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J O U R N A L
Research, Education, and AVID
AVID’s Executive Director Jim Nelson discusses
the need for current research in society,
education, and AVID.
Victor Villaseñor and the
Guiding Spirit of Genius
Learn more about the life and career of bestselling author Victor Villaseñor inside.
Juntos: Together Realizing Our Potential
Get an overview on Juntos, AVID’s upcoming
Latino-focused educational conference.
ELL Adolescents: Understanding
Leads to Success
AVID Staff Developer Michelle Mullen explains
the needs of English-language learners and how
educators can reach out and support them in
academics.
Why AVID Works: Notes from
a Cognitive Science Junkie
AVID Staff Developer Bill Madigan reveals the
brain research that supports AVID methodologies
and strategies.
Summer Institute Sidebar
A wrap-up of the 2009 Summer Institutes.
Can Effort Create Success?
AVID’s Executive Vice President Rob Gira
outlines research noting how students’ individual
efforts overcome their social constraints and
lead to their success in education.
Book Review: Mindset: The New Psychology
of Success by Carol Dweck
Reviewed by Rob Gira, Executive Vice President.
Book Review: Proust was a Neuroscientist by
Jonah Lehrer
Reviewed by AVID Center's Mark Bennett.
Did You Know...
National statistics and facts on English-language
learners and education.
VOLUME 15
NUMBER 3
FALL 2009
VOLUME
15,
FA L L
2009
AVID’S EDUCATIONAL JOURNAL
ACCESS Research Journal is
produced by the AVID Center
Marketing and Communications
Department
Editor: Steven Baratte
Assistant Editor: Roz Hafner
Graphic Design: Jill Dickens
Contributors: Mark Bennett, Rob
Gira, Aliber Lozano, Bill Madigan,
Michelle Mullen, Jim Nelson, and
Devon Tolliver.
The AVID Brain
From the very beginning, founder Mary Catherine Swanson was adamant that all
students could go on to college. Many, though, needed to be told they could. They
needed to rethink their destinies and picture themselves in college.
Do you like what you see? We want
to hear from you. Let us know what
you think by emailing the editor at
[email protected].
In this issue, we look into the power of thinking, how students use their brains, and
why they sometimes don’t. Real thinking is hard work but it’s what leads to success
for our students. Kicking off the issue, executive director Jim Nelson writes about
AVID research and why we need to continue these efforts. Addressing the subject of
genius, the brain and struggles that English-language learners face, executive vicepresident Rob Gira presents his captivating interview with bestselling activist author,
Victor Villaseñor. We learn about his take on “geniusing,” or not thinking, but instead
trusting your intuition. AVID’s upcoming Juntos Conference, at which Villaseñor is a
featured speaker, is outlined in a sidebar to the interview. The conference focuses
on preparing and supporting Latino students. Long-time AVID staff developer,
Michelle Mullen, delves further into the needs of English-language learners and how
educators can reach out and support them academically in her article, "Adolescents:
Understanding Leads to Success." Supporting Mullen’s piece are intriguing ELL facts
and statistics on the back cover. Another veteran staff developer, and 2009 Summer
Institute keynote speaker, Bill Madigan, offers an eye-opening and fun look at the
brain. His take on understanding how we think, can help educators really reach their
students. Rob Gira follows up with an article tackling many of the most current ideas
from noted brain researchers, and a book review of Carol Dweck's Mindset:The New
Psychology of Success. AVID Center's Mark Bennett rounds out the issue with a
thought-provoking book review on Proust was a Neauroscientist by Jonah Lehrer.
More information about our efforts can be found on our website, www.avidonline.org.
AVID Center
9246 Lightwave Ave., Suite 200
San Diego, CA 92123
Phone: (858) 380-4800
Fax: (858) 268-2265
www.avidonline.org
Donate Now
Look for our “Donate Now” button on the website this fall. This is a convenient, taxdeductible way to give to AVID and help ensure we are able to reach all students.
PAGE 2
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VOLUME 15
FALL 2009
Research,
Education and AVID
By Jim Nelson
AVID Executive Director
R
Research is the key component to
the progression and evolution of
a civilization. From technology to
transportation, from economics
to engineering, every part of our
society has been researched, tested,
and implemented.
Thomas Edison said, “I have not
failed. I've just found 10,000 ways
that won't work." Because of his
diligent research, others in that field
can rule out the ways that don’t
work, and begin their own research
with that knowledge in mind.
Like all other aspects of our society,
education relies on research to
help better prepare students for
the challenges of life beyond high
school. As the world changes, the
methods we use to teach our young
people must also change and adapt,
and the only way this can be done is
through vigilant education-focused
research.
Today's generation of students has
more access to information than
any generation before. With the
click of a button and the swivel of
a mouse, students are able to learn
about anything and everything
in an instant. But with every new
advancement comes new challenges;
the greatest being how to adapt
teaching strategies to the new way
of learning. Through research,
education can do away with old
methods and incorporate new and
tested methods that work.
The importance of research is
universally acknowledged and
educational organizations from
around the country host yearly
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VOLUME 15
conferences and meetings where
they give educators and researchers
the opportunity to share their best
practices.
Just as we ask our students to
provide evidence to back up a thesis,
so too must educators provide
evidence and research to back up
new educational programs and
techniques. AVID Center attends
many of these events, revealing the
methods and data that prove the
success of the AVID program.
When Mary Catherine Swanson
began AVID in 1980, she researched
every aspect that was incorporated
into the program. Through
research, she found the important
skills necessary for a student to be
successful at the postsecondary level.
The Cornell note-taking technique,
the strong emphasis on writing
skills, and student collaboration all
came from the diligent research of
Mary Catherine and her team of
teachers and professors.
AVID Center continues to expand
on the ideas of Mary Catherine by
continuing its dedication to research.
With the work of consultants and
third-party researchers, AVID has
learned which student demographics
are still struggling and how to
overcome the barriers that keep
them from achieving academic
success. Though finding the who,
why and how is an important first
step in education research, it is
equally important to use research to
continually verify the effectiveness
of any given program.
Without the dedication of teachers
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PAGE 3
and administrators, AVID would
have been a fleeting course
struggling to stand out in a sea of
temporary educational solutions.
During the nearly 30 years since its
inception, AVID has proven to be
an excellent program with excellent
educators. As AVID has evolved
into a schoolwide college readiness
system, the need for ongoing
research has become even more
paramount. With this in mind, the
AVID Center works with a number
of research groups to study the
system and our ongoing initiatives.
