Prairie Eydie Learns Something New, Part II

Warning.  The f-bomb detonates frequently in this book.  Definitely not for everyone.  In fact I can only thing of about three people I could recommend this book to.

 

 

I started reading Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, by Daniel Pink, last night.   Amazon had delivered the book several days ago and it had been laying on the living room floor waiting for me to get motivated to read it.  (Warning:  The book starts off with a lot of data, for those of you who suffer Staff Meeting PTSD.)  I  wasn't feeling motivated to read something life changing because a friend loaned me the super hilarious memoir Let's Pretend This Didn't Happen, by Jenny Lawson.  This book features nonstop hijinks, like when the author's dad adopted a rafter of turkeys and how the turkeys got caught in the windshield wipers while trying to peck the family's eyes out??!?  Good stuff.  Much more fun than finding out how all my carrot/stick motivation programs were a worthless waste of time. 

 

 

 

I have picked-up a bad habit from a friend of mine.  Now I open to random page in the middle of the book and start reading there.  As a Middle School reading specialist, this is against everything I teach my students, but it is kinda fun.  The first sentence I read in Drive blew me away.  (NOTE:  This is paraphrased because I didn't use the valuable strategy of marking important passages with post-it notes.  Truthfully I would be happy if my students used a post-it to mark where they let off reading.  So much time is wasted with the questions, "Now.  Let's see.  Where did I leave off?) 

 

 

 

85% of people do the right thing at work.  Rules and regulations are created for the remaining 15%.  Daniel Pink is telling me that 85% of people could handle flexible scheduling.   Possibly, all of my work could be done in four days instead of five - but I am working eight hour days, 5 days a week because some screwballs will take advantage of the system and cruise the corridors looking for donuts and caffeine. 

 

The second section I flipped to in Drive was about "task shifting".  Again, I didn't use my arsenal of post-its and am paraphrasing - If someone is bored with their current assignment, have them train someone else in the skills they have mastered. 

 

 

 

This is my 27th year of teaching and I would LOVE me some task shifting.  I could train someone to choose books for kids who hate to read and show how I boost vocabulary.  I could also suggest a gazillion books for kids who love to read.  In return, I would love be trained by someone else.  Here is a super short list of beneficial things I could learn from co-workers:

• How do I best teach our English Language Learners (ELL)?  Yesterday, I learned that most languages, other than English, don't use rhyming words.  Wow.  One of my 7th graders was having a rhyming breakthrough and I didn't even know what a big deal it was.
• What is Google Classroom and how can a luddite*, like myself, use it in my classroom.  (I actually put post-its notes on my phone to remember things.  It is the only thing that seems to work.)
• How do you keep things fresh after teaching for more than ten years?  What inspires you to return to the classroom everyday? (Other than new school supplies.)

 

Finally, I am super motivated to start reading Drive from the beginning.  Let me know what you think and if you want to shift some tasks.

 

Prairie Eydie

 

*Luddite