The Birchwood Project

We have established the need for context in relationship to academic expectations; now we should see how to align expectations with ability and talent. Even though we all hope our children will succeed in school at a superior level, we also must match our hopes to potential. We readily acknowledge the impossibility that every child will make the varsity soccer team or the varsity debate team. Academic achievement is the same. Even if we maintain high expectations and expect hard work under any circumstance, high expectations and hard work cannot alter aptitude.

Setting realistic expectations and being able to attain expectations requires two components: identifying performance ceilings and building habits of mind and industry to reach expectations. It is actually a rather simple equation that we frequently apply to everyday affairs. Let me illustrate.

Last summer I enticed my grandson to play catch with a 20-inch, plastic ball. From ten feet away, I tossed him the ball only to have him swat it away with his uncoordinated, outstretched arms. Being an astute educator I noted, “Ah, expectations are too high! I must adjust.” I moved closer, maybe eight feet away. I let the ball fly. Same result. I pondered, “The ceiling is still too high.” I moved to a distance of five feet and told my grandson to stretch out his arms. Then I carefully aimed my toss so that the ball would land softly in his grasp. Success was ours. He beamed with pride. We did it again and again. He loved his success.

You might say we found his achievement ceiling and practiced from that point until he could catch the ball every time. But after repeated successes, it was time to raise the expectations, establish a new ceiling. First, I challenged him, “Do you think you could catch the ball if I took a big step backwards?” Bolstered by his recent successes, he welcomed the challenge, “Sure I can. Let’s do it.”

Our first few attempts at reaching new expectations followed a similar scenario. He missed the first two or three tosses. We both made some adjustments and soon he was catching the ball about half of the time. A few tosses bounced out of his arms or off his head. Clearly, he had not reached mastery. He could not attempt more difficult catches until he became proficient at this level of ball-catching. Nevertheless, we did establish an important ball-catching ceiling. We needed more practice at this level of expectation.

I believe we have had many similar experiences while teaching our children new skills. Common sense (as well as piles of research) will tell you that this is how people learn. But I would suggest to you that this is exactly what should happen in the academic world. You, together with your child’s teachers, should be ascertaining academic ceilings. You ought to ask yourself, “What are my child’s aptitudes? What are his/her ceilings at school?”

The folly of lock-step grade level curriculum is that it cannot possibly address each child’s learning potential. That requires parent-teacher collaboration. If children are going to develop their abilities to the fullest, then they need help establishing ceilings and support to reach and surpass their ceilings.

By Charles Debelak

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When setting academic expectations, we have to be aware of context. Superior performance in one context may be a mediocre performance in another. A good illustration comes from a friend of mine who at one point in her career was teaching a remedial reading course to college freshmen. Quite surprisingly three of her students who had ranked among the top 10% of graduates at their respective high schools were required to take this remedial course.

“How could this be?” I asked, incredulous. The answer was context. These students attended schools where the academic standards were detached from a broader county or state context. What their own school called excellent may have only been average in another high school. The commencement of college level work became their day of reckoning and they were found wanting. In my opinion this was an injustice to these students. They were led to believe something that was simply not true.

If we are serious about high quality education we must face context - that can be very disconcerting. It may challenge us; it may expose us. Imagine! We might not be what we say we are! Maybe our claims to high quality education are true only in our self-serving bubble. We have to face the facts of context, because if you don’t you might find yourself in a make-believe world.

My wife and I have always taken this kind of “hard line” approach to assessing our claims of high quality education at Birchwood. We wrestle with context. Sometimes we don’t like what we see. We may fall short. But that’s okay because then we can address our deficiencies head on. Actually in this regard context saves us. It saves us from babbling about a school of “excellence” or “world class education” when in fact the only excellence we have is that which is invented in our self-serving bubble. Frankly, we have no choice; if we say we offer a superior education, we must answer the question, “Superior to what?” If we say we have a good math program or an excellent writing curriculum we must answer, “What is our context?”

When we establish academic expectations based upon a meaningful context, we also develop a healthy appreciation of ourselves and our work. In weaknesses, we seek improvement. Amidst superior work, we learn. If we cannot be the best, then at least we know why, and we appreciate those individuals whose achievement standards are even higher than ours. In any case, within a meaningful context, we take inventory of who we are and what we can do. This is a place from which we can move forward and grow. And that just feels good.