In the next two years, research
teams will examine the success
of AVID graduates in college,
including their rate of graduation;
the leadership role played by AVID
elective teachers; schoolwide and
districtwide AVID; the gender
gap; support structures for African
American male students; middle
school AVID; AVID's postsecondary
initiative; and support structures
for English-language learners. The
research conducted in 1980 helped
launch a tremendous program,
and the continuous conducting of
research will only improve the reach,
quality, and effectiveness of AVID.
______________________________
To learn more about AVID's previously
published research studies go to www.
avidonline/research.
Victor Villaseñor and the
Guiding Spirit of Genius
By Rob Gira
Executive Vice President, AVID Center
I
In some ways, Victor Villaseñor
began his education in the mid1940s with advantages that should
have made him a successful student.
His parents, Juan Salvador and
Maria Guadalupe, were wealthy
landowners in Oceanside, a
growing, beachside community in
northern San Diego County. Their
rancho, on which they had built an
elegant home, stretched over one
hundred acres from the eastern
mesas to the ocean. The rancho
produced livestock, fruit trees, and
a healthy lifestyle for Victor and his
brother Joseph, and sisters Tencha,
Linda, and Teresita. Juan Salvador
was a respected businessman in
the nearby towns of Carlsbad and
Oceanside. By the time he started
kindergarten, Victor could already
ride horses like an adult, and was
ready to live the vaquero cowboy
lifestyle. He had confidence in
himself, having been taught by his
grandmother, Dona Guadalupe,
that he was a “walking star” and
had been put on the planet to share
his gifts. She also taught him that
“every day is a paradise given to us
by the Almighty,” as he recounts in
his memoir Burro Genius.
However, school was not paradise
for Victor. In fact, when he began
his formal education, Victor
encountered a strange and hostile
world. At home, his parents spoke
only Spanish, and he knew no
English. In school, he faced racism
from both teachers and other
students who ridiculed his use of
Spanish. Because he did poorly in
reading, he ended up in the “slow
group,” which was composed
mostly of “you stupid Mexicans,”
as one classmate said to him. As it
turned out, Victor Villaseñor was
dyslexic, but would not be properly
diagnosed until he was 44 years
old and had already published four
novels. Suffering mental and physical
abuse, Victor flunked the third
grade twice, but found other ways of
expression by drawing and coloring
stars, riding his horse, Midnight
Duke, and helping his parents at the
rancho. He found wisdom from his
older brother Joseph and from his
father, who taught him what it meant
to be a man, to cherish the good and
bad times, and revere his immediate
family and his ancestors.
School would remain a challenge for
Victor. It would be safe to say that
teachers were not his favorite people,
as he suffered frequent humiliation in
class. Still, it was a chance encounter
with a substitute teacher in seventh
grade (described in Burro Genius) that
ignited Victor’s interest in writing.
After bouncing from public school
to Catholic school and back, Victor
ended up in military school where, as
he says, “I would be taught discipline,
and with enough discipline, I
would surely learn to read.” It was
a miserable existence, marked again
by failure and ridicule (his writing
always received low grades), until Mr.
Swift, a substitute teacher, showed up
and encouraged the class to express
themselves, write about what they
loved, and not worry about spelling
and punctuation. Victor wrote about
his brother Joseph, who had died
when Victor was in the third grade,
about how Joseph’s passing affected
him, and he also wrote about hunting
and riding, and about Joseph’s dog,
Shep, whose exploits he described
in great detail. When the paper was
returned, he received an A. When he
tried to talk the teacher out of giving
PAGE 4
Photo of Victor Villaseñor courtesy of The Western Stage.
him an A (“I’m a Mexican, you can’t
be giving me an A.”), the grade
stood, and Victor had discovered a
self-confidence he never had before.
Despite the experience, school
was still a struggle and Villaseñor
dropped out in his junior year
of high school. He spent time in
Mexico, studying the country’s
culture and arts, and then enlisted
in the U.S. army. Despite the pain
that reading caused him, Villaseñor
soon discovered literature and
devoured writers ranging from
Tolstoy to Faulkner while studying
philosophy at the University of
San Diego. Then he began writing
seriously, and after four years,
had enough confidence to enter a
writing course at the University of
California, San Diego, where he was
befriended by teacher and author
Ronald Kayser, who encouraged
him. After producing nine novels,
65 short stories, and receiving 265
rejections, in 1973 Villaseñor sold
his first novel, Macho, the story of a
young migrant worker, which was
compared by the Los Angeles Times to
the best of John Steinbeck. He also
wrote the screenplay for the movie
adaptation. Since then, Villaseñor
has published many non-fiction
works, including Wild Steps of
Heaven, The People vs. Juan Corona,
Walking Stars, Burro Genius, Crazy
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Loco Love, Rain of Gold, The Thirteen
Senses, and several screenplays. Rain
of Gold, which follows his family
from the days of the Mexican
Revolution to modern day Carlsbad,
became a national bestseller, was
translated into numerous languages,
and, like many of his works, is used
now by teachers throughout the
United States. It is a monumental
work, moving back and forth in
time, blurring the living and the
dead, and has been compared to the
“magical realism” of Gabriel Garcia
Marquez. Burro Genius, another of
his family memoirs, was nominated
for a Pulitzer Prize and also became
a national bestseller.
In the 1970s, Victor Villaseñor
discovered another passion, one
which many of his teachers would
never have predicted for him: he
became an acclaimed public speaker
and lecturer. Through a series
of odd circumstances, Villaseñor
ended up as the keynote speaker at a
large gathering of English teachers
attending a California conference.
His first novel, Macho, had just
been published, and his publicist
requested that he attend the
California Association of Teachers of
English Conference and “be part of
a workshop.” As Villaseñor describes
in Burro Genius, he expected to
be attending a workshop, not
presenting. And, it got even more
interesting when the planned
keynoter for the convention was
delayed and the meeting organizer
asked Victor and several other
authors in attendance, “Have any of
you ever keynoted before?” All of
the authors, several of whom were
quite successful, sat quietly.
Not only had Villaseñor never
keynoted but he had never spoken
in public before. But those who
know Victor Villaseñor, were not
surprised by what came next. As he
describes it, “I took a deep breath,
straightened up, picked up my
Western hat off a chair, and stepped
forward. ‘I can do it!’ I said in a loud,
clear voice.”
