You go tutors!

Every day I receive Google alerts about stories and statistics regarding test anxiety, test scores and test preparation. I like to keep current with what’s going on in the field.

Here’s one that came across my desk today:  It’s from “Janice R.” who runs a tutoring service in Palm Coast, Florida. Janice offers a good roadmap for students: familiarize yourself with the test, do some solid preparation and get ready for test day.

How often we overlook the essentials!

I applaud Janice R for getting the word out and offering what she can to students who may not be getting the guidance they need and deserve. Keep up the good work!

Janice R is a tutor at WyzAnt.com. Check out their website. While I am not personally familiar their services and therefore can’t yet recommend them, I definitely am intrigued to find out more, and suggest you look them over too.

Take a moment to breathe

New Year’s greetings to everyone, far and wide!  May it be a year of peace, health and prosperity for all.

Since the beginning of a new year is usually filed with resolutions– which are really thinly disguised attempts to change habits — I’m going to begin the year with a series of posts on habits.

Habits determine the quality of our lives. And they are fundamental if you want to reduce your stress around taking tests.

Life is made up of habits. Think about it. As you are reading this you are breathing (whether you are aware of your breath or not).  As your eyes take in these words do you know whether you are inhaling or exhaling?  Likely not because breathing is such an automatic habit — so much in the fabric of every moment of life -that most of us lose our awareness, or consciousness of it. Yet, it is the single most important tool we have for calming down and staying in the present. Wouldn’t it be helpful if we could use it to our benefit beyond simply staying alive.

Although everyone is breathing, very few of us have any sustained awareness of our breath.  Why is such an awareness important?  Because along the way each of us has adapted and even changed the fundamental habit of breathing so that it corresponds to our own emotional/mental state. Take a person who, every time she hears the word “TEST,” freezes up. In that moment she is stopping her breath. What’s causing her anxiety?  Surely not the four printed letters T-E-S-T. They are merely pixels on a screen, they are not “making” her anxiety. This person’s anxiety comes from her long-time habit of stopping her breath every time she reads or hears the word “TEST.” Her memories, associations and fears about tests have a stranglehold on the one tool that could really help her: her breath.

Try an experiment:  as you read this sentence, exhale deeply.  Keep going until all the air is out. Good.  Now what happens?  The inhale comes in automatically.  That’s the fundamental habit we come in with it at birth (it’s what kicks off life) and it’s what leaves us at death.  I remember sitting with my dear Aunt Rachel when she lay dying at the age of 105.  Over the course of two weeks I watched and listened to her breath, becoming every more shallow, ever shorter, until finally…. it stopped.

Keep your breath going, and keep your attention on your breath. As you click away from this blog xhale, and then inhale on the next thing you do, whether at your computer or away. Sustain your awareness of your breath in any activity you are doing today and forward:  whether it’s cooking, studying, taking a shower, or working out.  When you realize you’ve lost awareness—we all do, most of the time—bring your attention back to your breath. Exhale. Inhale.  Simple.

That’s your first task: just become more aware of your breath.. In a few days we’ll get into the next step of using this basic and most profound tool to our benefit.

OK. Get ready to click away from this blog.  Ready? Exhale.  See you in a few days

Sure enough, she wouldn’t talk to me.

OK, I thought, now what? I saw Amy eyeing a set of colored markers

I have on the floor in my home-office and I asked her if she liked to draw. She nodded. Rather than get into a tug-of-war over her not talking (of course, she would win), I said, “We don’t have to talk. You can draw if you’d like.” She started drawing and got very absorbed in an intricate picture of a group of lizards. When she was done I asked her if she would tell me something about it. All she said was, “It’s a family.”

In the second session she started drawing again, almost immediately. Again, lizards. The identical family as last time. They were in varying sizes and from the expressions on their faces (anger, fear, blankness) was obviously some story behind the picture. I asked Amy if she would tell me the story and she said, “In this family there is a father, a mother, a brother and a sister.”

Of course this corresponded directly to her own family configuration, and the story, as it wound out over several sessions, came clearer: the parent lizards didn’t think the little daughter lizard was as smart as the older brother lizard One day, as Amy was drawing I casually asked her, “So what’s the problem with math?” She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t understand it.” I asked her if she told anyone that and she shook her head, “No.”

Immediately a light shone for me on her whole situation: here was a child who didn’t understand the teacher but was afraid to say so for fear of that she’d be seen as not being smart. I asked her if this were so. Again, she nodded.

With Amy’s knowledge I spoke with her parents and teacher. I explained to them that it had to be safe for Amy to say, “I don’t understand this,” and that they needed to check in with her about it during or after class and when she was doing homework. I also trained Amy to say these simple words right away, “I don’t understand this.” When she saw it was safe to say it, she did.

Our work together ended several weeks before the math qualifying test and the interview. Her mother called one day and said, “Amy passed the math test and couldn’t’ stop talking at the interview.” She was accepted into the school.

