After nearly 10 months in classrooms, engaging and watching kids and their teachers, I am reveling in my quiet summer. The school year hums and clacks, gears engaged. Summertime breathes and sighs, everything billowy and imprecise. I like the change of “soundery” as well as the change of scenery. I want to bottle the peace and quiet and birdsong and monsoon rainstorm to bring into the classroom next month. I want to let it out of the bottle and see if we–the kids and I–can recreate some quietude right in the middle of a big, messy, noisy classroom.

Summertime is for quieting my mind which in turn feeds my soul. I teach best on a well-fed soul. Here’s something that might feed yours. Enjoy this TED talk about creativity and education.

http://www.ted.com/talks/sir_ken_robinson_bring_on_the_revolution.html?utm_source=newsletter_weekly_2010-05-25

I recently attended a Non-Violent Communication workshop, hoping to add to my toolbox of skills that allow me to positively interact with 1000 kiddos each week! NVC–also called Compassionate Communication–teaches that every behavior is a result of a personal need. Find out what the need is, and you can adjust your communication to reflect that understanding. It’s difficult to remain upset or angry at a student for his or her behavior once you realize what the underlying need is that has informed that behavior.

It was a great reminder for me to take the time to meet each child where they are and to bring them along from there. Since the workshop I have noticed a marked improvement both in how I am interacting with the students and also how they are responding to me. The workshop’s information has provided just the spark I needed at this point in a very busy school year.

Periodic sparks are just what we all need to keep it fresh, real, and positive!

Put 50 kids in a classroom, add 2 passionate educators, involved families, an innovative and effective principal and what do you get? Well, I don’t know what you’d get, but what I get is inspired!

Because these children have the benefit of being surrounded by caring adults, they are thriving. They like themselves–that is evident from the way they look me in the eye when I work with them. They like each other–easy to see from the way they interact like family. They are a family and it’s a treat to visit them each week.

When I have the opportunity to present my TeamMastermind seminars in classrooms like this one, I leave incredibly inspired, rejuvenated, and hopeful despite all of the dismal news about education.

Maybe the first step in fixing the problems with our educational system should be to re-inspire & re-energize our teaching corps. As my friend Cate suggests, teachers should continually remind themselves of the reasons they chose to be educators.

Though it’s always been true, educators are more aware than ever of the need to prepare young people for the entire life ahead of them. Real Life in the Real World.  And because that real world can be overwhelming, we also have a role in nurturing dreams and helping students find hope. TeamMastermind is a way to help children see the big picture by nurturing the process of exploration and discovery and by embracing both the failures and the successes along the way. The role of a TeamMastermind facilitator is to promote academic achievement as well as personal and social development.

It’s our goal to create dreamers who have the courage and the creativity to see beyond “what is” to “what can be.”  We hope to give our students the tools they need to become their own teachers; to give their lives purpose, direction, and meaning. TeamMastermind is a Real program for today’s Real students in today’s Real world.

Nine years ago I began writing and compiling a collection of seminars meant to model strong teamwork skills, creative thinking skills, and problem-solving skills for school-aged children. Since then, my staff and I have worked with thousands of kids throughout Arizona and beyond, coaching them to step up and become their own teachers. We’ve learned a lot along the way and this blog is my newest forum through which to share the insights and best practices that any educator or parent can use to kick-start their student’s motivation and to encourage them to take responsibility for their own education.

Occasionally I will include a hands-on challenge excerpted from one of the 4 TeamMastermind manuscripts.  If you choose to use them in your classroom or with your homeschool group, please do let me know how your students solved the problem. I’m always excited to watch the gears turn as kids think of innovative ways to rise to the challenge. Often, kids will be able to see ways to solve a problem much more creatively  than we adults can. Truly, during the past 9 years I have learned from these children as much as I have taught them.

In much the same way I am hoping that this blog forum will inspire you to comment on it’s content, so that I can continue to learn at least as much as I teach.

Looking forward to a lively conversation.

Mindy Degraff