Artists create remarkable things by moving in the opposite direction. They pursue simplicity and move away from complexity.

Consider the design of the iPhone. Its circuitry is complex. Its interface is simple.

Education is complex. Our interface should be simple and artful.

For learning to be powerful and life-changing it must be personal. These videos walk you through three ingredients that must be in place to move educational approaches from abstract and impersonal to concrete, personal, and life-changing.

I want to thank the University of Oregon’s Substance Abuse Prevention Program for this opportunity. Bryan and Sabine, thank you for your help planning, filming, and formatting the footage.

Part 1: Introduction to Personalized Prevention Education

Part 2: C.P.R. A Meta-Curriculum for Personalized Prevention Education

Part 3: Crystallize Your Message

Part 4: Personalize Your Methods

Part 5: Relationalize Your Approach

Part 6: Get Away from Group-think

EBB: What needs to change in environments where adults work with teens (schools, programs) to make relationships stronger and healthier?

AFR: Few things are nearer to my heart than this question and few things grieve me more than what I see happening under the auspices of education. If, like Rip Van Winkle, I could fall asleep for twenty years, here’s what I would long to see when I awoke:

1. Schools employing interactive, relationship-based approaches that engage and captivate teens at a personal level.

2. Teachers who fuel the learning process by enflaming a student’s natural curiosity.

3. Learning environments that have shed teach-to-the-test tactics in favor of unbounded creativity, divergent thinking, and regard for human ingenuity.

If our country is serious about transforming education, these three ingredients must be at the heart of the transformation process.

EBB: Given all the risks and dangers presented to teens, what can educators and parents do to help teens make better choices?

AFR: Commit to finding points of entry into the relationship. This takes determination on the part of the adult. Study teens and you’ll discover these entry points. But you have to be intently focused and committed, like when you lock yourself out of your house. You check every door and window to see if one is unlocked. The same is true with teens.

I introduce groups to the following three phases to help them strengthen their positive influence in the life of teens—C.P.R.

1. Crystallize your message— Sharpen your focus to the essentials

2. Personalize your methods— Increase relevance and meaning for teens as they take ownership

3. Relationalize your approach and build trust with students— Teens will connect with your message as they connect with the messenger.

EBB: What do educators and parents need to know about the adolescent brain?

AFR: Can you imagine hosting Thanksgiving while remodeling your kitchen? You could get the job done, but it wouldn’t be pretty. A similar remodeling process is underway between the ears of every 12-25 year-old. Functions like logical, forward thinking and impulse control don’t perform as well as they will in adulthood. I devote several sections of my book to this remodeling process and what we can do about it.

Continue reading on Examiner.com: Interview with the author of The Teen Age: 40 Reflections on Relating With Teens – Los Angeles Parenting Teens | Examiner.com http://www.examiner.com/parenting-teens-in-los-angeles/relating-with-teens-interview-with-the-author-of-the-teen-age-40-reflections-o#ixzz1ES7JQOHz

We all have pre-existing beliefs. Many of these assumptions are tacit, hidden in the recesses of our mind. Relationships, conflict, and myriad life experiences can flush these beliefs from hiding. Released into the open, they then provide us with the opportunity to refine them, change them—even kill them if they prove insufficient. Beliefs are like pieces of pottery placed in a kiln. The heat destroys those pieces containing air pockets and cracks. Pieces that are structurally sound survive.

I was in a group conversation not long ago in which we were discussing some weighty issues. I held fast to one perspective on the topic. Many in the group held a different opinion. I dug in and defended my ground. Fortunately, the others were patient with me. They asked good, difficult questions, tried to understand me, and elucidated their viewpoint. A dim light within me grew brighter, and I began to see how they understood the issue. I began to see fissures in my own ideas. I had to choose whether to cling to my existing fractured idea, or seriously consider killing it in favor of an idea that cohered. Our natural tendency is to do the former. In this instance I chose the latter. I wish I could say this is always the case.

Our ideas and beliefs help us make sense of the world. They possess tremendous governing authority, informing our choices. If their veracity is threatened, even for a moment, we can feel as though the ground upon which we stand has become unstable. So we’re prone to protect them, at times with breathtaking ferocity—even if they lack integrity. But this stance fosters a climate resistant to learning and growth. If we are to help others learn, we must first cultivate within ourselves a commitment to honest inquiry and intellectual integrity, and be willing to follow where this commitment leads.

In the spirit of the new year I will begin down a fresh path with my newsletters starting in January. I hope you enjoy this last newsletter of 2009 capping off the “Five Elements of Effective Structure” series.

