Archive for the ‘Education Books’ Category

The Power of Moments: Why Certain Experiences Have Extraordinary Impact by Chip and Dan Heath makes the case that we all experience moments that make a huge difference in our lives and that there are things we can do to make them happen. You need to be aware of moments in your life and look for ways to make them happen again for yourself and those you serve. This is a must-read for any leader.

1. Defining Moments

• We all have defining moments in our lives. This book has two goals. One is to examine defining moments and identify the traits they have in common. Two is to show how to create defining moments by making use of these traits. When we reflect on an experience, we do not average our feelings over time. Rather, we focus on the high and low spots, the peaks, and the pits, along with the beginnings and ends.
• One or more of the following elements are involved. 1. Elevation: Something happens to elevate the experience from those surrounding it. 2. Insight: Here is where you suddenly realize something about yourself or the world that makes a difference. 3. Pride: This is when you accomplish something special. 4. Connections: Defining messages are social. Special moments become more special when you share them with others.

2. Thinking in Moments

• There are three kinds of situations that stand out as moments in our lives. They are transitions, milestones, and pits. The goal is to mark transitions, commemorate milestones, and fill the pits. Here the Heath’s tell some stories of how employers can make transitions like the first day on the job special, how banks can help commemorate savings and mortgage milestones, and how service providers can fill pits as soon as they show up. At the end of this section and each section in the book they include a clinic, which demonstrates how the book’s ideas can be put to use.

Share this:

The Power of Regret: How Looking Backward Moves Us Forward by Daniel Pink deals with the power we can draw from dealing with our regrets in a thoughtful manner. Regrets deal with things you can control so you need to take action when possible to make things better and move on from things that can’t be fixed. Research shows that people who do this are healthier and happer. Thanks, Dan for this vital life lesson.

Part One. Regret Reclaimed – 1. The Life-Thwarting Nonsense of No Regrets

• Fron popular songs to literature to advice columns we hear over and over again about how successful people supposedly have no regrets. In this book, Pink shows not only that this is wrong-headed thinking, but when properly used, analysis of your regrets can serve to improve your life. We all have a portfolio of emotions and most of us try to have a bias in our lives for positive ones. That makes sense, but we also need to deal with negative emotions to help us avoid harm, be it physical or emotional. The purpose of this book is to show you how to use regret’s many strengths to make better decisions, perform better at work, and bring greater meaning to your life. Pink draws on his analysis of two massive surveys to accomplish this goal.

2. Why Regret is Human

• Regret is the unpleasant feeling associated with some action or inaction a person has taken which has led to a state of affairs that the person wishes were different. It is more understood as a process than a thing. As we mature, our brains naturally develop to experience regret. It is associated with the orbitofrontal cortex. People with lesions in this area typically do not experience regret. The same is true for people with Huntington’s and Parkinson’s disease. Reget is the most common negative emotion as things you regret are your own fault. They are things where you had control and constantly involve some comparison.

3. At Least’s and If Only’s

• These are two types of counterfactuals. When you think at least, you are thinking about how things could have been worse. When you think if only, you are thinking that an outcome could have been better if you had done something different. Most people engage in if only thinking much more than at least thinking. If only thinking degrades our feelings now, but it can improve our lives later. This is one way regret can help us do better tomorrow.

4. Why Regret Makes Us Better

• If you actively regret something you are not likely to do it again. A central finding is that regret can deepen persistence, which almost always elevates performance. Even thinking about other people’s regrets may confer a performance boost. Regret, however, does not always elevate performance. Lingering on regret for too long can have the opposite effect. Setbacks can supply fuel for future performance. Making mistakes and learning from them via regret is a path to growth.
• When it comes to things you regret it is key that you not wallow in them or dodge them altogether. Doing so will just make things worse. These feelings should result in thinking that results in future action that makes things better or avoids further pain. Think of this action as an evaluation that can be instructive. In short, if you make a mistake you need to ask yourself “what can I learn from it.” (Doug: This is a guiding principle for me.)

Share this:

The Sports Gene: Inside the Science of Extraordinary Athletic Performance by David Epstein (© 2013, Penguin Group: New York, NY) may not sound like a book for general educators and parents, but it is as it explores the messy relationship between biological endowments and the impact of training. You don’t need to be a sports fan to appreciate this look at modern genetic research that should apply to any kind of human accomplishment. Be sure to click at the bottom of any page to purchase this captivating book.

David Epstien

• David is an award winning senior editor for Sports Illustrated where he covers sports science, medicine, and Olympic sports. He was a track start at Columbia University and has a master’s degree in environmental science.

Innate or Will to Train

• The book opens by wondering how much of an athlete’s success is based on innate genetic composition (nature), and how much is a function of the will to train and time spent doing so (nurture). The first story deals with how a top flight women softball pitcher can routinely strike out the top men baseball hitters. How is it possible that girls can hit this stuff while top men can’t.
• In addition to action sports, David looks at how chess masters can reconstruct a chess game in progress after a quick look. This is where chunking theory came from. It was discovered that what the chess masters remember were clusters of pieces rather than each individual piece. Others also discovered that elite players of action sports need less time and less visual information to know what will happen in the future. Top tennis players, for example, can discern from the minuscule pre-serve shifts of an opponent’s torso whether a shot was going to their forehand or their backhand. No one is born with such anticipatory skills. Such skills are analogous to software, while genes are analogous to hardware.

Share this: