What can a self-help book about success in business and life teach us about finding and supporting student success in the classroom?
Unexpected PD: Teacher Development from Non-Education Sources
In this series, Unexpected PD, I want to explore teacher development through personal development and business development books as a resource for classroom and educator support. What ideas can we take away from books NOT focused on education and the art of teaching?
Grab the free discussion PDF at the bottom!
Part 1: Success
I don’t know about you, but I love to read personal development books. Recently, I stumbled on the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell sitting on my shelf. It had been passed to me from my younger sister, but quickly shelved away for “another day”. Why? Because, well, life.
The first half of the school year was spent in survival mode, so reading was a time privilege I didn’t have. Then the pandemic crisis hit. Although transitioning to distance learning was rocky, I was also given the gift of time. So, I looked through my shelf and Outliers jumped out! I wondered, what can a self-help book about success in business teach me about student success in the classroom?
My Top 3 Lessons Learned About Student Success in the Classroom
Outliers is filled with wonderful stories and case studies about success. One big take away is the idea that success is like an ice burg. Society only sees the top, the milestones. Under the surface, though, is background, opportunity and drive.
Here are three factors of success I’ll look at my classroom:
- Age
- Culture
- Opportunity
Age
When you think about students who find success in the classroom verses the students who struggle, is your first thought their age difference? Mine wasn’t.
One interesting idea Gladwell shares in the book is age, more importantly age caps, make a difference in success. In schools, students must turn 5 before a certain date to qualify for kindergarten. So, if a child turns 5 after that date they must wait for the next year. This means students born in September and October are often the oldest in their class, while students with summer birthdays are often the youngest.
Think about your groupings within your class. How are your students grouped? By ability? If you teach in America, most likely yes. Is this best? There is research to support both sides of the grouping discussion. One quote from Outliers I found to be interesting when thinking about grouping is this one about Denmark’s educational approach:
They [Denmark] have a national policy where they have no ability grouping until the age of ten. Denmark waits to make selection decisions until maturity differences by age have evened out.
Malcolm Gladwell
outliers, page 29
Culture
I loved the story Gladwell shares in his book about plane accidents and the nationality of each pilot. Long story short, how we are raised in our culture to communicate affects our ability to be understood.
Our classrooms become a mixing bowl of cultures. Our students are from different races, religions, and economic status. In addition, school culture and home culture function in very different ways. How can we use culture and understanding to ensure student success in our classrooms?
This section of the book made me stop and think about how I was being understood by my students. It also made me think about how I was understanding my students. Often, we make assumptions about behavior without directing it for a root. Maybe the student zoning out just doesn’t understand what you’re saying? What if the student using a disrespectful tone of voice hasn’t been taught how to speak to adults at school?
Student success in the classroom is dependent on student/teacher communication. Both sides need to be understood clearly and correctly. Within our classroom walls, we have the opportunity to build our own cultural communication rules. Every one who enters the classroom brings their own unique backstory. Within the classroom, we become a new culture that supports student success.
Who we are cannot be separated from where we’re from – and when we ignore that fact, planes crash.
Malcolm Gladwell
outliers, page 221
Opportunity
Around May each school year teachers and parents show concern for the same education phenomena- the summer slide. The summer slide represents the amount of learning “lost” to too much TV and no homework. However, the summer slide could be turned into the summer climb with one word- opportunity.
Toward the end of Outliers we meet a young girl who attends a prestigious school in New York City called KIPP (Knowledge Is Power Program). The school is designed to support economically disadvantaged students.
Their test scores are impressive, especially in math, but there is a catch. Student success is only guaranteed with student effort. School hours are long, homework is intense and students attend school on Saturdays and… wait for it…. the summer! The only way to defeat the summer slide is for students to continue to learn. When students continue learning over their two month break, student success the next school year is more likely.
I love the research Gladwell presents during this story. He talks about reading scores of students from three economic levels (low, middle, high) and student reading growth. When the table showing grow within the school year is analyzed, it shows growth across the board. However, when you look at grow from the end of one school year to the beginning of the next, students from low economic backgrounds aren’t showing growth.
Schools work. The only problem with school, for the kids who aren’t achieving, is that there isn’t enough of it.
Malcolm Gladwell
outliers, page 259
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