By Charles Debelak

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What should we expect from our children? What is appropriate? Expectations have a powerful impact on performance and achievement. If we expect too little, we get little and a child’s development will be limited. If we expect too much we will cause frustration and discouragement. The question then becomes how we establish expectations that will lead to growth, development, and enthusiasm.

The first thing to keep in mind is that expectations are always determined by context. Without context achievement gropes for meaning. Whether you want your son or daughter to excel in dance, mathematics or writing you set your goals and measure progress based upon context.

For example, let’s look at learning how to play baseball. At first, we may simply want our son or daughter to develop basic skills in catching, throwing, and hitting. The context is personal enjoyment. With certain rudimentary skills a child can come to appreciate the game and enjoy it. But let’s imagine a child who wants to play on the city’s traveling team. Immediately the context changes and the expectations change. It is no longer a matter of whether the child can catch and hit for personal enjoyment, he or she must be able to hit as well or better than the other children trying out for the team in order to get a place on the roster. The challenge is similar if the child wants to play on the high school baseball team, or if during high school he or she wants to earn a baseball scholarship to college. Increasing levels of achievement are accompanied by increased expectation. Someone might ask, “Is Joey a good baseball player?” A friendly answer is, “Sure, he is a terrific player.” An honest answer is, “Compared to whom? What context are you talking about?”

Expectations work the same in education. On the one hand, certain levels of expectation are absolutely necessary within a broad, general context. Every child must learn to read, write, and solve mathematics problems. The context is productive membership in a democratic society. It defines baseline proficiencies. In fact, this is what most state tests are all about – developing core competencies. But as a parent you may have greater expectations for your child’s academic career. If so, the question becomes, “What is your context? With whom or with what are you comparing your notion of ‘greater expectations’?”

This is a tougher job than you may think. It seems that everything in American culture today is “excellent” or “award-winning.” It would be amusing if it was not so misleading. Today children receive academic awards, trophies, ribbons, certificates of distinction, newspaper write-ups, and a whole host of other symbols of excellence. But you have to ask the question, “What is the context?” When your child earns an “A” or a “B” in writing or math or reading, you should ask, “What is the context. How does this level of achievement compare to my child’s actual ability? How does it compare to other students his/her age? How do the academic expectations compare to those in other classrooms, other cities, other states, other countries?” The academic levels to which you want your son or daughter to attain depends upon your level of expectations, and your expectations depend upon the context of your assessment.

Certainly expectations should be and will be mitigated by ability. Next month we will talk about this. But as a parent who cares greatly about your child’s academic achievement, it is important that you guide your child’s development by meaningful contexts.

by Charles Debelak

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EXPECTATIONS AND EDUCATION

Recently a Birchwood grad wrote me a letter about her experience in a high school mathematics course. As a freshman, she was taking an algebra2/trig course usually taken by high school juniors. At first she was intimidated and nervous, thinking to herself that everyone would be smarter than she. Her fears soon faded. Of the 15 problems the teacher assigned in class, she could do them all in her head. She said a junior level classmate asked her for help with “stuff I learned last year at Birchwood!” The Birchwood grad walked out of the class laughing and thinking, “I couldn’t be happier that I went to Birchwood. It was hard work but it sure paid off.”

I tell this story to make a point about academic expectations. Birchwood students are not smarter
than students in other schools. Raw statistics will tell us that 25% of the student population in Metropolitan Cleveland have IQ’s over 115 (students I call “bright”), and 10% have IQ’s over 130 (gifted in the traditional sense). That means that if there are 10,000 fifth grade students in Northeast Ohio, then twenty-five hundred are considered bright or gifted and one thousand of those have IQ’s over 130. That’s a lot of students. Why do Birchwood grads stand out among them? Why do they do so well comparatively in high school? Simple. We have expected more from them and they have responded to our expectations. They work hard and they achieve.

The fact is, that if you do not expect a child’s best work, you will not get it. There are no secrets here. Experience and research show that people perform to the expectations placed upon them. Expect little, you get little. Expect much, you will get much.

There is another side to this. If you do not expect a child’s best, and if you do not nurture the child to reach his or her best, you will not help that child develop a sense of fulfillment and self-worth. All children are driven to establish self-efficacy. Who am I? What am I? A healthy answer to these questions results from what a child accomplishes, and if children are not given meaningful academic expectations to achieve, they will not perceive of themselves as good students with high academic aspirations.

