What Day Do Schools Start? – The answer may not be so obvious.

What day do schools start? One way to answer this is to look at a school calendar but what if this question asks more than that? What day do schools start for teachers? For teachers, it starts as soon as they start planning for the school year (likely in June or earlier). What day do schools start for students? This is the million-dollar question. When do schools start the environment for learning in such a way as to bring the students’ potential to the surface?

Content Not As Important As Thinking Skills

All teachers want to help students develop their critical thinking skills. In fact, there is an argument that our primary job as teachers is to teach thinking skills. With the dawn of all the information of the internet and now AI, the actual information we teach is becoming less important and the thinking/learning skills we teach are becoming more important. AI can tell you the capital of every country in the world but it can’t teach you to distinguish good information from bad. It can’t teach you how to take control of your life and create a life you love.

In my last blog post, we explored 3 of the roles that students take in the classroom and how they affect the student’s learning. The hero mindset, the victim mindset, and the spectator mindset are more than just ways of learning, they become ways of life. Therefore, fostering the hero mindset is even more important.

The Hero Mindset

Based on the characters found in the stories of games, the hero is the mindset we need to foster in our students. The hero has a destination in mind (a goal/grade). A hero is in control and has a plan to get himself to the destination (studying/asking questions/taking notes). The hero will overcome the obstacles he encounters on the way to the destination through problem-solving. The obstacles only make him stronger. He has his goal so solidly in his mind that it’s not a question of “will he get to the destination,” the question is “when will he arrive?” He certainly will get there, it’s just a matter of time. If a student can learn to adopt the hero mindset both in class and out, that is a person who can do anything!

What Day Do Schools Start? – They Start Right Now!

What day do schools start? They start as soon as the teacher and the school decide to empower students to take control of their own education and their own lives!

How about you? Do you have a student who has an obvious hero mindset? How do they demonstrate their hero mindset? What have you done to foster a hero mindset in your students?

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