SF in Mexico... linking with the UK

Comment

Comment by Paul Avard on June 18, 2009 at 6:00pm

One of the things I often do to help teachers see their skills in working with children they believe are challenging is to ask a few simple questions -
1. When your class is working well, what are you doing differently?
2. How can you do more of that?
3. Who will notice how well you're working when things go well?
4. What will they notice happening that is different, when things go well?
5. When the children you work with are doing better, what, exactly are they doing that tells you things are better?
6. How can you help the children do more of what's working so that the differences are maintained?
7. What would a visitor to your classroom notice that would tell them things were going well in the classroom?
8. On a scale of 0 to 10 where 0 is not good and 10 is WOW!! where are your class now?
9. What would tell you that you had mostly all moved up one half of one point by this time next week?
10.What would you all be doing differently then, to help each other maintain this new position? What else? What else?

And that may be a good start point in a conversation. As you know, it is not all bad, all of the time. The teacher(s) and the kids can all co-create a series of exceptional moments when being helped by someone thoughtful - just some thoughts for now.

Comment by Rebeca Guerra Martínez on June 18, 2009 at 1:44pm

I know exactly what you mean Paul. I have to be honest, I´m not working at the public school system, but even in the private we face those problems; labeling students until you get nothing else from them, but what you were expecting...
And I´ve been working quite hard with teachers to avoid this, and somehow the situation is now changing, but one school is not enough, that´s mainly why I started working with Denisse to be able to design and start working with teachers all around our community to offer these students the access to be supported, but our main obstacle has been, ironically, the same school that´s educating them, because they just can´t believe the approach could make a difference... very few people know about SF here, so we´re starting from scratch.
Any help will be highly appreciated, thoughts, ideas, improvements, suggestions, achievements, whatever you think can help us open a path for the approach to start growing in this side of the globe will be great!
Thanks!
peace and kindness, have a bright day!

Comment by Paul Avard on June 18, 2009 at 7:14am

As someone who uses solution focus approaches in schools in the UK - 11 - 18 year old students, I'd like to echo Carl's comments. The young people I work with tend, in the main, to be socially disadvantaged, frequently disaffected, usually emotionally disconnected and labeled by the system as failures. However, using solution focus focus, I have, I know, a healthy batting average in working with these young adults where the majority (a significant majority) manage to finish schooling and often walk away with exam grades - all of which is due to them, their beginning belief in themselves and EARLY access to support.

If there is anything I can contribute to the project, let me know how, please.