What can we take away from Amy’s story? First, it’s all right not to know, and second it’s necessary to speak up, to confide it to someone who will be accepting. There’s an ancient expression, “He who thinks he knows not, knows; he who thinks he knows, knows not.” While this has deep spiritual implication, the bottom line is that not knowing is a natural, expected and an excellent place to start, provided you have a safe environment to express it.

When you are studying or preparing for a test and you don’t know something, recognize that. Rather than beat yourself up about it, say it—to yourself, and to someone who can help you. This is the first step on a path to building your confidence: it’s OK to not know.

You need some energy to perform well

Today’s question is:  How do I get rid of my anxiety before an exam?

Answer: You don’t get “rid” of anxiety. A little bit of anxiety has been shown (in over a hundred years of research) to be a good thing. Remember the “Yerkes-Dodson curve” (see illustration).  Yerkes and Dodson were two psychologists who showed, at the beginning of the 20th century, that there’s a direct relationship between stress and performance. Too much or too little stress and performance suffers. You need just the right amount of stress to perform well. The trouble is students think that their “anxiety” before an exam is a bad thing. Yes, it is, when it incapacitates you. In other words, when it’s too high.But if you think about it as “energy” you need some to give you the boost to get you launched. Think about those big spacecraft — the rockets are fired and the energy propels the rocket into space. The big hulking parts of the spacecraft fall away eventually and the small capsule does its thing once it is out of the earth’s gravitational pull. You are just like that before an exam. Your jets are fired, you are ready to launch. Don’t confuse anxiety with energy.  If you are truly anxious and you are not remembering things, you are doubting yourself, you are distracted and you are physically tense, then you’re going to slide quickly to the right side of the graph. You are unable to perform the way you ought to be.  Too much stress = poor performance. Use the tools in the book. Get yourself back on track. Learn to become calm, confident and focused.

Tell us your stories and send in your questions.

Our amazing brain: constantly seeking connection

Having just attended the Learning & the Brain conference in Chicago, I am struck with two competing thoughts I’d like to share:  how much science there is about the brain, and what a challenge it is for teachers to integrate the findings into their daily practice. I attended fascinating lectures about many new scientific studies on the brain and motivation, gender similarities and differences, stress, etc., but at the same time I was left wondering, “How do I implement these discoveries in my work as a teacher and a coach?”  I would like to suggest we need more collaboration between researchers and practitioners– between the scientists and the teachers. One of the

constant themes of the conference was neuroplasticity – how malleable the brain is over a person’s lifespan. We must extend this plasticity to collaboration, to working together, putting scientists in the classrooms and teachers in the lab.  Talking with Kelly Williams, who started off the Learning and the Brain conferences 11 years ago, Kelly shared his dream: have a school where we could teach and study the students and teachers at the same time. Now we’re talking!  So we chipped in to buy a couple of lottery tickets. The Megamillions jackpot that night was $161,000,000. I haven’t yet checked to see if we won.  Just maybe…..!

Need help? Confide in someone.

Recently a student came to see me. She said that she was having great difficulty with the one of the subjects in her medical school program. “I feel like everyone else is getting what’s going on and I’m not.” She was embarrassed to tell anyone she was having difficulty and so pretended that she understood what was going on when, in fact, she did not. This

just increased her unease and sense of isolation.

I told her that she made a good and important move by opening up to me about it, and I coached her to tell this to one of her classmates. She wasn’t thrilled with this coaching suggestion but  agreed to it any way.

At our follow-up session she said that when she was in lab she did, as agreed, talk with someone working near her. She said “I don’t get this stuff sometimes,” and, much to her surprise, her fellow student responded by saying, “You know, I feel the same way.” This got them talking, and then planning to get together to study.  The student I was coaching was much relieved.

The first tool in dealing with confidence issues is confide.  You have to admit– to yourself and to someone else– that you are having difficulty. You have to admit the negativity (“I’m not getting this,” “I feel dumb,” etc.). If you don’t acknowledge it you stay disconnected.  Remember: stress is a function of disconnection. When we are disconnected from self and others we get stressed and too much stress hurts performance.

If you are feeling “less-than” you need to reach out. In your isolation you think you are the only one who’s having difficulty. You will be amazed to find that many (many) other people are thinking the exact same thing. They think that you get it while they don’t.

Open the door and let out the negativity. Then something fresh, new and helpful can come in.

Let me know how it goes.

Worrying? Again?

Do you find yourself worrying about an upcoming test? Or, when you are in the middle of an exam answering questions, are you worrying then?

The first thing to know is that it’s normal. Just about everyone worries from time to time.

Second, know this: worrying never solves anything. Anything.  Worrying just breeds more worrying.  Haven’t you noticed that when you continue to worry

about something the worries just seem to grow and grow?

Also,  we often worry about things that never even come to pass. Have you ever worried that something would turn out one way and — as it happened– it turned out completely differently?  Most of us have had this experience– more than once. It’s common for test takers.  You worry about what’s going to be on a test and then, come test time, it’s not on the test.

The most helpful coaching I give to people who worry is this: when you start worrying, stop!  See a stop light, a stop sign, a hand go up, an alarm bell go off. Just stop the worrying. Take a deep breath. Ask yourself, “Is this worrying going to take me to my goal?”  The answer is “No!”  Next, listen– listen to the voice inside of you that’s going to tell you the next helpful action to take (“Get back to the books– keep reading the section you were working on”).  And then, fulfill the direction of the voice… do it!

