There is nothing like travel to give one perspective,
and along these lines I've been fortunate to have a
Fall filled with perspective. During October, I visited
several Australian boys' schools to give presentations
related to the social, emotional, and cognitive
development of boys. It was a great privilege and a
tremendous learning experience. Every day brought
new opportunities to discuss the critical issues those
of us invested in boys' education and development
are talking about these days.
The trip entailed visits with nine schools, all
members of the International Boys'
Schools Coalition.
IBSC's Executive Director, Brad Adams, who
graciously accompanied me on this journey across
Australia, deserves much credit for making this tour,
and the dialogue that resulted, a reality. In Melbourne,
Brad and I visited Marcellin
College, Camberwell
Grammar School, and Brighton Grammar School. In
Brisbane, we made stops at "Churchie"
(Anglican
Church Grammar School), and Moreton Bay Boys'
College.
In Sydney, I spoke at the
National Boy's Education Conference, organized
by
The King's
School, and spent a
day at both the Shore
School and Barker
College.
Finally, in Perth, I was fortunate to be hosted by Christ Church
Grammar School, doing presentations for
both staff and school community. Because the focus
of this trip was boys' education, the thoughts that
follow will necessarily relate to boys, although in many
instances the points raised will be germane to both
genders.
Without exception, every school brought a wealth
of experience and intellectual insight to the workshops
I presented. Usually, there was a chance for more
informal dialogue about boys and their educational
needs in between these presentations. As a result, I
met and was inspired by many gifted educators. In
some cases, conversation focused on building the
core skills of 21st century learners - certainly an
important objective of my workshop Building the Eight Pillars of
Capable Young Minds (scroll down).
Yet the most lasting impression of my visit is how
schools go about shaping "boyness." There is always
a degree of chaos bubbling beneath the order and
protocols of schools. If for no other reason, that is so
because schools are populated by children - agents
of chaos! What I found remarkable about the schools I
visited is how well they honor the vitality and promise
of that chaos, while remaining committed to the type of
structure and order that comprise the essential
infrastructure of boys' education. And it was clear that
the boys themselves understood and accepted this
essential tension - their countervailing instincts of self-
expression and self-control, guided toward a
productive coexistence.
Motivation is the Tie that Binds
Wherever in the world people gather to discuss boys'
education, conversation will inevitably turn toward the
perennial concern of how to motivate boys. It's a
reasonable concern, given that the experience of
adulthood illuminates the consequences of choices
made in childhood. Nothing could be more natural for
a teacher or parent than to make every effort to direct a
child toward choices that will deliver a life of
opportunity and success.
This grand plan would work quite well if only the
path toward these ideals could be counted on to
reflect the psychological needs of boys. But
increasingly, the paths that we map for boys' success
reflect things like the wisdom of adulthood, minimizing
risk, and the practical realities of the job market.
On behalf of boys everywhere, let me loudly
exclaim BORING! What a snooze.
Of course, boys have been conditioned to
disguise their lack of motivation. By the time they are
eleven or twelve, they're keenly aware of what
the "enemy" (by which I mean the entire realm of
commonsensical, advice-giving adults) expects of
them. Instinctually, boys know they can't defeat the
enemy, and thus resign themselves to simply
outsmarting us. In my experience, those boys who are
the best behaved may be the most expert at
orchestrating this deception. Their skillful suavity is
strategically deployed as a distractor for low
motivation. Or, more accurately stated, many boys
have an alternative set of motivators.
Before we rush to solve the riddle of motivation,
let's take a moment to think about what it reflects.
Once we grasp that low motivation is in part a
compensatory psychological strategy for coping with
disappointment, we will be ready to address the core
issue - how to help boys build lives that displace
disappointment with positive anticipation and the
seeds of significance.
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Significance - A Basic Human Need
Those who follow this newsletter know that I have
written before about the "missing ingredient" of
childhood - purposeful work. Essentially, it is
my belief that the delayed onset of work that affects
virtually all western cultures is detrimental to the
developmental needs of adolescents. For millennia,
adolescent boys have counted on some type of quest
or work to make the transition to adulthood. As our
societies are now designed, however, it is often
necessary to remain in school until one's mid-
twenties, years later than when one's body and mind
are ready to engage a more autonomous, meaningful
life.
