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Our group discussed the path of teaching Private Victory before Public Victory, due to the nature of teamwork that is required. In some of Covey's lectures, he even mentions that he has, at times, taught the seven steps in reverse order.
What order do you think is the best for teaching Covey skills?
What Public victory skill do think is most difficult for teens, in general, to accomplish?
11 comments:
Dependence: Beginning with the end in mind. Teens can't think past tomorrow.We need to teach them how and why they need to think ahead. Many alumni have come back and shared with my students that they need to stay in school and earn good grades that this is very important after graduation. Our students can see past high school. I like the reverse order for teaching the steps
I like the idea of teaching the private victory first. Without the students believing in themselves and pushing themselves to achieve, I feel they would have a little more difficulty treating others with the respect that they deserve. I feel people who treat others improperly do it because they have insecurities in themselves. By teaching the student first that he/she is a good person and giving them ideas on how to be successful, they could then treat others with respect.
For the second question:
I think that "seek first to understand, then be understood" would be the most difficult to accomplish (with students and teachers) It is always very easy to give your opinion on an issue, but very difficult to hear what others have to say about that opinion.
I think the students need to seek an understanding of themselves before they can understand anybody else. We have many students that do things because it is expected of them either from their home, here at school or some other outside influence. We start identifying personal understanding when we assess and share their learning styles, and other academic information. Maybe we need to find ways to focus on the whole person in a manner that they'll be able to understand.
When I considered the question of, "private or public victory first?", the biblical parable from Luke 6 about the two different house builders popped into my mind. Like it says- when building a house, we first "dig deep and lay the foundation on rock",(or at least on footings below the frost line). To me, by starting with private victory, we are building the house's (our) foundation on rock. So when we our shaken by life's potentially destructive forces we remain standing because the principles we personally live by are solid, making us stronger and more stable. To me by starting with public victory, we would be trying to build a house without laying a solid foundation. When the potentially destructive forces hit the house it is likely to fall, and "what a terrible crash it would be". I agree with Covey that the maturing process must start from the inside out, with the first step being taking responsibility for our actions.
In today's culture many people take on the personna of being a victim, this includes many of our students. One way to avoid the victimization trap is to counter it with Habit 1 "Be Proactive", taking charge of our lives. If we then continue to develop Habit 1 by effectively using our freedom to choose, based on universal principles, we can "become the master's of our own ship". Therefore, I think we all(advisors and advisees alike) need to start building our houses by beginning with Habit 1 if we want our houses to stand strong throughout life. Otherwise the saying, "a chain is only as strong as it's weakest link", is likely to come true and inhibit the public victory maturation process we need to go through together in order to become a win/win, empathic, synergistic community.
The second question is a harder one for me to answer in a way where I think I have as clearly settled it in my mind. At first I thought why not go with Habit 5 "empathic communication" like Seth said, since most of us (especially me) struggle so much to hear what others are saying, meaning, and feeling. Even though I want to immediately jump in feet first and become a better empathic listener, I fear that if I do that without a win/win attitude, I'll eventually lose the motivation to improve my effective communications within my community. I like the thought of mutual benefit as a reason to stay hard at work building Public Victory - within a community of success with enough rewards or spoils to go around for all to share in. So I'll stay with Covey's schema again, and begin Public Victory with Habit 4 - Win/Win Attitude.
The hardest to teach would be Public Victory. Working with varying personality types can be very challenging. Teens especially find it difficult to cooperate and listen to someone who seems to be so different than they are.
We need to begin with Private Victory. Students need to visualize the type of person they want to become and take steps to become that person. They need to learn to take control of their space ship--and not blame others. They need to try to overcome the idea of being a victim. Prioritizing and self discipline are so important to develop before we focus on others.
It seems to make sense for the Private Victory to occur before engaging in the Public Victory, as Tom mentioned, this is where the foundation is being formed. It's difficult to be expected to reach beyond oneself if the "self" isn't rooted. We (my husband and I) have begun reading Covey's book on the 7 Habits of Highly effective Families, with the goal of establishing a firm foundation of proactive decision making, family goal setting, and establishing priorities, thus setting the stage for a private victory. With that built, we hope to build on that scaffolding to become effective foster parents and extend ourselves into the community and create a Public Victory as well. With the responsibilities involved in foster parenting, I wouldn't try to do that first and then learn about myself (Habit 7,6...1)...I would learn about myself/ourselves and then employ that knowledge towards the greater good (Habits 1,2...7)
The Public Victory skills are all rather abstract and in the "live for today" world of most teenagers, all pose difficulty in their comprehension and application.
Win Win is difficult since it is probably contrary to how many students are parented, coached, and socialized to think. The "I want it all" mentallity is prevalent in society and it's difficult to get them to recognize, much less put into practice win win decision making.
Listening in general is a skill that many students struggle with, so to become empathic listeners is a double hurdle. Again, its one thing to absorb the knowledge, but to actually practice that skill could be quite difficult for some.
Synergism requires a certain maturity and responsibility as each part of the whole has to do their part ( or more so, to make the equation of 2+2=10 work out)and many students have difficulty doing a portion of their part.
Due to a variety of factors, I would say that each skill has inherent barriers and it depends upon the person and their experiences as to which would be most difficult to accomplish.
I agree with all of the posts in beginning with the private victory. Each day we talk to our students we are building a "home" for their self worth. Each teacher puts bricks in or takes bricks out as well as family members and friends doing the same. Teenagers are very good at taking bricks out of themselves and these hawk habits are great for teaching them to build themselves instead of destruct.
I believe the teachers here do a fantastic job of helping build kids up. The hawk habits that we study will help us to continue to get the students to push themselves instead of relying on someone else to push them. Private first.
In the Public Victory students have a hard time understanding the winwin. It takes years of maturity to get to a point that both parties, while disagreeing on some aspects, can still come to a workable solution.
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