Juntos: Together Realizing our Potential
By Jill Dickens
Project Manager II, AVID Center
For educators wishing to learn and grow, AVID’s professional
development is second to none. Adding to its current line-up of
educator trainings, which includes Summer Institute and National
Conference, AVID presents Juntos: Together Realizing our Potential.
The purpose of the Juntos conference is to inform and share best
practices in raising Latino student achievement. It is tied to AVID’s
Equity initiative, which was implemented to raise achievement for ALL
students. The Latino population is the fastest-growing population in
the country, yet there remains an achievement gap between Latino
students and their white counterparts. The conference is November
16-17 in San Antonio, Texas, and is open to all educators trying to
make a better future for young Latinos and English-language learners.
Juntos is a Spanish word that means together. It is an alteration of
junta, or meeting, a venue for a group of persons joined for a common
purpose. Juntos will provide solutions to the challenges Latino
students face through the elementary to postsecondary pipeline.
Practitioners from around the country will share their successful
strategies in the areas of: parent involvement; student performance
(grades 4-12); postsecondary enrollment, retention, and completion;
as well as policies and procedures surrounding Latino equity issues.
Additionally, they’ll be able to hear from our keynote, featured and
student speakers to get a broad perspective of the issues. The goal
of the summit is to unite educators with a targeted focus, to leave
energized, and armed with new ideas to take back to their school
districts and immediately impact the educational issues of the fastestgrowing population in the United States. Educators can expect to take
away a better understanding of issues impacting Latino achievement
and solutions to those issues.
We all must do what we can to raise achievement for all students.
Educators from across the country will want to come to learn how
other districts have had success with programs or strategies in their
schools. It will be a chance to learn, network, and share with the
common goal of raising academic achievement in Latino students.
Keynote Speaker Russlynn Ali is the Assistant Secretary for Civil
Rights, U.S. Department of Education. She is Secretary Duncan’s
primary adviser on civil rights and is responsible for enforcing U.S.
civil rights laws as they pertain to education—ensuring the nation’s
schools, colleges and universities receiving federal funding do not
engage in discriminatory conduct related to race, sex, disability or age.
Ali is dedicated to equality and fairness in education for all students
and has been an advocate of high academic achievement of Latinos,
blacks and low-socioeconomic students.
Victor Villaseñor is the featured speaker. See the article to the left for
a profile of him.
To register for the Juntos Conference, please visit www.avidonline.org/
juntos.
Continued on page 8
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ELL Adolescents:
Understanding Leads to Success
By Michelle Mullen
AVID Staff Developer
E
English-language learners [ELLs],
particularly adolescent ELLs, are
faced with abundant challenges as
they work to master the cognitive
and physiological demands of
adolescence, the academic demands
of increasingly more challenging
academic work, and the demands
of English language proficiency. It
is clear from the kinds of statistics
cited on the back page of this
journal that our schools are not fully
prepared to help adolescent ELLs
master these demands. If we want
to reduce the number of long-term
ELLs in our schools and increase
their rates of academic achievement
and college preparation, we have to
reconsider how we view and provide
services for our adolescent ELLs.
We must recognize the unique needs
and assets that adolescents bring
with them (ELL and non-ELL), and
we have to be willing to challenge
our notions of who is capable of high
level academic work.
Adolescent students bring unique
developmental needs to the
classroom: they need safe learning
environments, movement, novelty,
connections to real-life, and caring
adults who hold them accountable.
They need meaningful challenges,
choices, opportunities to set goals,
and “cheerleader” adults who
support those goals (but don’t
embarrass them). When met,
these needs can turn to motivation
and we find open and engaged
teenagers with increased initiative
and self-sufficiency. The adolescent
English-language learner has all
of these same needs but they are
often set against a more complicated
backdrop: the adolescent ELL may
have more “adult” responsibilities
for helping non-English-speaking
parents/family members navigate
the linguistic hurdles associated with
community and household tasks;
they may have a peer group who
believes that achieving good grades
or showing interest in school means
you’re “acting white” and “selling
out” your race (or friends); they
may have additional physiological
needs associated with living in
poverty such as needing more
sleep, healthier food, or appropriate
healthcare. Turning these needs
into motivation isn’t as simple as
developing a safe atmosphere and
active lesson plans or creating
opportunities for metacognition.
While these things help, the ELL
student also needs culturally relevant
curriculum and connections, a safe
place to regularly discuss peer issues
and challenges, the right words
to self-advocate with peers and
adults, access to services that can
mitigate the effects of poverty, and
adults who understand that lack of
achievement isn’t always rooted in
laziness.
While our adolescent ELLs bring
many needs to our classrooms, they
also bring many assets. Adolescent
ELLs (like their non-ELL peers)
often have outside-of-school
literacies that can be tapped into;
playing computer games, using
mobile phones, texting, surfing the
internet, participating in hobbies,
paying the family’s bills, helping
parents translate job applications,
and holding down a part-time job
(yes, even in middle school) all
PAGE 6
develop cognitive and linguistic
skills. The trick is to find out what
skills students bring with them to
the classroom so we can capitalize
on their expertise and tie the
school curriculum to the skills and
knowledge they already possess and/
or have interest in developing.
While most long-term ELLs are
orally proficient in their native
language, they don’t have the
reading and writing skills to show
full proficiency. However, even
their oral fluency is a benefit
when learning English as a
second language—it gives us the
opportunity to capitalize on the
connections between the two
languages, particularly cognates
(especially good for the 75% of
ELLs who are Spanish speakers).
Those students who are fully literate
in their home language (can read,
speak, and write) also have an easier
time learning the structures of
English literacy; literacy skills (and
other academic concepts) transfer
across languages. If they know
the concept in Spanish, it’s much
easier to learn the “label” for it in
English (Koelsch, 2006). Adolescent
ELLs who are gaining proficiency
in more than one language also
have increased cognitive flexibility.