Quite honestly, I really push my students in mathematics. I expect much more from them than what most elementary and mathematics programs would expect. Certainly I take into consideration their aptitude and needs. Nevertheless, based upon their abilities, I expect and demand! Don’t get me wrong. That does not mean that I have to be harsh or mean. Students know I always support them, and will do anything to help them achieve. They perceive from my expectations that I care about them greatly. In addition, my classes are often filled with joking and laughter (my wife thinks far too much); but my expectations are uncompromising. On this, I do not relent. And guess what? My students excel and they enjoy (if not love) mathematics.

Nurturing talent and demanding performance are not mutually exclusive. They go together. If you do not demand, nurturing morphs into pampering and your child will whine about every little challenge placed in from of him or her. On the other hand, if you do not nurture, your demands will just become a pressure upon your child and create anxiety.

In next month’s issue we will discuss how to establish meaningfully high expectations.

By Charles Debelak

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In this last essay on “becoming great,” (that is, becoming virtuous) I would like to emphasize the enduring value of this objective. The value endures because this value is intrinsic to human nature (this was Aristotle’s view). Each child is born with the potential to be virtuous. It is a common heritage. Not everyone is born with the capacity for music or athletics or leadership. Not all have the same cognitive abilities or the good fortune to be born in a wealthy society. But concerning the capacity for virtue, there is no difference. The virtuous s life can, and has, emerged from every corner of the world and every strata of society. It is no surprise then that stories of great people are ubiquitous, spanning intellectual, social, economic, racial, ethnic, religious, and cultural spheres.

Since virtue is intrinsic to human nature, setting virtue as an objective is like making plans for personal fulfillment. It includes lifelong enrichment, growth, and accomplishment. It enables us to become a blessing to family, friends, and society.

What does this mean for parenting? First, we understand that our children will discover personal fulfillment and happiness when they are growing and becoming who they can become. Consequently, we show them how to identify their strengths and weaknesses in and out of school, and explain how to set meaningful goals that will stretch their abilities. These are goals that will require self-discipline and hard work but are still within reach. Then we support this effort with the language of achievement: “Do your best; don’t quit; push yourself; work now – play later.” In the end, we let them know that we stand right alongside them as they stretch forward to achieve.

Second, we show them how to take positive ownership of their life among others - how to make friends, how to be a friend, how to create a friendly atmosphere, how to be a productive contributor in every social setting. Don’t let children become victims! Don’t let them pick up the habit of blaming everyone and everything for their lack of happiness. Show them how to get along with all kinds of people – those they like and those they do not like. Explain how to make the best out of each environment and social situation. If you can teach your children how to become a positive influence wherever they are, they will be valued and cherished throughout their life.

Finally, we must recognize that parents are the catalyst to make children “great.” It may require our time; it may require our money. It most certainly will consume our heart. But we make it happen. If we do not grasp this central role, someone else will, whether deliberately or by default, whether for good or ill. In one way or another, our children will be shaped by the influences bearing upon them. We ought to posture ourselves to exert the greatest influence. For better or worse, our children are our most enduring legacy. We ought to guide them toward a life of enduring value.

By Charles Debelak

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The fourth Cardinal Virtue is wisdom. Wisdom describes matured insight, discernment, judgment, and decision-making. In some ways wisdom is the fruit of practicing the other three virtues – justice, courage, and self-control. Wisdom embodies the cumulative experience of someone who struggles to live a virtuous life. In circumstance after circumstance, in event upon event, in trial after trial, the individual seeks to do what is “good”, and exercises himself toward justice with courage and self-control. In this pathway, he apprehends what is good and true. He learns from success, but more frequently he discerns truth through failures, setbacks, and hardships. If he is determined to mature, he will learn from the lives of other virtuous people - sometimes through biography, other times through cultural history, and still more frequently, through family and friends. Through practicing virtue, wisdom is learned – step-by-step, day-by-day, year-by-year. Wisdom becomes a skill, honed through life-long efforts to know the good, love the good, and choose the good.

Unlike any other human endeavor in which we become better and better through practice, wisdom’s deepest and most enduring lessons come at the hands of failure. The person who strives to become virtuous discovers how often he is wrong; how recurrently he is weak; how repeatedly he must say, “I am sorry.” In the end, the pathway to wisdom is paved with humility. Humility is wisdom’s midwife and its signature characteristic.

