Persistence...The Missing Link?

This semester I have been participating in a teacher led micro-credential on classroom discussions.  As part of the discussion process, students were asked to reflect on two objectives of the discussion:  perseverance/ persistence and active listening.

A few things emerged from this activity.  First off, students struggled to fill this out with enough detail so that their responses could be understood.  It appeared that they had rushed their responses. As a result I handed it back to students and asked for more detail.

As I was doing some research on Costa & Kallick's Habits of Mind, I came across a resource that suggested having students outline and define what it means to demonstrate perseverance/persistence.  We are responsible for working on (4) of the habits of mind as part of our 100 day plans and I wanted to be more intentional about teaching them. The soft skills are as, if not more important, than the content that we are responsible for teaching.

We're at a point in chemistry where things are getting more difficult and I felt it would be a great time to have this discussion.  In teams, students brainstormed what they could do to demonstrate perseverance/persistence and we placed these sticky notes on the board and there were some themes that emerged.  Here is what students came up with: 


Most of what they came up with was great, but they were missing a few key elements that I had to help them add to the list:
  • Ask peers for help
  • Get help before & after school
  • Get help during advisory
  • Take advantage of reassessment
Students are extremely busy and in some cases are overextending themselves that these ways of demonstrating persistence are not being exhibited.  If we are going to help our students to develop a growth mindset and adopt these skills, we need to be more intentional about teaching them and having students reflect on their use.



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