Studies have shown that “bilingual
children tend to solve problems
that involve high levels of control
and analysis of language better than
monolingual children (Bialystok,
1986, 1992). The simplest
explanation for this is that bilingual
children are accustomed to hearing
and seeing language in two different
ways. As such, they possess not only
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FALL 2009
a heightened awareness of form
and meaning, but the concomitant
ability to move fluidly between
dual realms. This does not however
imply ‘an acceleration of cognitive
development, but rather an enriched
approach to the use of language as
a tool of thought . . . this leads to
cognitive flexibility through self
regulation’ (Diaz & Klingler, 1992,
p. 189)” (Meskill, Mossop & Bates,
1999). The challenge, of course,
is to help our ELLs see all these
benefits. As they are bombarded
with negative messages about
bilingualism and are surrounded by
English-only rhetoric in our schools
and communities, it is incumbent
upon us as educators to help our
ELLs shape a different reality for
themselves. This means educating
them about their assets, but it also
means having high expectations for
what they can accomplish and giving
them the necessary tools to meet
these expectations.
As many of our adolescent ELLs,
particularly our long-term ELLs,
become more aware of the academic
gap that emerges between their
achievement and that of their
non-ELL peers in middle school,
one of two things starts to occur:
they become “invisible” or they
become the trouble-makers on the
campus. The “invisible” students
become masters of “getting by.”
They do just enough work to not
get in trouble, they speak only when
spoken to in class (and very quietly
at that), they travel in like-minded
groups to blend in, and they stay just
below the radar; they have no sense
of self-efficacy and are just biding
time waiting for someone to tell
them when they are finished with
school. The trouble-makers, on the
other hand, are masters of “being in
charge.” They do little work or just
enough to show that if they really
wanted to they actually could do the
work, they act out in class because
they have an image to uphold (and
it isn’t academic), they travel in
like-minded groups to garner more
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FALL 2009
control on the campus, and they
stay on the periphery of the radar;
they have a sense of self-efficacy
typically rooted in the social skills
they possess.
Our imperative is to interrupt both
of these courses for our ELLs or
none of their assets will be used
and the needs of these students and
families will grow deeper. We must
not let our ELLs become invisible
or become the trouble-makers. We
need to provide role models and
community mentors that allow them
to see alternative identities. We need
to engage them in activities that
allow them to analyze, critique, and
shape others’ perceptions so they
learn how much power they have to
inform those perceptions. We need
to teach academic language, formal
language registers, and discourse
patterns that allow them to speak
and write in ways that let others
take them seriously. We need to
provide rich critical thinking and
problem-solving opportunities
that capitalize on their cognitive
attributes and forces them to work
at using their English in increasingly
more sophisticated ways—orally and
in writing. We have to be willing to
become language coaches who hold
our ELLs accountable for using
appropriate language constructions
and who help them elaborate their
language so they sound “smart”
(like those “smart college kids”). We
have to be willing to advocate for
them while teaching them to selfadvocate. And we have to be willing
to fight for the opportunities for
these students to be fully engaged in
rigorous course work and to become
fully bilingual (or multilingual).
While we can and do address
some of these imperatives in the
AVID elective class, if we are to
really interrupt the long-term
ELL path and increase the number
of adolescent ELL students who
graduate from high school and
college, we need a more strategic
and coherent support network
PAGE 7
for these students. All contentarea teachers, counselors, and
administrators need to have “high
expectations about [ELL] student
performance and offer high
support so that students achieve.
Thus, two factors need to be
addressed: 'developing the skills
and dispositions of accomplished
teachers of English language
learners' (Walqui, 2001) and
changing the school structures
that keep ELL students tracked
into segregated and/or remedial
courses"(Koelsch, 2006).
_____________________________
To learn more about AVID's efforts
in ELL, visit our Initiatives page at
www.avidonline.org/avidinitiatives.
_____________________________
References
Cummins, J. (2000). Language, power, and
pedagogy: Bilingual children in the crossfire. Clevedon, Avon: Multilingual Matters.
Fryer, R. (2006). Acting white: The social price
paid by the best and brightest minority students.
Education Next.
Koelsch, N. (2006). Improving literacy
outcomes for English language learners in high
school: Considerations for states and districts
in developing a coherent policy framework.
National High School Center.
Meskill, Mossop & Bates (1999).
Bilingualism, cognitive flexibility, and electronic
literacy. Bilingual Research Journal.
Olsen and Jaramillo (1999). Turning the tide
of exclusion: A guide for educators and advocates
for immigrant students. Oakland: California
Tomorrow.
Swanson, C. (2009). Perspectives on a
population: English-language learners in
American schools. Bethesda, MD: Editorial
Projects in Education, Inc.
Victor Villaseñor and the Guiding Spirit of Genius
Continued from page 4
Victor’s remarks that day, as
recounted in Burro Genius, became
legendary among California English
teachers. He had planned to
describe how he researched the book
Macho, how he figured out how to
tell the story, and a few adventures
he had in preparing the book.
Instead, when he faced the crowd
of teachers, his whole experience in
school came flooding back to him:
the humiliation of trying to learn
to read, the racist remarks, and
his time spent as a “slow learner.”
As Villaseñor says, “Then I don’t
know what happened to me, but as
I looked out at this sea of faces, and
I realized they were all…English
teachers, I suddenly felt my heart
EXPLODE! But not with fear. No,
with white hot rage, and now I knew
exactly what it was that I wanted to
say.”
What followed was a description of
the “torture” of school for Victor,
of the power of inspiration and
pain that teachers possess, of his
efforts to overcome bad teaching,
and to become a writer. He praised
good teachers with all his heart.
He condemned bad teachers. This
was not the type of keynote the
audience expected. Some teachers
walked out. Some hurled insults at
Victor. However, the majority of the
audience stayed, and he received a
standing ovation.
Since then, Victor Villaseñor has
received offers of more speaking
engagements than he can fulfill,
speaking about “geniusing,” finding
gifts in ourselves and our students,
and teaching from the heart. He
allows himself only 40 speaking
appearances a year. One of those
will be at the upcoming AVID
Juntos Conference in San Antonio,
November 16-17, 2009.
Recently, I had the opportunity
to spend the better part of the day
with Victor Villaseñor. We talked
at the kitchen table of his Spanishstyle home on the remaining acres
of Rancho Villaseñor, where he grew
up. We toured some of his childhood
haunts in Oceanside, and discussed
the planned HBO mini-series based
on Rain of Gold. We also retraced the
memorable ride that he and his horse,
Midnight Duke, took to the beach
after his brother, Joseph, passed on,
so well described in Burro Genius.
