Customer Reviews

7 Strategies for developing Capable* Students. (*responsible, respectful, and resourceful)

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Just when you thought you knew everything about teaching; along comes another book claiming to do it better.

Well, this little book packs a punch so powerful that you might well be forced to re-evaluate your thinking and un-learn some ineffective habits and replace them with some of the recommendations offered by H. Stephen Glenn and Michael L. Brock.

Even if you have been teaching for some time, these ideas are fresh and simple enough to begin applying during your next lesson.

Even though the advice is geared towards the parent, it can and should be thoroughly studied by teachers of all levels from Primary to University. An awareness of the comparative stages of mental ability and emotional development will enable the teacher to identify and adapt the appropriate approach needed.

The book is not long on theory, it cuts straight to the heart of the matters discussed with practical and concrete recommendations.

For example, a anxious and impatient parent at a Parent-Teacher Orientation meeting, wanting to know the single most effective thing they can do to promote their child's lifelong success in education, is promptly told:

"Sit down to dinner with the television off every evening for 30-45 minutes".

So, at least for me, its "Back to the Drawing Board"; time to clean the mental attic again on the road to becoming a better teacher.

Thank you, H. Stephen Glenn and Michael L. Brock for sharing your ideas.

This book helps you focus on the long term outcome. It answers the question "What do you really want for your children 20 years from now?" And leads you to everyday practices that you can implement to get to that point. Good, poignant stories that help you see with your heart as well as your head. Practical proactive advice that will help you to parent in a way that feels good to you and to your child. For those parents who are looking for an alternative to the shame and blame route.
I highly recommend it!

This well written book is both powerful and inspirational. A must read for every parent wanting to do the best job in raising responsible, respectful and resourceful children in today's society.

For some strange reasons, I am always attracted by books with the magical number `7' (seven) in the titles or sub-titles. Remarkably, they often turn out to be great stuff. Some of these books have already been reviewed here & there are more to come. Partly, my obsession with the number has probably to do with my impressionable exposure since I was a kid.

When I was twelve in the early 60's, my first `blood-thirsty' movie was the Japanese cult classic, The Seven Samurais, which reportedly inspired the Hollywood epic, The Magnificent Seven. Both movies became my perennial favourites & I have seen them countless times. In both movies, a ragtag group of fearless fighters helped a poor village to deal with & outsmart a gang of marauding rogues.

In this book, the magical `7' (seven) takes on a more serious & sober stance. It refers to the critical attributes that are embodied in the seven resources & skills necessary for your kids/teens to become capable - responsible, respectful, & resourceful - in dealing with today's complex world.

Firstly, let me reveal the author's Significant Seven resources & skills of capable students:

- strong perceptions of personal capabilities;
- strong perceptions of personal significance;
- strong perceptions of personal influence;
- strong interpersonal skills;
- strong intrapersonal skills;
- strong systemic skills;
- strong judgment skills;

I have always hold the view that understanding perception is the key to peak performance.

Maxwell Maltz started the ball rolling by coining the term as `psycho-cybernetics', even though ancient masters in the East have known about it for a very long time. Edward de Bono, the guru of lateral thinking, calls it 'First Order Thinking'. Steven Covey relates some insightful anecdotes about perception in his `7 Habits for Highly Effective People.' Joel Arthur Barker, a process futurist/consultant, considers perceptual understanding as one of five strategic tools necessary for navigating your future. Other consultants, like Mark Brown, Philip Kirby, to name a few, have talked at length about the intricacies of perception & their impact on personal as well as business (or organizational) performance. In the field of stress management, the research people at Institute of HeartMath, creator of the cutting-edge Freeze-Framer Technology, have linked `stress' to `perception'. Even in the world of esoteric practices, Harry Palmer, creator of the expensive Avatar training program, thinks along the same lines, as far as reality creation is concerned.

Henceforth, it is exciting for me to note that these two authors have drawn an excellent & compelling parallel in the academic arena.

I fully concur with the authors that, in the case of our children, strong perceptions of one's personal capabilities, personal significance & personal influence are the precursors to building one's strong assets in dealing with a world that is hurtling at us with breakneck speed, & compounded by hurricane-force changes.

Surprisingly, the book, written by two educators by profession, is presented in very clear, easy-to-understand language.

I highly recommend this book to all parents & teachers. This book can help you develop the resources & skills for your children/students to become capable adults.

I would go further to recommend parents & teachers to take a look at the following books, as supplementary reading:

1. What Kids Need to Succeed: Proven, Practical Ways to Raise Good Kids, by Peter Benson;
2. What Young Children Need to Succeed: Working Together to Build Assets from Birth to Age 11, by Jolene Roehlkapartain;
3. What Teens Need to Succeed: Proven Ways to Shape Your Own Future, by Peter Benson;

What a fabulous book. It has helped me in so many ways with my three children. Very easy and entertaining reading. I've recommended this book to all my friends and even to the teachers and administrators at my children's school.

I can not believe that nearly ten years has gone by since this book was first published. I thought that everyone had read this book, and more importantly was "using" this book. It took a room full of educators and parents indicating that no one knew of this book for me to write this review. It is less a review than a sales pitch, but it is a pitch that needs to be made.

From personal experience as both parent and teacher, this book changed my outlook on both. I have experienced considerable success at both, and it has to do with a fundamental switch in thinking. In fact, once you read this book, and get the point, you will see how simple it really is to help students become capable. But, everyone has to have their oars in the water and be working in the same direction.

