Small things for big differences

On this last day of 2022, it’s an appropriate time to take stock: how did this year go for you?  What have you learned about yourself?  What new skills did you acquire?  More difficult, perhaps: what would you want to do differently?  We also go through this introspection as teachers - the feedback we could have given in a more thoughtful manner; the advice before a test that we forgot to give.   

The nice thing about an academic year is that it bridges two calendar years - students have a natural opportunity to apply the lessons from 2022 to their upcoming semester in a coherent, not disjointed, manner.  

New Year’s resolutions are notoriously difficult to keep - it’s frequently because we try to do something too big; too much outside of our habits and routines.  We frequently say to our students, “what’s the small thing that can make a big difference?”

We’re big proponents of keeping things simple.  If you want to wake up earlier, don’t set your alarm for an hour before your typical time - start by setting it for 10 minutes!  If a sentence isn’t working in an essay, don’t spend a half hour trying to wrangle it into shape - just delete it and write something new!  If you want to study more for a test, don’t block off time every day for a week beforehand - start by apportioning two or three days!  Equally important, instead of brooding over the last test or grade, make a plan for how you can perform well on the next one.  

These small shifts accumulate over time to make major impacts - so let’s get started!