To illustrate this final element of effective structure, Transition, let’s build on the example I introduced in the last newsletter: Imagine you are working with a group of youth to encourage them to avoid using tobacco. You’ve discussed with them the role of various media (TV, Internet, movies, etc.) which may employ subtle and not-so-subtle methods to encourage youth to smoke. After giving a brief, clear introduction, you facilitated discussion and dialogue during the process phase, synthesized the student comments, and helped them develop actions they can take based on the discussion. With your help, the youth arrived at some brilliant ideas and developed specific strategies–ones they now “own” in a way they didn’t when they entered the room. You’re sending them back into the world with a newfound sense of responsibility and clarity. Excellent!

The next topic you want to discuss is the role of peer pressure (again, insert your own topic), and how it relates to tobacco use. Here’s where we can stumble. Not infrequently I witness presenters that begin a new topic without connecting it to the previous topic. The topics remain isolated. By breaking these topics out of isolation we encourage students to strengthen relationships between the topics. As you draw the conversation about media to a close and prepare to move into your introduction on peer pressure, pose a simple question to strengthen the relationship between media and peer pressures: “Before we move on to discuss peer pressures, I’m curious, how would you say media influences and peer pressure are related?” I like using the second person in this kind of a question. It is a reminder that your audience members, not you, are responsible for their own learning process. Then, allow for silence. Brains are working.

Our brains crave coherence. Brain research indicates that our brains are wired to preserve what is coherent and purge dissonance. We want to know how things relate. This is how we learn. The transition phase is when you offer your audience opportunity to create meaningful connections between two separate topics. When we can strengthen the relationship between two or more distinct topics, we strengthen the learning process. This is the point of Transition–to connect the topic you’re leaving to the topic you’re entering. There’s a reciprocal, chicken and egg relationship here: Whichever comes second we will best understand by connecting it with what came first. Switching topics without a good transition is sure to create “topical whiplash.”

I’ve designed this five-part presentation progression to maximize the engagement of the learner. My desired outcome by practicing these elements is that our presentations will be more engaging, lucid, and effectual. Please don’t feel you need to adhere to every jot and tittle of this structure. Make it your own. Adapt it to serve your needs. Remember, the agent of change is you.

A couple weeks ago I received an email about a tree tour at the University of Oregon hosted by none other than Whitey Lueck. What a coincidence! Far from the mythical, hobbit-like person I pictured, Whitey is a well-known, well-respected local naturalist and all around outdoor guru. He knows more about trees than I expect I’ll ever gather about a single subject. I signed my family up.

Two elements of Whitey’s tour particularly intrigued me. The first was the simplicity of the curriculum: trees. Whitey took us from one tree to the next, gave us a few interesting facts about each, then invited questions. The second striking aspect was his wholesale engagement in his subject matter. Whitey’s interest, passion, and knowledge were unmistakable and inspiring.

Our tour group comprised a blend of adults and children. Kids are natural learners. Curiosity is in their being. One need not teach them to learn. They want to know and make meaning of what they see and experience. Their questions are often pure, unrefined, and earnest. They want to suck meaning out of things to satisfy their curiosity, an appetite I find contagious.

I encourage you to take a tour, with children, if possible. Note what made the tour helpful or unhelpful. I’m a believer that the qualities of a good tour guide are the same qualities that are central to good teachers, parents, and managers. You will see this most clearly in how he or she responds to the questions people ask. The best tour guides welcome questions and contributions from the group. Second, notice the children’s questions. How would you describe them? Study their faces and notice what curiosity looks like. This is how we get close to curious and how we rekindle it within ourselves.

What kind of music do you enjoy? If you’re like me you appreciate a broad spectrum. So far today I’ve listened to Bach, Radiohead, Ryan Adams, and The Rolling Stones. The music I’m drawn to tends to result from synthesis: the combining of multiple, different parts into a complex whole. Attend the symphony and you’ll experience the splendid coalescence of myriad, unique aural expressions.

Synthesis, the third step in our learning structure, is when we collaborate with our audience to reassemble the elements explored during the process phase into a new coherent whole. Imagine you are the conductor. The orchestra is your audience. Together you are working to shape something resonant and memorable.

A powerful shift happens as you progress from Introduction through Process and into Synthesis. The topic you present in the Introduction, though helpful for the purposes of orienting your audience, is as yet abstract to everyone but you. Imagine if you told me, “Today we’re going to talk about native vegetation.” I would know what we’re discussing, but I wouldn’t have any relationship to the topic. It remains intangible to me. Process allows me to explore the content and make it my own. I can ask questions, deepen my understanding, and at least begin to satisfy my curiosity. Through synthesis we can then create a new form, or composition, that has personal meaning and relevance to each individual.

Too often, because we bypass the process phase, synthesis becomes merely a reiteration of what was stated in the introduction. For example, an introduction may be, “Smoking cigarettes is harmful to your health.” The “synthesis” that follows falls flatly as, “Furthermore, don’t smoke. It’s bad for you.” This prevents the message from taking root and yielding change because the topic remains distant and impersonal to the audience.

