An educator’s advice for approaching things ‘little by little' | Hazier Rios | TEDxBonitaVistaHS

[Applause] it's the little things in life that matter now I'm sure most of you have heard this phrase at least once in your life but if you're like me well you probably didn't really care too much at all about this phrase I mean I wanted to dream big achieve big I didn't want to task around with the little things I wanted to graduate get rich get famous or perhaps just have a l loving family meaningful life but then a thought occurred to me not too long ago I started to think well how does one actually get there and then I remembered a f memory long ago I uh some time ago I had a big mountain of laundry when I me Mountain I mean Mountain it was pretty bad some of you are like oh that kind of looks like M others moms probably got a mini heart attack it would get so bad that at night my mother would be walking across the hall it's kind of dark and she just looks she goes I wait I see who is that who she thought it was another person that's realiz that is kind of bad but still I don't want to do that that looks like too much work for me maybe someone else do it for me then my mother rightfully so had scolded me but then she said something that has stuck with me forever she said just approach it little by little I thought little by little okay I took this idea and I cemented it with my students as my time as an educator let me tell you how so my time as an educator uh these past two years I thought it would be more interesting more fun and probably just improve the overall classroom Dynamic if I were to meet with the students once on one now I had about 130 students but I made it happen during class time I met with them one on one and I would ask them three questions one how's school going for you two how is life outside of school and three what is one thing you are looking forward to let me give you an example of each so with the first question whenever I ask how school going for you typically Ty Ally when students weren't doing well on certain subjects I would ask them well how often do you study for that subject at home 95% of the time I would get zero nothing NADA so this one student in particular let's just name him Johnny he had around a GPA of 2.6 so I asked Johnny well why don't you study at home said well I have around 20 or 30 missing assignments I don't really say the point anymore I don't really care about graduating anyway so I stopped and thought like H know that is a lot of work but you know that's actually kind of impressive you're passing high school with little to no effort at all you're technically passing imagine if you did 25% more effort no 5% more effort how much can your grade improve so I told them try five minutes five minutes he looked at me like what Mr I have 20 missing assignments what's five minutes going to do well that's a start and it's better than nothing it's better than nothing maybe after 5 minutes you start studying a little bit more you get used to it and Johnny face his whole demeanor had changed after I said that he was filled with hope I'll come back to Johnny later my second question uh I had asked a student in particular let's name her Becca I asked Becca how's life outside of school she hesitated for a second I gave her time she didn't even really have to answer that question we could have just moved on totally up to her but eventually she said I don't think it's as good as I'd like it to be I just I feel distant from my and then my heart ache a little bit so I asked well do you do you talk to your family every day what's going on there it's like well it's just me and my mom and there's just some days where we say littl nothing at all so I thought about that I thought well Becca do you do you try to spark up a conversation no not really it's like okay what's a little thing one person can do to spark up a conversation oh how was your day how was work so I suggest Becca what if you had asked her how was your day try doing that and see where it goes maybe she just say good moves on maybe she eventually asks you back maybe little by little the conversation evolves now the door is open for you to have that conversation with him and it's not guaranteed but it's better than nothing it's better than nothing she looked up and she said you really think so said the sh Becca's face her whole demeanor had changed she was I'll come back to bed down to my third and final question I had asked a student in particular his named Steven and I asked stepen Steven what is one thing you are looking forward to now typically when I ask this to many students they say prom graduation College home coming but Stephen in particular what he said honestly broke my stepen said I'm not looking forward to anything and I paused I wasn't expecting that answer from Stephen he's type of student very Lively ni people so I had to take a second okay let's break it down maybe let's thing um okay Stephen what are you doing this weekend or even tomorrow he PL on stepen you know he had a look at defeat but he started looking up a little bit started thinking more and then he eventually said oh I'm going to my friend's house this week oh okay and your friend like what are you guys going to do it's like oh we're just think we're just going to hang out play video games like oh is this a friend you see often no I I actually haven't seen him in 3 weeks it's like oh there you go that's something you can look forward to it doesn't have to be some big life event for you to look forward to something it can be as simple as going to a friend's house or looking forward to what's for dinner starts small and slowly build up to something bigger if You' like even face his whole demeanor had changed he was F hope now I'll come back to stepen in a little bit let's take a trip back to the past I had been working tirelessly hours days even I was honestly so drained once I had finally completed this project I had finally completely my launer vo there you go it was um a lot of effort for me but then my mother came in the room and she said oh was that so hard and I said honestly a little kind of hard at the end of the day little by little I finished so back to the presentent uh my time as an educator it's been a year since I've seen my students they're seniors now all of them and I see Johnny I'm like Johnny how have you been how's everything how's school and Johnny looks at me say wow it's just I started studying like you said 5 minutes turned into 10 then 20 then 30 and I went from a 2.6 to a 3.7 I actually want to graduate now big smile on his face then later I saw Becca Becca how are you how's everything well um I started talking to my mom more and we're actually going shopping this weekend wow last but not least I saw Steven Sten how are you how's that he looked at me he smiled on his face said life is actually a lot more fun now little things are different for everyone what brings you Joy what helps you progress what brings you peace in life is unique to you life isn't just about the grand Milestones it's about the little things you do to get there being with your friends talking to your family working on your school on your careers I just want to say thank you to those students as well for proving that the little things in life truly do matter and if we ever get stuck in our lives whether it's with our careers our school our relationships are with ourselves at least we know now we can start by working on it little by little thank you [Applause]

Channel: TEDx Talks

Views: 498

Keywords: Academic, Acceptance, Achievement, Change, Community, Education, English, TEDxTalks, Teaching, [TEDxEID:56382]

Id: NKgjGw-xHrQ

Length: 11min 44sec (704 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 05 2024