That was when Duke and Victor
swam out to a large rock formation
and were greeted by dolphins, who
spoke to the horse, and the horse
spoke back. The rock formation is
still there, barely covered on this day
by a high tide. As Victor and I looked
at it, I realized that, in Victor’s world,
everything endures, including magic.
Here is a portion of our conversation.
How do you think your life would
be different if school had been a
more positive experience for you,
if reading had come easily, and you
had not had to grapple with abuse
and racism?
It’s hard to tell, because I went
through some very abusive things in
kindergarten as well as in third and
fourth grade, with a few kind teachers
here and there. But in 7th grade we
had a substitute teacher for three
days who changed my life. He and his
wife had been ski bums and now they
were learning to be surf bums. As a
teacher, he was just so full of vitality
and energy, and he had been a ski
instructor. He told us he wanted us
to share with him in writing what we
loved to do. He told us not to worry
about spelling and punctuation; that
would come later. He said technique
always comes after enthusiasm, and
you learn 100% faster. So I was able
to write about my life on our rancho,
all the things I loved. He opened up
my heart and soul, allowed me to tell
my secrets. If he had stayed for a year,
I know I would have learned to read,
PAGE 8
and I would have probably gotten
great grades in high school and in
college.
In Burro Genius, you describe
your absolute terror at being
chosen to read in front of the
class and all the manipulations
you used to avoid it. In fact,
reading was a lifetime struggle
for you, and you dropped out of
high school after your junior year.
You had already published four
novels, when at age 44, you were
diagnosed with dyslexia. How did
that happen and how have you
coped?
Both of my sons have some form
of dyslexia, and they were being
diagnosed on a 20 point scale. One
was a 12 and one was an 8. I asked
to be tested. I was so far off the
charts that they said it was a miracle
I could read at all. In order to read,
I had to train myself to read the
introduction, then the summary,
then go back to the text. When I
became interested in literature, after
I had been in the army, I was living
in Ocean Beach (in San Diego) and
became friends with a librarian and
a bookstore owner. They introduced
me to Camus, the Russians, and
Emerson. I could read for just a
little while or I would get splitting
headaches. The way I see the world
is in patterns. It is hard for me to
see letters. In the army, I was the
best shot out of 1,500 marksmen,
when we were firing at moving
targets. I am good at chess because
I see patterns, moves ahead. In high
school, I beat everyone—faculty and
students. I still have to go slowly
with reading.
You have been compared to a
number of other writers, including
John Steinbeck and Gabriel
Garcia Márquez. How do you feel
about those comparisons?
First, I’d like to tell you why I write.
I started writing because I was so
full of rage that if I didn’t write,
the rage would kill me. When I
read Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men,
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I found there was compassion.
Then I read others, including
Faulkner. Finally, as I began to
write, I learned about what Camus
said: “If you can write well about
one person, you have written well
about all humanity.” So, I decided
to write well about my family.
What creates a nation is its stories,
not its history. What moved the
English—perhaps the most barbaric
people on the planet—out of the
dark ages was that they invented the
story of the Roundtable, including
fair play, nobility, honor. That was
the beginning of England. During
my brief time in college, I was a
philosophy and theology major, but
I found that dealt too much with the
head and just gave us more to argue
about. When I discovered literature,
I found you were dealing with the
whole person—life, love, sorrows,
and a way to bring philosophy and
theology to life. And, for me, both
Steinbeck and Marquez write about
life so well.
In AVID, we focus on teacher
development and their readiness
to work with a diverse group of
students. What should we focus
on, so teachers can guide their
students and build resilience?
First of all, AVID is by far one of
the greatest things to happen to the
educational system. My oldest son,
David, who is now a doctor, was in
AVID during high school. He has
told me that he never would have
gotten the grades he did without the
AVID training. He learned how to
organize and set priorities. AVID
trains you on how to be teachable.
My other son, Joseph, who is now
a writer, was placed in the gifted
program. He has told me, “They
assumed I knew how to organize,
how to study, how to set priorities,
and I didn’t.” As far as getting
students to college, I don’t think
that needs to be the objective. The
objective is to give kids the tools so
that they can love learning, so that
they respect books and knowledge.
AVID teachers need to get students
ready for that. As far as resiliency, we
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achieve that with students when we
stop trying to teach and realize that
we are planting seeds. For example,
I met an Iraqi teacher in Texas, who
had been an engineer, but had been
laid off and was now teaching math
at a very low income school. Ninety
percent of the students were Latino
and 75% were expected to drop
out. His colleagues told him not to
expect too much from his students.
He did not accept that. On the
first day, he greeted his students by
saying, “Welcome college students!”
And he greeted them that way every
day. When he taught juniors and
seniors, he greeted them by saying,
“Welcome college graduates!”
A very high percentage of those
students not only graduated from
high school, but 90% of them went
to college. He told me it was not
about teaching, but about planting
seeds.
Your interpretation, in your
writing and your lectures, is
different from what has become
the more traditional view of
genius. Can you explain the
difference?
First of all, until 1987, the dictionary
definition of genius said nothing
about IQ. The first dictionary entry,
dating back to ancient Rome, says
that genius is a ‘guardian spirit.’
Genius is simply the ability to stop
thinking and trust your intuition.
Once you trust your inner voice,
you can’t be broken. I also prefer
the term ‘geniusing’ because I think
everything should be a verb. When
I give my lectures, I plant the seed
of genius; but we must water it with
inspiration, enthusiasm, respect, and
love.
You’ve become a popular speaker
for both adults and children.
What do you like about speaking
to children?
Children know more than their
parents, and they are available,
reachable. Adults have grown their
bodies, but their minds have gotten
smaller. I tell children that it is “All
of your jobs to teach your parents, to
PAGE 9
remind them that they are angels.”
You have had tremendous
success as a writer, with Rain of
Gold, 13 Senses and Burro Genius
all becoming bestsellers and
translated into many languages,
and Burro Genius and Crazy
Loco Love both nominated for a
Pulitzer Prize. You’ve also written
screenplays, and now, HBO is
preparing to develop Rain of Gold
as a mini-series. What additional
value will the work gain from the
medium of television?
Movies and TV have it all: words,
pictures, music, and living people.
I think that, just like “Roots” (the
blockbuster mini-series following an
African-American family) changed
the world of TV and gave dignity
to African American people, Rain
of Gold, as a mini-series, will cause
an explosion and bring respect and
dignity to Latinos, showing our
spirituality and love of family. What
holds us back across this planet are
stereotypes and prejudice. Film can
be a powerful medium to combat
that.
