Perseverance in 4/5B

Perseverance in 4/5B

As I have mentioned in previous posts, our school has a 7 Strengths for Success character education program. So when this month's topic of Perseverance came up, we linked it to one of our school's 7 strengths, Grit. 

Arianne’s video was very inspiring. She has had to show a great deal of grit and perseverance to get through the tough times dealing with her back injury. She had some great suggestions for how to show perseverance:

Are you an egg or a super ball?
We did a fun demonstration to show the difference between resilience and fragility.
I brought in an egg and a sky ball and dropped them both on the floor. The egg, of course, smashed into a mess on the floor. The sky ball, however, rebounded over and over again. 
   
We discussed how failures and falls are going to happen to them all, but they can choose to be crushed, like the egg, or rebound with perseverance, like the sky ball.



Can you persevere?
To test students' perseverance, I gave them a challenging task to complete:
(From https://blog.classcreator.io/teaching-kids-to-struggle-growthmindset/)

Students were given a scrap of paper and scissors. I had several examples for them to look at, but they were not able to touch them. As they struggled to figure it out, I wandered around and took note of the conversations they were having. After a short while, I began writing their words on the board:

• I can't seem to figure this out!
• This is really hard. 
• I didn't get it this time. Can I try again?
• This is impossible.
• It can't be impossible. The teacher did it.
• I've almost got it!

After about 10 minutes, we stopped and discussed the statements. Are they egg statements or sky ball statements? No one wanted to be the egg, smashed on the floor with no hope of going on. I let them think on this challenge overnight and one student was able to complete the task! Was she ever proud of herself the next day! She shared her success and learning with the class and we celebrated.

We have decided to use the egg and sky ball example whenever we are working on challenges this year. I love being able to have this reference point for when students are having a rough time. It gives them hope that they will be able to "bounce back."