Just yesterday, I heard from one my students that he and his partner won Bronze at the Canada Wide Science Fair. This is the third time we won Bronze, and incidentally we scored Silver a few years ago. This book helped me "coach" kids. I had little to do with the science, but I believe that I was influential in the primary aspect of this book - pointed out the paradigm of their only capabilities - their success.

I have an email from one of them, and it has squarely hit this point.

Earlier last week, at a wonderful seminar on Assessment by Damian Cooper, I was struck by the way that he also used questioning techniques of the participants, but as well the students in his videos. He uses the materials in this book to a tremendous advantage. I see strong similarities, and attribute his success for working along these paradigms.

Seven Strategies for Developing Capable Students is MOST DEFINITELY A MUST READ by any parent and/or teacher. It is a wealth of information, tips, and tricks, but more importantly allows any parent or teacher to focus on the student - making them capable, and feeling this as well.

Let me quote a passage which I see as prophetic as it is more of a problem today, than it was ten years ago.

"Parents often FEEL they must run to school to CONFRONT the teacher or principal with the responsibility of solving children's problems. This may be called for at times, but such occasions SHOULD BE RARE, and should only take place after we have done all we can to EMPOWER OUR CHILDREN TO DO ALL THEY CAN TO SOLVE THEIR OWN PROBLEMS."

The capital letters are my own, and should point to the emphasis for which I see as integral to proper parenting. SADLY, there has been an apparent increase in this type of CONFRONTATION. It is wrongheaded, and is actually bad for the student. While it might make the parent feel good, and this is also problematic, makes the child see a FICTION for which they must bring to the REALITY of life. It arms them with the inappropriate tools of success. When the school unions need to add language to their collective agreements that protect them from this type of confrontation, it is clearly a sign that there is a problem - a problem to the process of parenting.

"We do a DISSERVICE to children when WE communicate a perception that everything is SOMEONE else's problem rather than theirs. 'You are doing poorly in school because the teacher doesn't like you'. 'You didn't make the team because the coach is prejudiced.'" p. 53

While it could be rumour or gossip, I have heard that this is said quite often, and am shocked. There are a considerable number of parents who blame a teacher for many different reasons. As a teacher, there is no defense to this type of claim. The logical fallacies riddle the event, but it is nonetheless pointless to argue - a parent's mind is made up at this point.

BUT, I have spent 25 years at teaching, and NOT ONCE HAVE I EVER HEARD ANY TEACHER say anything close to this. I can't imagine any teacher being so very shallow that they would willingly and knowingly do this to a child. In STARK CONTRAST, to help a student who might even be trouble in a classroom, to experience success would be something that would help the student not be a trouble maker. It is in the teacher's BEST INTERESTS not to be like this, and for this reason, I believe that blaming someone is a parental fiction.

I believe that the problem with many students now-a-days is that they come to teachers with the meta-understandings or the paradigms of "shields up", if I can use an old Star Trek phrase, where there is absolutely nothing wrong with them, and they simply need to sort out who to blame.

This book will help anyone see the problem with this thinking, and get them to think towards helping the student develop a capable nature.

"The perceptions of being capable, significant, and able to influence one's own life are powerful confidence builders that instill the courage to take healthy risks, improvise, and transcend failure. PARENTS WHO INVEST TIME HELPING CHILDREN INTERNALIZE THESE PERCEPTIONS ARE GOING A LONG WAY TOWARD ENSURING THAT THEIR CHILDREN WILL SUCCEED IN SCHOOL AND ENJOY LEARNING".

This book is WELL WORTH the read, and I hope that every parent read this. Form discussion groups, and share your observations and creatively work toward making this happen. It was relevant 10 years ago, and is more relevant today.

Some times faces are not deceptive. The face, they say, is the index of heart; and so is the book in hand. No kidding about this fact.

Was wondering why don't such creative visualization minds write a similar book for adults (i.,e other than children and parents).

Nevertheless, 7 Strategies is a value-added resource for the concerned group. I envy the readers of this book. This book directly works as a guide on the three R's: Responsible, Repectful and Resourceful.

Does your child's notebook explode upon opening? Does your child do homework every night after supper and yet bring home dozens of missing assignment reports from school? Does your child come home with the book but no idea what the assignment is? Or perhaps with the assignment and not the book? Does your child frequently have no idea what the words of an assignment actually mean? Does your child weep over the tedium of homework assignments whose worth they cannot comprehend? Does your child go off to school in the morning moderately happy but come home looking beaten down by life? Are you looking for help for such a child? If so, don't look for the answers in this book. There is not a whisper of how to help the organizationally-impaired student. (P.S., If anybody knows of such a book, or can write such a book, please let the world know.)

I found this book extremely helpful as both a teacher and mother of three. The insights of Stephen and Michael are written in a format that is down to earth and easy to impliment in everyday situations and hardships that occur in a parent's life. And speaking from experience their ideas work! It's easy to reference specific challenges as they occur, read the ideas, try them , and move on. This book has been inspirational and has served as my parenting survival kit. I only wish it was available when I was not yet a mother and teaching, so that I would have been enlightened to parenting issues. New teachers, please read this book for the sake of all us parents! Parents, please read this book for the sake of your children and their teachers!