Reading List 011

How to have a eureka moment and a plea to stop punishing students over their gadgets…all in this week’s Reading List.

How to Have a Eureka Moment
By David Burkus
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David’s article speaks to why, right before beginning to see people at my practice, I take 30 minutes to sit back and read. I usually read magazine articles as they offer more natural breaks and allows for completion of the written work. I find reading miscellaneous articles, instead of completing billing, responding to emails, or other daily chores, allows a relaxation and an energy boost that I couldn’t quite explain until I read David’s article:

The researchers found that the group given a break to work on an unrelated task (the Myers-Briggs test) generated the most ideas, averaging 9.8 ideas. The group given a break to work on a related task placed second, averaging 7.6 ideas generated. The group given no break but four continuous minutes of work time generated the least possible uses, averaging 6.9 ideas. The research team had validated the idea that incubation periods, even those as brief as a few minutes, can significantly boost a person’s creative output.

One possible explanation for these findings is that when presented with complicated problems, the mind can often get stuck, finding itself tracing back through certain pathways of thinking again and again. When you work on a problem continuously, you can become fixated on previous solutions. You will just keep thinking of the same uses for that piece of paper instead of finding new possibilities. Taking a break from the problem and focusing on something else entirely gives the mind some time to release its fixation on the same solutions and let the old pathways fade from memory. Then, when you return to the original problem, your mind is more open to new possibilities – eureka moments.

Punishing Students for Gadget Use Will Make Their Tech Etiquette Worse
By Leah A. Plunkett
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When the majority of people and institutions are thinking one way, it’s usually best to stop and at least give the opposite view a read over. Lot’s of times public opinion is not the best opinion.

For a while now I have been hearing about students getting their cell phones taken away while at school. At first it struck me an odd that schools could have a policy that allows the removal of personal property (property that isn’t illegal or unsafe) but over time I just came to accept it was a school/district wide policy and at the end of the day it’s probably a good policy.

But something continued to nag at me. Aren’t we punishing kids for a behavior that the majority of adults do in their day to day life? A behavior that is, let’s face it, a necessity of life? I’m constantly in meetings where adults are using their phones. Whether for an e-mail, for research, or to check their Facebook status, our phones are vying for our attention (and getting it) all the time.

But when it comes to students we expect them to turn that off for 3–4 hour chunks of time. Although, the reality is when they graduate they are going to need to learn how to properly navigate the “always connected” social world we now live in. Why not embrace it in high school and teach the respect and restraint behind the etiquette?

Learning etiquette and high school go hand in hand. Academic etiquette. Athletic etiquette. Extracurricular etiquette. Social etiquette. Dating etiquette. And on and on. And not only is technology etiquette important for students, like Leah says in her article, students also need to learn how to important technology is for tomorrow’s thought leaders on innovation.¹

That’s because technology – mobile in particular — has come under fire in zero tolerance enforcement, sending students a warped message about technology and running counter to the Silicon Valley spirit that accepts making mistakes as normal—even beneficial—to personal and professional growth. At a time when today’s tech leaders are concerned about educating tomorrow’s innovators, putting an end to zero tolerance should be a top tech priority.

Why a Reading List? I do a good amount of reading and I‘m constantly finding articles which are informative, entertaining and applicable to my private practice. Instead of hoarding this information to myself, I’ve decided to begin sharing the articles and pull quotes on a semi-regular basis.