How then do we teach children wisdom? Well, we don’t. Instead we encourage, remind, inspire, and provoke them to practice the other virtues consistently and habitually. Practice leads to habit; habit to lifestyle. John Bargh, professor of social psychology at Yale and pioneer in the studies of automaticity, writes, “Most mental processes that adults perform happen automatically based upon their particular history of habit formation.” Similarly, Ray Kurzweil, inventor, futurist, and author at Harvard, writes about brain functioning, “What we know, what we believe, what we think, is a product of pattern recognition. Our thinking and behavior is based upon a personal history of patterns.”

Parents can start by reading stories of virtuous people or pointing out examples of virtuous behavior wherever they can be found. Parents can also begin by supplying the language for virtuous living: “Did you do your best? Did you try hard? Were you nice to everyone at school? Did you make friends? Did you listen to your teacher?” As children grow, parents can remind them, “What are your goals this quarter? Have you treated your classmates and teacher well? Were you respectful? Did you finish your work before you began playing?” Language precedes good behavior and consistency of good behavior becomes habit. When children grow up with the mantra to know the good, love the good and do the good, the effort to do so becomes a part of their personality.

We hope and strive that our children will excel in life - some professionally, some in academics, some in finance, some in power and influence. Each achievement is valuable, yet the personal satisfaction therein fades. Wisdom endures. It is the crowning attribute on a life lived well, and the greatest commodity with which to bless others.

By Charles Debealk

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The Cardinal Virtues - justice, courage, self-control, and wisdom – work together as a whole. Justice – the effort to be right toward yourself, others, and responsibilities - requires courage, and courage describes the attitude and will power to choose what is right even when the choice runs contrary to popular opinion. As I wrote last month, recognizing the need for courage, reminds us of the “good” that lives in our hearts and our aspiration to “do the good.”

Courage is coupled with self-control. It is one thing for a young person to aspire toward the good. It is another thing to have the mental and psychological wherewithal to answer the call to courage. Without self-control - the combined effort of mind, will, and emotion – it will be difficult to carry out one’s aspirations. Self-control is the aggregate of reasoning, passion, and volition. The young person who learns self-control not only knows the good and loves the good, but is able to do the good.

At a practical level, self-control describes one’s ability to manage an internal conversation. This conversation is a discussion in our minds between contending ideas - what we should or should not do. Sometimes it is a conversation about good or bad. Other times it is about what is good, better, or best. When teaching middle school students, I often describe the conversation in simplistic, yet very experiential, language. On the chalkboard I draw a large circle that represents a young person. I draw a diameter dividing the person in half. On one side of the circle I sketch a cartoon character with horns and a pitchfork. On the other half, I scribble a crude stick figure with a halo over its head. A childish illustration to be sure, but the young adolescents understand immediately what I mean because this picture illustrates their experience. They have experienced the arguments between these two caricatures.

I explain to my students that at each juncture of decision-making, whether it is something simple like doing or not doing homework, or something more serious that challenges the morality and ethics of family and culture, each of us faces contending, internal “voices.” Self-control is learning how to manage these conversations. Successful management, that is, the ability to regulate the conversation so the youngster does what is good, requires three components.

First, students should realize that their internal debate is normal; it is human. Like every human being, young adults are capable of very good thoughts and very bad thoughts. There does not exist on the face of the earth a category of people who are good and hence have only good thoughts. Nor are there a group of people who are bad and have only bad thoughts. It is rather that both voices do battle within our mind and hearts. How a person finally determines to live his or her life is not the result of being inherently bad or good, but how he or she manages the internal argument between good and bad. It is within the power of each youngster to become a good and noble young adult.

Second, students need an arsenal of moral and ethical arguments for all the challenges they face. Without weapons of good reasoning - lessons from parents, lessons from church-temple-synagogue-mosque, examples from role models, reinforcement from school and society - young people are helpless puppets easily manipulated by the ideas, trends, and justifications for thought and action that can misdirect and then spoil their aspirations.

Finally, students need mentors - parents are the best - with whom they can rehearse and practice managing their internal conversations. This is particularly important in the early teen years when young people are flooded with ideas and concepts that may challenge their moral upbringing. During times of challenge, young people need mature adults with whom they can discuss their internal conversations and learn how to develop healthy reasoning that will lead to self-control and the attainment of their aspirations. When functioning as a mentor, adults must be careful not to judge a young person’s thoughts too quickly. If parents are judgmental, they risk driving the youngster into silence and rebellion. If parents are too flippant, i.e. “he’s free to make his own choices”, they are relinquishing a powerful role that could help their child reach his or her highest potential.

Self-control is a learned habit, cultivated through guidance.

By Charles Debelak

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