Stand and Deliver

After almost eleven years of teaching, I’ve heard a lot of “I really want my kids to do [blank] but they’re not ready for that yet.”

The [blank] can literally be whatever:

Talking transitions, gallery walks, academic discourse, group work, homework, reading at home, listening to / discussing music during assemblies, discussing real life topics that especially pertain to our kids, collaboratively solving peer conflicts, being nice / being really f’ing nice, working hard / working really f’ing hard, etcetera.

The truth is your kids are ready for [blank] right now.

(Yes. They absolutely are. I 10,000% believe that.)

They are ready for whatever it is you want them to do.

If you think they can’t: you’re actually right — but only because you limited them.

If you think they can: you’re right too — but only because you trusted / empowered them.

I’m not saying it’s not going to take a lot of work.

It is.

And you’re probably going to need the help of other people on your team (so you might need to rally them too).

But it will be so worth it.

As Jaime Escalante says in Stand and Deliver when he drops this fire / knowledge / unambiguous truth-bomb:

“Students will rise to the level of expectation.”

Which means the main question you need to answer is –

How high is your bar? And can it be even higher?

& relatedly –

What are you going to do to truly invest kids in [blank]?

& not hyperbolically –

How scorching hot and potentially world ending is your fire?

Because I bet it can get pretty fucking hot.