How should our educational
system change so that we do a
better job of finding the gifts and
genius in our children?
It’s not about changing the system.
It’s about changing the individual
perceptions of teachers. What we
need teachers to understand is that
the way they see reality limits them.
For many years, white European
mentality looked down at the rest
of the world and it was thought
that indigenous people did not have
much to offer. Europeans aren’t bad
people; they were just brainwashed. I
think it is not enough to be tolerant.
In fact, by itself that is terrible. We
need to cherish our differences, not
just tolerate them.
Didn’t Rain of Gold sort of
capture the imagination of an
entire community?
Continued on page 11
Why AVID Works:
It's all About the Brain and the Heart!
by summarizing or discussing it.
AVID, of course calls this TPS
– Think, Pair, Share. Think by
yourself, share with a partner and
then with a larger group or whole
class.
By Bill Madigan
Leading With the Heart
AVID Staff Developer
O
“Oh, my god! No wonder Cornell
notes work!” So said I over 15
years ago when Eric Jensen’s
work on brain-based teaching
was coming on to the educational
scene. I happened to be attending a
“Quantum Learning” training, and
what I learned somehow coalesced
in my brain and I had an epiphany,
an “Ah ha!” moment. They said
new information was more likely
to hang around in the memory if it
was repeated in a 10-24-7 pattern:
10 minutes after first learning it,
24 hours later and 7 days later.
Basically, the pattern succeeds at
fighting our brain’s programming
to forget things. We forget over
96% of our daily experience! Yes,
our brains are allowing a great deal
of information loss. Although this
sounds, at first, rather bad, it really
isn’t.
There is a LOT of useless
information experienced by our
minds each day: smells, sounds,
tastes and moments of tedium in
lines or in the car that the brain
does well to let slide into oblivion.
Most of our day’s experiences pass
through our brains like passengers
at Grand Central train station. We
tend to remember novel experiences,
threatening ones and, of course,
those associated with basic needs
identified by Maslow and others.
Thus, we must visit with new
information in a clever repetition so
as to not forget it.
Building Memory
My “Ah Ha!” moment needed a bit
more information, though: brain cell
gel formulation. When information
is presented to us in the classroom,
too often it lacks the emotive
power to create a quick and lasting
memory. Always in a battle for the
attention and minds of students,
all good teachers attempt to do
what they can to excite students to
listen and learn. The challenge is
that much of what we teach is not
directly about immediate survival,
nor is it about snaring a mate or
getting a slice of yummy pizza. No,
we teach Algebra, Science, and
English literature.
So remembering new information
is best retained by (1) taking notes
on a lecture or while reading an
assignment; THEN (2) writing
a summary after 10 minutes of
finishing the notes; THEN, (3)
creating questions in the question
column some time later, say the next
day in class as a review (24 hours
later). This rounds out the Cornell
triad of ways to process the new
learning. This tripartite method
convinces the brain to build “gels”
between and among brain cells,
which solidifies our memories.
The Cornell method is insistent in
its structure and convinces these
“reluctant-to-remember” brains of
ours to store the new information
in a more permanent way. The fact
that the summary is done within the
10-minute timeframe, and questions
are done within the 24-hour period
helps alter the “forgetting curve.”
To further aide the maintenance
that the Cornell notes afford us, we
can add a review of the lesson seven
days later. In addition, according to
William Glaser, all lectures are also
more memorable if we pause for two
minutes every 10 minutes and allow
students to process the information
PAGE 10
Another area for which AVID
has been a great example is in
connecting teachers with their
students as human beings. This
especially occurs in the AVID
elective class. This occurs because
AVID elective teachers do so much
more than impart information;
they also inspire, motivate, and
coach. This places the teacher in
a more mentor-like role where a
relationship with the student is
formed. Outside of relationship or
connection, little inspiration can be
done. In addition, AVID elective
teachers often have students for
more than one year to ensure that
this connection occurs. Along with
creating a family-like community
in the class and the consistent
utilization of tutorial groups, AVID
is one of the most powerful venues
for relationship building: student-tostudent, student-to-tutor, and most
importantly, student-to-teacher.
A great deal of support for
relationship building within the
world of education comes from
such educational philosophers as
Carl Jung, Theodore Sizer, Parker
Palmer, Martin Buber, and Lev
Vygotsky, among many others. Also,
a great deal of research supports
connecting with students as well.
Research resultant from the ideas
of Lev Vygotsky, for instance, has
revealed that relationship as well as
the trust and affection concomitant
with it are key to sustained learning
that persists after mentoring ends.
I have noted often that the
professionals who have truly touched
us and left a lasting impression
have done precisely that because
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they stepped out of that distant
costume of the “professional.”
They became human, real and
caring—attributes too often
concealed behind the pretense
of professionalism. Basically,
we don’t remember “talking
heads” but we do remember
real “people” who engage us
emotionally and intellectually.
One study I read two years ago
concluded that a lesson taught
by your loving grandmother
about tying knots would excite
a much more rich and lasting
memory than the same lesson
from a distant, emotionally
detached educator. Duh?
Well, clearly when you are
cared for by someone who
you are connected with as
well, you are “open” in many
ways. There is a greater
amount of the hormone called
oxytocin coursing through
your blood. As a result, more
of your brain is receptive. You
remember more and better.
That’s learning and growing in
relationship. AVID does this
with not only the academic
world but with the personal/
emotional one as well. That’s
why AVID works – Ah ha!
For Our Students. For Our Future.
By Steven Baratte
Editor
More than 17,000 educators from
across the U.S. and the world took
part in this year’s AVID Summer
Institute.
The eight week-long professional
development trainings took place
in six cities (Atlanta, Chicago,
Dallas, Orlando, Sacramento, and
San Diego) across the country.
Most participants were from
schools that are implementing
AVID for the first time in the fall.
“Summer Institute is a vital part
of the AVID implementation as it
lays the foundation for a school,”
said AVID Executive Director Jim
Nelson. “It is also many times
a life-changing professional
development opportunity for
some participants because of the
quality of the staff developers and
curriculum.”
This year, some of our best staff
developers also served as our
keynote speakers and shared their
AVID journey. It was a wonderful
way to begin the week and really
helped to let participants know
what was in store for the week,
and what they may face ahead in
their own AVID journey.
