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Remember when you were young; that if you started something you stuck with it? You stuck with it and you persevered until you'd completed whatever was it was that you had started in the first place. As an example, when I was 8(ish), I wanted to play a sport. Back then, pretty much the only option was footy (Aussie Rules - look it up if you don’t know what it is - a pretty good game!), or cricket, and since the latter was akin to watching grass grow, footy was the choice.

After a couple of weeks playing, I wanted to quit, but my mum wouldn't let me. She made me keep going to training and then took me on Saturdays ot watch me play in the weekly match, then continued to take me to training the following week, and so repeated the process until I learned that it wasn't so bad after all and I did actually enjoy playing the sport. I continued to play for another couple of years - until I was old enough play in the under 12’s and the old hip ’n’ shoulder was replaced with the more undesirable tackle. At which point I promptly changed sports to basketball.

My preamble here comes on the back of a post I wrote last week that probed the use of technology in society today, and whether it is, in fact, good or bad that it is such a prevalent entity, especially among adolescents.

This post has received a good bit of discussion around it, and a few of the comments drifted towards the idea that we (Gen Xers in particular) were much more patient 'back in the day'. It were these comments that got my mind drfiting towards the idea that students today lack another very basic trait that we displayed also - that of resilience.

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Has Resilience Disappeared?

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I'm sure I'm not the only one who has noticed recently that students today really seem to struggle with resilience. It seems that they start one thing and then within a couple of weeks will either spontaneously stop attending, or slowly move onto the next trend without as much as a yelp or curteousy shrug in your direction.

I commenced a lunchtime coding challenge last term, and begin with a modest 11 students. By the end of the term, only 9 weeks later, I had only 5 regular attendees. Now, I'm aware that students will try something and just not like it, or decide it's not for them and move on. This is just par for the course, but I did happen to ask one of the students who dropped out after two lunchtimes why they left, and their response was something along the lines of, 'Oh, I just couldn't be bothered.'

Now that irks me! It's not like they were bad at coding, in fact they they seemed to be picking the skills up nicely. They just couldn't be bothered. Couldn't be bothered! Just like that!

So, is it just me or have teenagers today lost their spine? And if they have, where did they get to!? Is this something that has been growing for a few years, or decades, or is it a phenomenon that has recently cropped up and we were just blissfully unaware of it until now?

I'm inclinded to suggest that this is not a recent occurance, and as with many of the flaws in society, it has been brewing for a while now, but it is only just really catching up with us.

I had a conversation with a collegue about 5 years ago now. He was frustrated because he was the guy who administered the Pedal Prix (I've linked to their web page for those of you who are unfamiliar with - yet interested to know about - this race) for our school, and he was having a tough time getting enthusiastic students to participate in the competition. Those he could get only wanted to turn up on race-day. They had little to no interest in training and working up the stamina they required to compete in a 24 hour-long cycle race.

We concluded that the problem was stemming from a lack of resilience. From the students being unable to find the basic ability to cope under pressure situations for sustained periods of time, or to bounce back after a setback during training. They preferred to remove themselves from the program for a couple of weeks, or in quite a few cases entirely.

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Building Resilience

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There are no hard and fast rules here, and there are many places that will happily give guideance on how to build resilience, but from personal experience, I sometimes think that a mixture of tough love, honesty and continual positive encouragement work a treat. I cannot tell you which measure of each to use, and when to use them - this comes from understanding your student's needs, and being able to read each situation as they arise. Every student and situation being different means reuqires you to alter your aporoach as needed, and you might even find that in some circumstances, none of my preferred strategies work, and you will need to blindly think on your toes. Sorry! Not much help, hey!!

It seems the person lacking resilience is often first lacking self-esteem, they may or may not have learned how to deal with conflict, and their coping skills are probably quite underdeveloped too. As such, they struggle to get over major (and sometimes minor) setbacks in their life, such as poor test results, sporting troubles, and friendship woes. This will often manifest itself in a 'quitting temperament', whereby it is easier to give up quickly when the going gets tough, or to simply not try at all, and I'm sure we have all seen students such as this in our classrooms. The one who puts their head in their arms five minutes into a test, or the student who sits sullenly (usually at the back of your classroom), with their arms crossed refusing to even begin a task, no matter how simple it may be. These are the perfect opportunities to begin resilience building. To speak positively into a life that may have only ever had negativity thrust at it - to begin to exact change.

Positive Encouragement (Praise)

I often find that being positive and giving lots (lots) of praise initially works the best. For the student lacking self-esteem, this is just what they need. At the outset, praise even the smallest things, just strat building their confidence, and let them know that they are doing things right. I praise some of my students for just remembering to write their name at the top of their test, or putting the date at the top of the page without being reminded. In some cases, just find anything and praise them for it.

Honesty

I'm always honest with my students. If I don't know something, I won't try and bluff my way through. They'll call me on it every time, and I end up looking like an idiot. I will tell them I don't know and that I'll find out as soon as possible. But make sure you are prepared to actually follow through, and quite quickly at that.

I find that honesty is one of the best avenues for building relationships and for fostering trust. When students believe that you are an honest person, then you also are seen, in their eyes, as a trustworthy person too, which is why it is important that you follow through on finding information if you say you will.

While this isn't necessarily exactly a direct help in resilience building, it does aid with the next point.

Tough Love

To be used sparingly unless you know the student on the receiving end will be able to handle it. Which is why it is important to build relatonships based on trust first. I know my students well, and will use this tactic quite often. I find it is one of the best ways to build resilience, however, it is always slathered in the first two points, especially praise. Praising a student just before or after using some tough love will soften the blow slightly, but done well, not enough to diminish the underlying tone that you are trying to get across. I find that something along the lines of: 'you've done really well so far, but your whining is a waste of both our time, so get cracking or you'll be staying in at lunch to get this finished', works really well.

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To Conclude

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As per many of my posts, I'm not professing to have answers, I'm just trying to ask some tough questions, and maybe, along the way, offer some insights into methods I've found useful over the course of my career.

Resilience is lacking in society. It certainly is lacking in our youth, and it is something that we all need to be encouraging them to find again. Is it any wonder that univerity dropout rates for first year students is sky-rocketing? We need to find a way to stem the flow. I know of many teachers who are changing their vocabulary in an effort to help shift the mindset of their students.

Terms like: 'I don't know... yet.' Instead of simply: 'I don't know.' Are being used to assist students to think in a growth manner, rather than a defeated one.

There's a big culture, on social media and television, feeding this problem. Teaching counter to the things I've written about here - saying that it's okay to sit and sulk if you don't get what you were expecting. This needs to be combatted. We need to let our students know that they do have the ability to make it through the tough things life may throw at them. We need to teach them that they are strong.

Thank you for reading. I appreciate you taking the time to make your way to here. I hope that you have gained some insight into a topic you may or may not have considered before.

Please leave any thoughts or comments below. As always, I'd love to hear from you.

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