND is filled with inspirational stories and is worth a look as we
continue to grow and “think differently.” As Boaler says, “we are all learning
all the time.”
Piece of Mind by Michelle Adelman is a debut novel with a unique
perspective.The narrator is Lucy, a 27
year old woman who lives with her father because, at the age of three, she was
in a serious accident that resulted in traumatic brain injury.While Lucy cares for herself, she cannot
drive, hold a job, or even really plan for the future due to limited executive
functioning.Her strengths lie in her
drawing ability, her sweet temperament, and her empathy with animals.
She moves to New York to be with her college age
brother and frequently visits the zoo and a local coffee shop, all while
tentatively testing her independence and forging new relationships.Both Lucy and her brother experience a range
of emotions and struggle to cope with their changing circumstances. I found
Lucy’s voice to be very real and her introspection to feel like a dialogue at
times. Kirkus says, “a soft-edged portrait of a subject who struggles to
grasp complexity.” I was fascinated at the glimpses of Lucy’s
thought process, inspired in part by Adelman’s real life sister.Starred reviews from Library Journal
and Publishers Weekly for Piece of Mind.
As I was reading Piece
of Mind, I also read a non-fiction memoir about depression and anxiety:
Reasons to Stay Alive by Matt Haig.It was
unexpected, but these two books seemed to complement each other, sharing
stories of resilience.
Reasons to Stay Alive by British author Matt Haig is a very powerful book.Haig depicts the pain of depression and
anxiety and describes what his brain feels like, while acknowledging that the
experience is unique for everyone.As
you read, it is likely that an emotional pain will be there, too, especially if
you or someone you love is among the twenty percent (yes, one in five) of the
population who experiences depression.
Reasons to Stay Alive definitely increased my understanding of this condition and
my empathy for people who face depression.It’s a relatively short book (272 pages) and one that is best
read – and then re-read - in parts, but it is ultimately a hopeful work and absolutely
worth reading.
Mental health seems
increasingly to be a focus for new books. Another related title which is on my
“to read” list is The Memory of Light by Francisco X. Stork, a favorite
author with titles like Marcelo and the Real World.In this new novel, Stork explores the story
of a teenager learning to live with clinical depression.Do you have a related title to recommend? If
so, please let us know.
Today’s post covers three soon-to-be-published books which deal
with reading and writing. In this important area, we can learn from personal
experience, from new neuroscience research findings, and from strong role models.That is what these books respectively attempt,
but in each case, I found myself repeatedly asking, “Who is the intended audience
here?”
The first book, A Comedy and A Tragedy by
Travis Hugh Culley, is a memoir which tells the story of Culley’s many struggles.
His ultimate success came through acting,
reading plays, and writing about his experiences. The cover is certainly
appealing, but I found the text too dense for our reluctant readers. (July 14,
2015 by Random House/Ballantine). As an
educator, I felt compassion for Culley as a misunderstood student, some curiosity
about his coping strategies, and mainly frustration at not seeing more
suggestions on how teachers could help to counterbalance his extremely dysfunctional
family.
The Reader’s Brain: How Neuroscience Can Make You a
Better Writer does indeed focus on writing (July 31, 2015 by Cambridge
University Press). The author, Yellowlees Douglas, has been an instructor and
consultant in this discipline for years.As a result, it is a little intimidating to write this review. I found both
helpful suggestions and some over-simplified direction like this “Expert Tip”: “start sentences with a subject and follow
with a verb.” Douglas argues that we teach about making an argument and about
correct grammar, but not so much about a “middle ground” involving these 5C’s: clarity, continuity, coherence, concision, and
cadence.
Overall, the digital text was difficult to navigate and the
author added so many examples that I often had trouble distilling his main
point. I suggest consulting a print copy where specific chapters and other
highlights are more easily distinguished in order to better implement Douglas’
advice for writing non-fiction. Reviewing The Reader’s Brain led
me to other texts such as Wired for Story by Cron which offers practical
guidance for writing fiction and could be valuable for some of our Senior
English electives.
Creative Successful Dyslexic is edited by Margaret
Rooke and profiles a series of entrepreneurs (e.g., Sir Richard Branson), entertainers,
and sports figures who are dyslexic (Sept. 21, 2015 by Jessica Kingsley Publishers).
Having role models is always helpful, but those are almost all British and
therefore would be less well-known to our students.