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As part of the annual tradition,
each Institute featured three
students and one teacher speaker
sharing their stories of how AVID
has affected their academic and
personal lives. The speakers
competed in a national AVID
writing contest, where 24 students
and eight teachers were selected
from hundreds, to be a part of the
Summer Institute celebration. The
student speakers were awarded a
$500 scholarship to be used at a
postsecondary institution.
At the end of each week-long
Institute, participants were able
to return to their schools ready
to apply the AVID techniques in
their own classrooms. Educators
left knowing that they were a part
of a system dedicated to making
college dreams a reality for
thousands of students.
And, as educators have returned
to their classrooms, prepared to
implement AVID, folks from AVID
Center are preparing for Summer
Institute 2010.
FALL 2009
Victor Villaseñor and the
Guiding Spirit of Genius
Continued from page 4
Yes, all across our country. For instance,
a teacher in Benicia, California is a good
example of how to get kids to read my books.
There was this tough kid, about 15, I think,
and he had been in a lot of trouble. He was in
one of those schools where they put the tough
kids. They could never get him to do anything.
He wouldn’t read anything or participate. All
his brothers were already in prison, and that
was where he was headed. One teacher just
said to him, “Take this book, Rain of Gold,
and read just the first three chapters. You
don’t have to do anything else this semester.”
Well, to the teacher’s shock, he not only read
the first three chapters, but asked if he could
finish the book (in paperback, Rain of Gold is
over 500 pages). He had to work hard and it
took him the entire semester. Then, he was
telling his friends about it, getting them to
read the first three chapters, then the entire
book. Eventually, they had about 100 kids
reading the book, then their parents were
reading it. Then they invited me to come to
the community and speak. This 15-year-old
kid met me, and he was so happy. He had been
prepared to go to prison and now he wanted to
go to Sacramento State to become a teacher.
Previously, he had believed the propaganda
that Mexicans were no good. As I said before,
everyone needs a story that uplifts the heart
and soul.
_______________________________________
My “interview” with Victor Villaseñor turned out to
be more of an inspirational message and true learning
experience for me. Villaseñor is a man who not only
triumphed over a severe learning disability, but also
fought through extreme prejudice as a student. As with
so many of us, it was a single teacher who first unlocked
the door to his “genius.” His remarks, "Tools of Genius:
Finding and Promoting the Genius in our Children,"
at AVID’s Juntos conference in November will no doubt
be inspirational and thought provoking. See www.
avidonline.org/juntos for a description of his remarks.
Victor Villaseñor’s most recent book, due out this spring,
is titled Geniusing 2013: Cellular Memory of the
Tree of Knowledge and Beyond. He claims that he
has been guided many times in his past writing by grand
masters who have passed over, including Shakespeare and
Tolstoy. This one was guided by Einstein.
PAGE 11
Can Effort Create
Success?
By Rob Gira
Executive Vice President, AVID Center
S
Since AVID’s founding in 1980,
we have stressed that individual
determination and hard work will
lead to success. Our students hear
this as soon as they are recruited
into AVID and this philosophy
underpins almost every aspect of
the AVID program as they progress.
The data regarding AVID students,
both quantitative and qualitative,
indicate that circumstances of birth,
environment, and socioeconomic
status can be overcome. Numerous
AVID graduates tell us this in their
stories at our Summer Institutes.
We also know—and researchers
have affirmed this—that the
AVID environment, including the
academic elective class, provides
academic and social scaffolds
that build AVID students’ social
and academic capital so that they
are willing to constantly take
on intellectually challenging
opportunities. They leave us with a
lot more than they arrived with.
Still, do our students and all of
our AVID site team members
uniformly believe that background
and environment don’t matter? This
past summer, while teaching the
administrator and coordinator strand
at the AVID Institute, I heard from
participants that some site team
members believed “Those kids really
can’t do it. We are asking too much
of them.” In addition, I have heard
younger AVID students say things
like, “I really can’t do this; I stink at
math,” or “It doesn’t matter what I
do; that teacher just doesn’t like me.”
When site team members or other
faculty from an AVID site attend an
AVID Summer Institute or read the
research, they are often convinced
by student stories that effort, when
combined with support, indeed
leads to success. In recent years, as
the controversy of IQ and social
status versus the power of effort has
escalated, a number of authors and
researchers have made compelling
cases that success can result more
from individual effort and support
than from inherent traits and
social circumstances. Some of the
following researchers and writers
might be beneficial for study by
AVID site teams, and for discussion
at staff meetings.
Lauren Resnick
One of the most veteran voices
about effort creating success,
Dr. Resnick has published many
research studies on the cognitive
science of learning and instruction.
Since the 1970s, Resnick, the
former president of the American
Educational Research Association,
has examined the nature of
intelligence in numerous articles
and books. A good introduction
to Resnick’s work for AVID site
teams is her paper “Making America
Smarter,” (1999) in which she
notes, “In practice, though, it is
proving harder and harder to meet
the twin goals of equity and higher
achievement. This is because our
schools are trapped in a set of beliefs
about ability and aptitude that make
PAGE 12
it hard to evoke effective academic
effort from students and educators.”
Resnick makes a number of other
compelling assertions, including:
• Americans assume that aptitude
determines what we can learn,
and our schools are still too often
organized around this principle.
• IQ tests, or their surrogates, are
still used to determine access to
enriched curriculum.
• Persistent beliefs about the
importance of inherited aptitude
result in a self-sustaining cycle.
Students who are held to low
expectations do not try to break
through the barriers because
they believe that inherited ability
matters most and they did not
inherit enough capacity. The
design of too many of our school
systems perpetuates this belief.
• Resnick argues that school
systems can and should be
designed to create intellectual
effort, and that “effort-based”
schools will help students believe
that intelligence is not fixed, but
is something that grows. In these
kinds of environments, students
will see the importance of effort
and its connection to their
development.
ognitive researchers have
• C
turned their attention toward
educational strategies that
immerse students in longterm, intellectually demanding
environments. Resnick notes
research shows that, if students
are treated as if they are
intelligent, they actually become
so.
Resnick’s long list of work can be
found via an internet search. If
you would like a matrix showing
connections between her theories
and AVID, please contact me at
[email protected].
