I like to motivate my students with a You-Can-Do-It attitude.
True IT student story:
I had a student who was always disgruntled with the class labs, and materials. He was always saying, “This stuff doesn’t work correctly, how can I learn anything from this?” My answer was, turn negative things into positive things. The more things that don’t work, the more you have to try to fix it with results of learning more. After all, what is to be learned from something that always works? If that were the case, employers would not need trained employees to fix these problems. When things go wrong, instead of turning away from it, and just giving up, embrace it, and say I can do this. He gave it a try, and passed the course with B+.
The next semester he came up to me and said, “Ya know….I learned from you. I fixed my neighbor’s, my friend’s, and my own computers using the tools and skills you taught me. I am so proud of myself. Thanks.”
The problem now is that I’m getting all kinds of emails about his repair triumphs. It’s ok though.
Anyway, I think you know how I felt. This is what it is all about.
