Sunday, March 23, 2014
We can all agree that meaningful schoolwork promotes students' learning of academic content. But why stop there? I believe that meaningful work can also teach students to love challenges, to enjoy effort, to be resilient, and to value their own improvement.
Meaningful learning tasks need to challenge every student in some way. It is crucial that no student be able to coast to success time after time; this experience can create the fixed-mindset belief that you are smart only if you can succeed without effort. Do mountain climbers really like all the hard climbing? Maybe, but the key is that they love the challenge. The bigger the challenge, the harder they work.
Hard work is the best and surest way to achieve your goals. I really used to think that hard work was not enough and that one could arrive at desired goals with sheer intellect... Truth is intellect, passion, & interest alone doesn't suffice.
“There are no shortcuts to any place worth going.”
