Teaching Grit: Taking a Lesson from the Athletic Playbook

In my teaching career, I've witnessed rampant grade inflation in the independent schools at which I've taught. Coupled with that, I've witnessed an increase in student anxiety and stress. How do better grades lead to more stress? I agree with Angela Lee Duckworth's TED talk that the solution to this paradox lies in increasing grit and perseverance in our teenagers. However, as a teacher, it seems that no matter what I do to try to enhance these skills, I feel like I'm failing. But, as an athletic coach I've had a lot more success. That's because, when my team loses, we lose. There are no retakes, no extensions, and no extra credit. And "success" is variable, you do not have to win every game to be successful, and even sometimes when you do win, you didn't "succeed" (read: play) the way you should have. These conditions cultivate athlete and team agency and buy-in for a coach's instruction. This process fosters grit and perseverance.

One of the biggest contributors to both the grade inflation and the anxiety and stress inflation described above is the increase in the amount of retakes/rewrites, completion points, test corrections, and extra credit offered by schools. Students and parents demand these extra chances for a pretty clear reason: they improve grades. Of course, there's also some truth to the fact that students learn more when they retake something or turn in extra credit, but the focus is still on the grade. I tip my hat to my progressive colleagues that have switched to standards- (or competency-) based grading to get out in front of this change by making retakes all about mastering a skill rather than getting a grade. Regardless, this style of assessment does not provide students a chance to truly fail. There is always a chance to get points back, to show mastery, or to massage the grade in other ways. This trend does not exist in sports.

As a coach of twenty seasons, I've noticed that my athletes respond to defeat or failure in a very different way than how my students respond to a low test grade. There's also a difference in coaching a student through failure on the field and teaching a student through "failure" in the classroom.

There are countless ups and downs in an individual game, but when it ends, the team records a W or an L, that's it. Sure, they can complain about the refs or the coaching, but it's a well established fact that you and your teammates could always do more. And there are times when you feel like you and your teammates have done everything you can to prepare, and you still end the game with an L. The permanence of these losses presents rich opportunities for improvement (read: learning).

After every game, win or lose, coaches take time talking through the game's successes and failures and defining goals for improvement. Many coaches open it up to players to contribute during that time as well. These reflections focus an athlete's and team's attitude, which helps recommit them to their goals, leading to improvement.

After a tough loss on the field, a player realizes that he needs you (his coach) and he needs his teammates in order to not experience that feeling again. This makes that player and his teammates receptive to coaching to improve for the next contest. The classroom should work the same way, but it doesn't. When a student earns a bad grade, he feels that you (the teacher) need to grade differently, teach better, write an easier assignment, etc. for him to succeed next time. The difference in agency between these two responses is everything. To be fair, I have had students who respond the way I described the player above, and I've had players (and teams) respond the way I described the student above, but anecdotally, that seems to be an exception not the rule. So how can teachers make this the rule, rather than the exception?

• There have to be assignments where students lose (or fail)
• There has to be permanence to this failure
• There has to be time to digest and reflect on failure
• Some assignments should be too hard so that success is variable
• There have to be times when students try hard, but fail
• There must be an agreement that a teacher (coach) will be there to facilitate improvement via instruction and practice
• Teachers (coaches) must value, encourage, and identify incremental improvements from one assignment to the next
• There should be multiple opportunities to practice and improve, but not to change a previous grade/outcome (think about a season with many games)

A Teacher's Shoes Podcast Appearance

Recently, I had the opportunity to speak to a fellow educator about the course I taught this year called "Passion-Based Learning through Social Media." Eryka Desrosiers invited me onto her podcast and proceeded to ask a number of excellent questions about how to run a project-based and personalized class. I hope it will inspire more teachers to do the same.

Listen to this episode of A Teacher's Shoes Podcast on Soundcloud

Is #HigherEd Leading the #EdReform Movement?

No. But some institutions like Stanford's d.school are trying. Last month, they released an article detailing some of their new programs called "Exploring provocative ideas for undergraduate education at Stanford." I was excited to see such progressive proposals (see below). However, until Stanford starts accepting undergraduates who exhibit these skills, high schools will continue to push AP-heavy schedules and SAT scores.

Though I didn't use the same language, I designed my elective called Passion-Based Learning thru Social Media to fulfill all of these educational trends. Embedded below is an explanation of that course and how I got there.

It predicted and embraced all of Stanford's "provocative ideas about learning" by asking students to holistically investigate a topic of their choosing. 1) "open loop" - the course helps students create personalized learning networks and digital portfolios. Naturally, their learning expands beyond the confines of the classroom and the semester. 2) Paced education - the course is entirely personalized since students choose their own content. 3) The "axis flip" - I run the entire course based off of a skill progression that I designed (see image at 14:55 in the video above). 4) Purpose learning - Students carefully construct their own brand. They write a mission in their "about me" page on their digital portfolio.

It took me several years to convince my school to offer an elective that encompasses the pedagogy that Stanford wrote to "[reimagine] the undergraduate experience of the future." Interestingly, one of the hardest groups to get on board was college counseling, because they didn't know how this course would look on a transcript. Now that the course exists, ironically, the top students at my school don't take the elective because it doesn't say AP in front of it; if they want to get in to Stanford--to experience the innovative program described above--they need to show rigor on their transcript.

I hope Stanford (beyond just d.school) leans in to some of these progressive pedagogical trends, but I also hope they will start to select students who have experience succeeding in this type of learning environment. Nevertheless, there's a long way to go before high schools and colleges close that gap. One way Stanford can help high schools prepare students for the future of learning they describe is to be more deliberate about how they plan to model this learning so that other schools can emulate their work. They should also begin to establish partnerships with high schools, colleges, and grad schools that are implementing these new trends.

When I tweeted this article out to encourage more schools to embrace this style of learning, I heard from a fellow high school teacher (@gedwards30) wondering the same thing: how will this look at Stanford in practice? So here are our lingering questions from that thread and an ensuing email exchange. I trust Stanford's d.school answering these questions will help push these educational reforms to other schools and classrooms.

• How does this learning fit in with Stanford's overarching institutional mission & how do staffing/cohort size/personal attention play into the program’s ability to scaffold and evaluate student progress?
• How will instructors evaluate this style of continuous learning focused on skill competencies?
• Is the final a digital portfolio? A capstone project? A thesis? A culminating experiment?
• How will instructors provide guidance in student inquiry and structured evaluation of student progress to empower this style of learning? 
• How do administrators allow teachers the freedom to impart their wisdom while also adhering to pedagogical best practices?
• How do teachers allow students the freedom to refine or change their "mission" or stated objective(s)?
• Might Stanford's initiative (and others like it) lead to an educational experience that functions more like a membership/subscription model rather than traditional schooling?

Educators, please add additional questions in comments or on the Twitter thread!