Doing our best? YES!

“I will do my best, always my best and only my best!”

The boy scout´s pledge to service includes these words.They are noble ideals to aspire to and match the ideals of the Scouting movement which sought to develop the human being and help young people grow into useful individuals for society.But what is doing our best? And is it actually possible?How many of us really do our best?

We can take some guidelines from NLP to help us define what is doing our best.We tend to do our best when we are fully engaged in what we are doing.Our attention is focused on the task before us, our senses are wide open to notice whatever information will help us perform our job well, our minds are relaxed and attentive, ready to be creative or disciplined when necessary.At a deeper level, what we are doing is congruent with what we value and believe in.We use our skills as completely as we can, regardless of whether we have learnt or practised enough to be masters or proficient in the activity. And we do it with love, respect for the material, love for the recipient of our work and love for ourselves in our own efforts.Many craftsmen, even when they are producing replicas of their work imbue each item with the same care and affection as the first.Super cooks prepare each dish with loving attention, even if they make it every day.Each time they cook it they notice what is the same and what is different in order to register that this time is new and special.That is being fully engaged.

When we do not put our best efforts into something we run the risk of mediocrity and middling results.And this is not very healthy for anyone.What is mediocrity?It is going through the motions, saying that “near enough is good enough”, acting without care or interest in the other or in the task, being “slap-dash”.It is being asleep.

There are very good “reasons” for not putting all of ourselves into a project or piece of work.Maybe, we have other concerns and our attention is elsewhere, maybe we are not interested in it.Sometimes, we can see no personal use or benefit to us, or it is really a task for someone else to do and not us.Perhaps we are overloaded with other duties or we feel we are underappreciated.Sometimes, people don’t exert themselves because they do not wish to do something too well.If they reach a certain standard, they consider that it will bind them to that level forever and that is not their desire.Mediocrity can be comforting in that way.Nobody expects too much of you.And it can be easier (but not always!If you can sing in tune, singing off-key is actually harder to sustain).If you feel you are not putting 100% into something that you should, take a look over the points above and see if one of them corresponds with the reason for your lack of effort.

This is particularly important when we are doing something that we perceive is our vocation.Whatever difficulty we face, when we are doing what we are truly here to do, should give us the energy and desire to keep going.One of the most salient comments by thinker and educationalist Parker Palmer is that many people in this world are doing jobs “that are not theirs to do.”By this he means that we are engaged in work that we have not chosen for ourselves.Someone else has chosen for us or we have selected an activity that may give us money, prestige, fame, an easy life or whatever, but it is not our heart’s desire.

Of course, being in the educational system is not the choice of many students and we are often compelled to take subjects that we find hard to see any relevance to our lives and even harder to enjoy.What can we do?As teachers, we can embrace the notion of the process of learning.First, we can help people be fully engaged.The simple pre-task questions to a reading activity are a model of what we can do on a wider scale:What do we already know about X?How might knowing more be of use to us? Therefore, what specifically would we like to learn? How may we apply what we know in the future?

In other words, we can build curiosity, we can show or help students find the relevance and connection to present knowledge.We can regularly give feedback, pointing out improvements and progress. We can assist our students to recognise their own progress and how the investment of energy and attention to work leads to better, more satisfying results.Give credit where credit is due.When students work well, even if it is simple for them, give credit and make sure they personally acknowledge this.Inside themselves.And give credit when they they have made the effort but the results fall short of the expectations.

If you feel they could do better, use the phrase that Scott Thornbury advocates: “Do it again but better!”We are doing our students a service by asking them to repeat when we know they can produce better work.Then praise the good work fully so that they get a buzz from it and it serves as the motivation for the future.Some teachers refrain from praising good work because they think the student will get big-headed or she will stop making the effort to improve.So, a really excellent piece of work gets an 8 or a 9 out of ten.It is not really fair to never give a ten.Just as it is unfair to always give them when some work patently could be improved on.

Sometimes, the purpose for learning something is not apparent and sometimes, the benefit will comemuch later.This is useful to underline.It cannot be a justification for everything as then our reward for motivating ourselves would be so distant in the future that it would hardly serve us. Nevertheless, students should have the concept that some of the learning they are doing now is a long-term investment.You can ask them to imagine how a certain piece of knowledge or a skill might serve them in ten or twenty years in different contexts.Make it a game or a challenge, especially when an answer does not come to hand easily.

Highlighting the process of learning is a balance to the test-result system so prevalent in our education systems today.Many students become demotivated or fail to learn because everything seems to depend on passing or failing an exam.No one fails if they have learned a skill or new knowledge in a lesson.Put the spotlight on what students have accomplished.Regularly.

One of our teachers, Pat, says that she is worried not about the high-flyers or the weakest in the class but about the silent majority.These are the students who are present (but not always or not fully), who seem to participate on an irregular basis, who hover around the basic pass mark, who do not show signs of much work, enthusiasm and progress.Often they are mediocre and after a year in class, there is little evidence of them having been there.These are students that we can work with to help them find a purpose for their learning.

Learning constantly, every day, is one of the noblest acts of self-love that we can perform in this world.It is a display of self-pride and respect for ourselves and others. Everybody learns, but, sadly, some learn a lot more in the street than in the school. We cannot change what happens out there but we can make our classrooms a learning world and we can promote the culture of doing one´s best by our own actions inside it and by what we expect from our students.

Palmer, Parker J., The Courage to Teach, Jossey-Bass, 1998

Ó Laura Szmuch and Jamie Duncan 2003