Am I suggesting that being a student is not
meaningful? No. To the contrary, few experiences are
as meaningful, or as privileged, as the opportunity to
be a student. Yet I am raising awareness of a global
socioeducational conundrum:
An education that sufficiently prepares one to
enter the market of desirable jobs requires young
people to remain relatively passive for years beyond
the point at which they are ready and willing to
become more "necessary" to the worlds they
inhabit.
Although I've been writing and talking about this
issue for some time, interacting with Australian
educators afforded me the perspective to understand
that what I've been trying to say is both deeper and
more fundamental than I had realized. Simply put,
boys yearn for significance.
The need for significance runs so deep, and is so
universal, that it is as endemic to living in a tribe as it
is to living in the world's most cosmopolitan cities. It is
a need that manifests itself in the basic human need
to be productive and expressive. When I give talks
about the communication challenges of boys, I am
trying to address this issue. The important reward for
communicating is not more friends or greater
popularity (those are fringe benefits), it is an
opportunity for significance. By making themselves
known to others, boys build a bridge to a world larger
than themselves - an essential step toward
significance.
It was exciting to see how this need for
significance was being recognized and nurtured by
Australian boys' schools. To cite just a few examples:
- 1. Thriving arts programs that give boys a
myriad of ways to express themselves, and
opportunity for sharing their creativity with a larger
school community. (I saw some amazing visual art
and video that clearly gave boys a chance to
demonstrate their motivation to be excellent in ways
that reflected personal priorities.)
- 2. Connecting boys with their environment
and the cultural diversity of their nation by way of
mentored cross-country travel. (Imagine boys on a
four week camping trip across the continent without
iPods and related electronica. Then imagine boys
creating a documentary book of this adventure so
excellent it would be worthy of a high-quality
bookstore.)
- 3. Encouragement of boys' industriousness
through extracurricular projects involving technological
problem-solving. (Think of groups of students across
Australia competing to design the fastest Formula
One racing car possible.)
It is certainly true that the resources of private
schools make opportunities such as these possible.
Yet the spirit of these opportunities is what matters
most, and what can serve as a template to any school
sincerely concerned with motivating boys.
The Psychology of Vocation vs. the
Psychology of Success
So many have been mislead to think about vocation
as a matter of choice - as though picking a career
were akin to selecting one's lunch from a buffet filled
with all sorts of delectable choices. Such deceptions
are implicit in career tests and "help wanted" ads.
Unfortunately, this type of trivial approach to
discovering one's life path is a recipe for
disappointment - even though it is precisely what
most boys have in mind as they ponder the
question, "What will I be?"
Self-help books notoriously promote the idea of
doing what makes you happy. What nonsense! This
advice does little more than reflect a value system that
emphasizes pleasure and narcissism at the expense
of knowing one's true destiny. The last thing boys
need is permission to be more pleasure-
centered.
If we really want to increase the motivation of all
boys, we should spend less time talking about
success and considerably more time emphasizing
the merits of vocation. Is the purpose of doing well in
school to be a good student? Of course not. And the
purpose of being a good student has to be anchored
to a reward greater than success for its own sake, or
even being promoted to the next tier of education.
Still, if you've spent time with boys you know that
they like to fantasize about success, which they most
assuredly translate as an abundance of riches,
power, and sex. In short, a life built upon a foundation
of pleasure. Some boys (and perhaps a few men)
mistake pleasure to be synonymous with
happiness.
Psychologically, pleasure shields boys from an
enduring conflict which they cannot resolve without
assistance - the growing divide between their
idealized selves and the relative humility of their day-to-
day experiences. If there is a "crisis" of boyhood in the
world today, the immensity of that span embodies its
essence to a far greater degree than not working up to
one's potential in school.
If I could suggest the one thing that any of us
could do today to improve a boy's motivation it would
be to orient him to the notion that his primary job is not
to create success, but to discover his destiny.
When I talk to boys about the idea that their
destiny already lives within them, they get quiet - and
very attentive. The concept of destiny is made
contemporary by explaining that it is comprised of the
individual strengths, experiences, and curiosities of
an individual. I try to convey to boys that is their duty to
honor the destiny that lives within them. Doing so is
apart of a social contract a boy has with his family,
teachers, and all others who have invested
themselves in his life. The key aspect of this message
is that boys are not so much accountable to the
expectations of others as they are to the fulfillment of
their calling and potential.
Doing purposeful work is one way that people
bring shape to their calling and define their
significance. That is exactly why we need
opportunities for boys to do real, necessary work,
rather than activities which are obligatory or symbolic.
