Let's Be Solution Oriented
From the desk of Hope…
As I reflect on my work week I keep thinking about all of the obstacles and barriers I heard that keeps progress from happening. I recounted conversations over and over in my head and the more I recounted the more stressed and drained I felt.
All of us are guilty of being problem focused at times. I know I am (but I sure don’t want to be!)
One of my personal goals is to focus on solutions. However, I have to constantly remind myself of this personal goal and the person I want to be. It seems like my natural tendency is to whine and complain.
When I am being the person I want to be, solution focused, I feel productive and more in control. I feel like I am more successful and very importantly, I see results with what I am trying to do.
My work with educators:
As a literacy coach working with educators on a daily basis I would like to be a positive influence with this solution focused mindset as well. There is nothing more important than delving into challenges and having a plan for working on them in education. Our students are counting on us!
I see no value in pointing out things like, “my students are not good readers”, unless you are willing to go the next step and put thought into how to assist with this challenge.
Students not being able to read well is certainly a common observation in classrooms I visit and should by no means be discounted. But we can’t throw up our hands and merely make this proclamation.
What we CAN do is be problem solvers and put our heads together to work on finding solutions.
No we can’t change out brains and no we can’t change the circumstances in homes and no we can’t help that some of our students did not see print until they walked through the doors of the school building in kindergarten.
But there are many things we CAN do.
We CAN give assessments to diagnosis reading issues.
We CAN instruct to fill in the gaps.
We CAN provide interesting texts to help motivate.
We CAN provide texts students can read instead of providing texts that are too hard.
We CAN model what effective reading looks and sounds like.
We CAN work on changing failure mindsets to success mindsets.
We CAN work towards helping children love reading.
Let’s spend time and energy strategizing and planning the answers to challenges instead of announcing them and stopping there. As educators, let’s commit to being solution oriented rather than problem focused.