Synthesis offers the opportunity to make meaning of process. The presenter or educator can facilitate synthesis by bundling together comments from the audience into likenesses, then reframing the main message after integrating input. This is a far cry from traditional approaches wherein we state the message in our terms, irrespective of participants’ voices.

In summary, a solid Introduction promotes productive, divergent Process, which in turn allows for constructive Synthesis. Keep in mind that all of these elements apply to both formal and informal presentations. What applies to teaching a workshop will also be relevant in a dialogue with your coworkers or children. Fidelity to each element will enhance the potency of all our interactions.

It’s great to be working with you to promote meaningful, lasting change.

Best,

Questions? Send me an email.

Suzuki’s method evolved from a simple observation: “all children in Japan speak Japanese easily” (Ability Development from Age Zero, p. 4). Most people didn’t initially comprehend the significance of Suzuki’s observation. But Suzuki recognized that his observation carried profound implications for how all humans learn. If kids acquired the Japanese language through immersion in the language, could immersion in music also teach students to hear and play a musical instrument? Then, as with a language, they would internalize and know the music in a personal way. This, Suzuki posited, is meaningful learning. This is why we play the Suzuki music in our house each day. Listening to the music trains our ear to recognize and “speak” the language. When we sit down to play “Lightly Row” on the cello, our ear knows what it should sound like. The cello is a tool by which we speak.

Suzuki’s method applies to settings that have nothing to do with music. Many of us spend at least part of our lives, if not considerable chunks, learning and helping others learn. Note who you will be spending time with this week, and what are you trying to teach. You may be a chef who is trying to teach her staff how to julienne vegetables, or a manager working with one of your staff to help him better organize his time. In each case, Suzuki advises us to create a language into which we can immerse the student. Do those you’re teaching understand the language? With their help create a vernacular that you can agree on.

Suzuki incorporates two additional elements into his method that can enhance every learning process. The first is to connect what you teach with a desire that exists within your students. People you work with will learn what they want to learn. The second element is to make it fun. Find a way to make learning fun. Even if you’re teaching someone how to create a spreadsheet, with a little creativity, it’s possible to make the learning process something you both enjoy.

I’m fascinated by the relationships humans have with tools. As the story of my daughter demonstrates, the purpose of a tool is to successfully overcome a problem. In fact, such problems as this create opportunities for us to tap our human creativity and ingenuity. We seek out a tool to enlist in our problem-solving efforts.

But in relation to tools, I find one of two realities is possible: I am using the tool, or it is using me. Any time my intent becomes subservient to the tool—rather than the tool serving my intent—that tool is using me.

In education, for example, the intent of a teacher ought to be to help students learn and understand. Curricula, created as tools to enhance learning, can assume a determinative role in the learning process. Instead of tapping curricula as a resource to help deepen student understanding, we defer to the curriculum to tell us what we ought to do. The tool becomes our master.

Tools are meant to avail us of our innate gifts. They are channels for human expression: Jimi Hendrix and his guitar, Pablo Picasso and his brushes, J.K. Rowling and her pen and napkin. A right relationship with a tool promotes the expression of our humanity. When tools use us, less of our unique humanity shines forth for others to see, know, and experience.

If you manage a team of people, you employ tools to build an efficient team of people that trust each other and enjoy working cooperatively. If you are a parent, you may borrow principles and ideas to help you relate to your children. Whatever your context, you have a challenge you are trying to address. Tools can add potency to your efforts. What they can’t do is be a substitute for you.

I played soccer throughout high school and college. During each high school season we’d gather at a teammate’s house the night before the game. The menu was always the same: spaghetti. In addition to building camaraderie, the high carbohydrate fare helped fuel us up to play the next day. Our bodies required approximately 24 hours to digest the pasta and extract the necessary nutrients.

Imagine playing a soccer game immediately after eating three helpings of spaghetti. Not a pretty thought. (Viewers of The Office should have no problem conjuring an image here.) But sadly this is what many educational approaches amount to–a spaghetti feed/soccer game.

Without process we can’t assume any material we present will be relevant to our listeners. The goal of the process phase is to help others take ownership of the content we present. They do so by strengthening their relationship to the content. Through process we can afford participants the opportunity to more deeply understand and internalize the risks of alcohol, for example, resulting in their truly owning their convictions surrounding alcohol use. This ownership can lead to changed action.

Underlying process is the opportunity for abstract, intangible ideas (think “Just say no”) to be more concrete. As ideas become more concrete they become more real. Then they have power to alter our perception.

It’s great to be working with you to promote meaningful, lasting change.

Send an email to andrewfrobinson@aweber.com to subscribe to future newsletters.