It’s the best cure for worrying.

Appreciate your greatness

It’s well known, in the circles of positive psychology, that expressing appreciation is a powerful tool for improving relationships and performance. Usually we think of expressing appreciation  to someone else– someone who has done something for us or with us, whose contribution we want to acknowledge.

We don’t often think of expressing appreciation to ourselves, about ourselves. In fact, in workshops I offer when we get to this part, people are often stymied. What can I appreciate about myself?

Appreciation means “perceiving value” and “expressing gratitude.”

As you prepare for tests and do the work involved in studying, reviewing and practicing, take time to appreciate yourself for what you are doing.

In other words, take a moment to perceive the value in your actions, in what you are doing:  you are taking definite steps towards your goal. Acknowledge this, inside yourself. You might close your eyes and see yourself in a mirror, your bright, shining self, as you accomplish the work. Express your gratitude — your thanks –  to yourself, for following through.

This brief “appreciation pause” is a tonic: it will give you the energy boost you need to keep going.

When you hit a wall: grow something slowly. You will break through.

One of the things test stress can do is get you to feel like you can’t do anything. You feel like you’ve hit a wall.  Everything looks too big, too insurmountable, too daunting.  You shut down and collapse. Some people  spin in place. The talk in your head sounds like this:  There’s too much to do, I’ll never be able to accomplish what I want to, I won’t do well… on and on. [If this happens to you I'm sure you know what I'm talking about and could supply your own script].

This kind of talk is, literally, self-defeating. The way things work is on a

step-by-step, moment-to-moment basis. And you work that way too. You need to do what’s in front of you and in small manageable steps.If you take on too much all at once you hit the wall and shut down.

Here’s the way to resolve the everything-is-too-much,  spinning-in-place issue:  Choose one thing that you can do in the next 15-20 minutes and do it.  Once you start working you’ll see that all the energy that’s gone into being stuck, now goes into accomplishing the one task.  Make sure the thing you choose can be done in 15 minutes.  It may be learning one concept, or reviewing one problem. Just choose something — one thing — that you know needs to be done right now and do it.

Once you’ve accomplished that, take a pause. Look back at what you just did.  First, you’ll see that you got something done. This is beneficial in that it’s something you needed to do and you did it.  Next, realize  that you’ve just disproved the notion that you had a half hour ago that you couldn’t do anything.  You just did.  Congratulations!

Now, repeat the process. What’s the next small thing you can (and need) to do?  Now do that.

Send in your own methods for getting out of spinning in place and feeling overwhelmed.

By the way, this is an issue that touches all three legs of the stool– calm, confidence and focus. If you’ve been reading the book you can see I jumped to the third tool for regaining confidence, which is envisioning taking small manageable steps. The focus leg is also involved:  you got into action in a way that supports you in achieving your goal.  And I’m sure the whole thing calmed you down.

You got back on the path and kept walking.  Appreciate yourself, and thank your supports (friends, family, your spiritual guides) for helping you to help yourself  get moving.

What's your body doing?

Let’s start out with this rule of thumb: 

When you are thinking of of an upcoming test (or anything else in the future), remember to breathe.

Here’s a very common experience for test-takers:  “My test is next Tuesday (or tomorrow). YIKES!” Your heart rate goes up, your blood starts rushing, your stomach wrenches. You know the routine.

I don’t know about you, but often, when I’m thinking about something that I have coming up later today or tomorrow or next week (and it doesn’t have to be as stressful as a test), I find myself getting a little amped up. What do I mean by “amped up”? 

When I check in with my body while I’m thinking about what I have to do, I do notice that maybe my heartbeat has speeded up, maybe a little sweat is breaking on my upper lip or my legs feel a little twitchy. What’s going on here? I think of it as launching myself into the future. As if I were a cannonball on my way to whatever the future event is, I’m speeding through the air, only to explode on the other end.

“Amped up” or “worked up” – whatever you call it –  it’s not a comfortable feeling. Some people think it’s energy that’s preparing you for the event. Yes, that’s true– to a point. But chances are you are simply getting a bit anxious—thinking about something that hasn’t happened yet and imagining all the possible scenarios and outcomes (how come most of those tend to be not-so-positive?)  While we can’t control what thoughts come to us—try not thinking about the test you have to take next week—we can, while having the thought about the future, stay calm.

The simplest way?  Just breathe. You notice you’re thinking about the test, you notice your stomach starts to knot up.  Stop. Breathe deeply down to your belly. Ground your feet on the floor. Open up your senses to what is around you right now. The future event (that pesky test) won’t go away, but all those anxious feelings will. And wouldn’t that be a relief?

Remember: it’s a 3 legged stool. Your mind-leg takes over and throws your body-leg and spirit-leg out of balance. Get back in touch with your body. I’ll talk about getting back in touch with your spirit in another post.

Let me know your experiences with getting “amped up”. What happens to do? What do you do for relief?