Creating these opportunities requires little money,
but substantial time. Why? Because capable mentors
are what make these experiences meaningful.
Compensation for the type of work I'm describing is
less important than the satisfaction of being useful
and appreciated.
When we try to explain this principle to boys, they
will probably stare blankly back at us. Don't waste a lot
of time trying to explain the merits of purposeful work.
Instead, spend your energy on trying to orchestrate a
great experience.
I hear from and talk to parents often who ask me
why their sons are unmotivated to take responsibility
for themselves. The answer is straightforward: the
opportunities that lie before them seem
insignificant. Unconsciously, most boys believe that
significance is derived from a job's external attributes:
status, authority, and compensation. If they are so
unfortunate as to enter the food chain (by which I
mean job market) before they taste significance, there
is a good chance they will be devoured by the fictional
portrayals of success that infiltrate media, and
currently have us on the brink of global economic ruin.
It's Time for International Dialogue
Because the need for significance is so fundamental
to boy's development, it is my hope that an
international community of schools and allied
organizations will begin to examine this need, and the
practicalities of how to best respond. Perhaps
professional groups and conferences might
temporarily shift from focusing on boy's achievement,
to engaging a dialogue about the practical need for
significance? Such a shift would be productive
because the shortest route to improving achievement
is to embed that journey in the psychology of
significance.
(*If and when such conferences are planned, it
would be fantastic to showcase the ways in which
boys are already making themselves significant. This
would be less a "talent show" than a demonstration of
how the intellects of boys bind with their energy to
produce significant results. Living, breathing
motivation.)
How can we help boys to heighten their sense of
interdependence, empathy, and recognition that their
collective efforts are enormously powerful - even
massive?
Can we begin to imagine a project that would
experiment with bringing boys together to discover this
potential for significance? I hope so, because it would
reflect positively on the schools involved, and would
contribute to reframing discussion about who boys
are.
The next big wave in pedagogical reform appears
to target the need for a relational
approach to teaching. As that wave breaks, we
will necessarily
need to look more closely at the difference between
how we view boys, and how they view themselves.
We have had nearly a decade's worth of reporting
on boy's deficiencies. We should by now be keenly
aware of where boys need extra help and time to do
well. Now, it's time to focus on the natural strengths of
boys: industriousness, creativity, and stamina to
name just a few. Although we can't reasonably expect
to motivate boys by pathologizing their nature, we can
help jumpstart their productivity by giving them a
necessary role to play - an opportunity for significance.
Boys' Voices and the Power of Narrative
One of the great contributions of an organization such
as the International Boys' Schools Coalition is that it
serves as a catalyst for distilling educational
strategies that are most effective with boys. During the
course of my travel, I learned that IBSC is on the cusp
of releasing a major report detailing what boys have to
say about the instructional style of great teachers, and
how specific elements of those approaches help
them learn. I had a chance to preview of this report,
and its content is a treasure trove of useful
information. It is my hope that IBSC will eventually
transform the insights of this report into a multimedia
experience. Hearing boy's voices explain what works
and what doesn't in the classroom will triple the net
gain of these insights.
Boy's voices are also needed with respect to
motivation. The field of psychology has a way of
compartmentalizing questions in the interest of
defining an explanatory equation. Yet even if we could
dissect the component parts of a well-motivated
adolescent, would it lead us to the types of
relationships that motivate boys?
I believe the compass we need has less to do
with explanatory pie-charts and statistical analysis
than compelling narratives. We need boys to tell us
the stories of how they got excited about learning
something, or found the energy to take action. We
build our lives and sense of purpose around stories
rather than imperatives, or even goals.
The ubiquitous, reflexive tendency to emphasize
goals displaces a deeper need for meaning. The
need for meaning and relevance wraps itself around
the roots of motivation: What's the meaning of asking
me to do this? How does this activity lead me toward
significance? Motivation will not ascend to find air and
light until these questions have been adequately
answered.
I feel grateful to the schools and landscape of
Australia for helping me to hone what is significant in
my own work. New England is home, but the warmth,
humor and love of family I encountered in Australia
reminded me that belonging can be found anywhere
that people share a common sense of purpose and
the will to connect. Across the big pond it's already
tomorrow, and that day, like all tomorrows, is ripe with
possibilities and promise. No worries mate!
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