In fact, two of the above titles are from England where
traditionally it seems there is much more interest and timely research on
reading and literacy.Educators looking
for a US perspective will recognize the name of Sally Shaywitz (Overcoming
Dyslexia, 2003) who appears in this short video stressing the importance of
a caring educator:
One of our faculty
members is a close, personal friend of David Epstein (The Sports Gene) and this teacher is extremely enthusiastic (as he
should be) about Epstein’s latest non-fiction work: RANGE: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World. Epstein is
an engaging writer who begins by contrasting the stories of Tiger and Roger –
showing that Woods (the early specialist) and Federer (a generalist) achieved
dominance in their sports through different philosophies. Epstein continues by citing examples and
academic studies involving music, mathematics, education, science and medicine –
essentially giving his readers some broad and general exposure to his thesis. He
describes participants of one study who “were perfectly capable of learning
from experience, but failed at learning without experience. And [yet] that is
what a rapidly changing, wicked world demands – conceptual reasoning skills
that can connect new ideas and work across contexts.” Epstein repeatedly points
out that frustration actually means that you are learning. RANGE has been favorably
reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Guardian and The Atlantic. I highly recommend
that you add it to your reading list. Epstein has made me want to do some more
exploring of the concepts (like Fermi thinking) and
resources (like University of Washington’s course on Calling Bullshit) that he
mentions, particularly in regards to the application for our students’ Junior
Theme research. If you are looking for more ideas to stretch your mind, consider
also the recent list of summer reads for educators recommended on Edutopia.
“The Power of Patience in a World Obsessed with Early
Achievement” is the subtitle for LATE BLOOMERS by Rich Karlgaard which
one of our administrators has been strongly recommending. There is a great deal
to discover in Karlgaard’s writing and beyond; he shares numerous anecdotes and
devotes roughly a quarter of the text to notes and sources. He begins by looking
at the potential consequences of how we measure and focus on achievement,
especially for young people: “when so many people believe they are inferior
based on a few narrow measurements made when they were children, society as a
whole suffers.” Karlgaard then shifts to a chapter on the strengths of Late Bloomers:
curiosity, compassion, resilience, equanimity, insight, and wisdom are all illustrated
with numerous inspirational examples. One memorable quote comes from a global
consultant named Don Peppers who says, “Not being curious is not only
intellectually lazy, but it shows a willful contempt for the facts. If you don’t
want to know the truth about something, then how moral can you claim to be?” Karlgaard
also mused about the idea that almost everyone seemed to self-identify as a
late bloomer and that perhaps some of the current, painful political discourse
is a result of people feeling “unacknowledged, unappreciated and disrespected.”
He encourages employers to take advantage of that potential, parents to “enjoy
your children as they are” and for educators to better meet the needs of late
bloomers. This past May, Karlgaard wrote a feature essay (adapted from his
book) called “It’s Never Too Late to Start a Brilliant Career” in The Wall Street Journal where he cited many examples including the recently deceased Toni
Morrison who “published her first novel, The
Bluest Eye, at 39 and won a Pulitzer Prize for Beloved at 56 and the Nobel Prize in Literature five years later.” Reading
LATE
BLOOMERS may cause you to re-evaluate the path to long-term happiness
for yourself and others. 
LIMITLESS MIND by Jo Boaler encourages us to “Learn, Lead, and
Live Without Barriers.” Boaler is the Nomellini-Olivier Professor of
Mathematics Education at Stanford University, and the faculty director of youcubed.
As you can see from that website, much of her work has focused on
mathematics and students in the K-8 range. However, the soon to be released LIMITLESS
MIND has application across ages. Boaler first debunks damaging
assumptions that limit confidence and willingness to try new things. Using a
fairly academic tone, she discusses neuroplasticity and then outlines six keys that
deal with our growth journey, the value of mistakes, relationships between
beliefs and health, multiple ways of learning, importance of creativity and
flexibility over speed, and importance of connections. I especially liked this
last section where she discusses how “part of the reason students give up on
learning is because they find it difficult and think they are alone in their
struggle.” Boaler stresses the importance of working together so that student
realize that “for everyone learning is a process and that obstacles are common.”
Just as I encourage my student researchers to be sure they use a variety of
sources (who will they invite to that metaphorical dinner party?), Boaler also notes
that “connecting with another person’s idea both requires and develops a higher
level of understanding.” Her examples for schools to encourage community involvement
are practical, including a profile of Shane Feldman, founder of Count Me In movement. LIMITLESS
MIND is filled with inspirational stories and is worth a look as we
continue to grow and “think differently.” As Boaler says, “we are all learning
all the time.” 