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Daniel Willingham
Willingham, a professor of cognitive
psychology at the University of
Virginia, writes regularly on the
brain, the complexities of thinking,
and challenges our students face. In
his new book, Why Don’t Students
Like School? he offers insights into
the design of our brain and how
our wiring makes complex thinking
difficult. A good starting place with
Willingham’s work for AVID site
teams is his work for the American
Educator, “Ask The Cognitive
Scientist.”
In an excerpt from his book,
Willingham quotes Henry Ford,
who said, “Thinking is the hardest
work there is, which is the probable
reason why so few people engage
in it.” Willingham goes on to say
that reasoning is what sets us apart
from animals and that humans are
good at certain types of reasoning.
However, he adds, “Humans don’t
think very often because our brains
are designed not for thought, but for
the avoidance of thought. Thinking
is not only effortful…but slow and
unreliable.”
No wonder our AVID students
sometimes go “over the edge”
with all of the complexities we
push at them. Other points from
Willingham that make his work
compelling:
• Our brain serves many purposes,
and thinking is not the one
it does best. Compared with
its support for thinking, the
brain has a much easier time
with tasks such as seeing and
moving. (Which is why many
of our AVID teachers and staff
developers include movement in
their AVID lessons.)
• Thinking is slow, effortful, and
uncertain. Despite this, however,
Continued on page 14
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Book Review
Mindset: The New Psychology of
Success by Dr. Carol Dweck
By Rob Gira
Executive Vice President, AVID Center
Dweck examines the way we think about our
destiny, how much we believe in our innate
abilities versus hard work. Currently a
professor of psychology at Stanford, Dweck
proposes that human beings fall into two
categories: those with a fixed mindset, and
those with a growth mindset. Those with a
fixed mindset believe they can go only as
far as their natural endowments. These type
of individuals are less willing to risk, less
willing to change, and, while they may be
successful, are less curious and take less
responsibility for their own development.
Growth mindset individuals, which Dweck
has researched at many different age
levels, including elementary, junior high,
and college, welcome a challenge, and,
in fact, expect it. Failure, for the growth
mindset types, does not measure them or
determine their fate. Instead, they welcome
new challenges and adapt their strategies.
As part of her argument in favor of helping
individuals develop a growth mindset,
Dweck discusses her own struggles,
including relationships and education. In
junior high school, Dweck was in a class
where the teacher knew all of the students’
IQ scores and seated them accordingly,
and gave important tasks only to the
students with high IQ scores. Dweck recalls
the impact this had on her own progress
and the challenges that some students
faced as a result. Later in her education,
during high school, Dweck, who had been
a “math whiz,” encountered a teacher who
believed that girls could not do math. She
gave in to the stereotype and left the math
course. Dweck mentions the research by
Claude Steele and Joshua Aronson (former
AVID Summer Institute keynoter) around
“stereotype threat,” the notion that having
to check a box on a test form indicating your
race or sex can actually lower your score by
itself.
In her book, Dweck offers many examples
of individuals who fall into both the growth
and fixed mindset category. Michael Jordan
is offered as an example of the growth
mindset because he struggled early in
his basketball career and worked hard to
improve his skills. The racehorse Seabiscuit
PAGE 13
is another of her examples, where early
failure was overcome with hard work. The
basketball coach John Wooden is offered
as an exemplar of the growth mindset,
while Bobby Knight is an example of a fixed
mindset. One of Dweck’s more compelling
discussions is around the concept of
genius. She asserts that someone like
Thomas Edison, who is often viewed as
the epitome of a genius, laboring alone
in his lab, was actually a great networker,
surrounded by many assistants, who shared
his successes and his failures.
I recommend this book for educators and
parents. Dweck is very instructive about how
we talk to young people about their destiny.
She is particularly cautious about praising
kids as “smart,” and believes that we
should reward them more for efforts, even if
those efforts result in failure. I appreciated
the wide variety of examples she provided
from the arts, from sports, and from science
and medicine.
Connections to AVID:
• Despite AVID’s support structure, many
students still believe that their path
is set, that they are limited by what
they bring to school. We must teach
them that adaptability, hard work,
and willingness to struggle are key
components of success.
• Dweck emphasizes the importance of
a growth mindset when we undergo
transitions. This pertains to AVID
students moving from elementary to
middle to high school and then on to
college and graduate school. If we
don’t train ourselves to have a growth
mindset, welcoming challenges and
struggles, we will limit our opportunities.
• Using failure to motivate us is another of
Dweck’s key points. This comes through
very strongly in her chapter on sports.
She describes the failures that Michael
Jordan, Kareem Abdul Jabbar, Pete
Sampras and others had to overcome
and, in fact, use as motivators. AVID
students are continually being pushed
into new and challenging areas. How
they learn from their failures and
welcome new challenges is vital.
Can Effort Create Success?
Continued from page 13
we still like to think and reason.
However, conditions must be
right for our curiosity to thrive.
Thinking is so hard; it doesn’t
take much for us to shut down.
• Thinking occurs when we
combine information from the
environment and from longterm memory in new ways. For
educators, designing the right
kinds of challenges for students is
critical. If we make the tasks too
easy, they become bored. If we
overmatch them, they can shut
down.
Willingham also examines how
students learn facts best, how they
can be engaged in problem solving,
and, like Lauren Resnick notes that
“Americans, like other Westerners,
tend to view intelligence as a fixed
attribute, like eye color.” This
contrasts with the Eastern view in
countries like China and Japan,
who see intelligence as malleable.
Willingham also agrees with Resnick
about sustained hard work, noting
research that indicates “intelligence
can be changed.” In his book,
he outlines some suggestions to
make school more enjoyable for
students—even complex thinking.
These are just a few samples:
• Praise effort, not ability (see our
review of Carol Dweck’s Mindset)
• Tell students that hard work pays
off
• Treat failure as a natural part of
learning
• Don’t take study skills for granted
• Catching up is the long-term
goal
• Show students you have
confidence in them
Willingham’s work connects well
with AVID and should make good
reading for our site teams, especially
for a Socratic Seminar. If you read
the article excerpted from Why Don’t
Students Like School, take particular
note of how students “catch up,” and
how we can level the playing field
for “slower learners.”
Willingham can be reached at www.
danielwillingham.com.
Malcolm Gladwell
In my opinion, Gladwell is one of
the most “out of the box” thinkers
of our time. His books Blink and
The Tipping Point were very good
and should be read twice to get the
full effect. I have read The Outliers:
The Story of Success twice and will
probably need to read it again.
This is his best work and has strong
connections to our AVID efforts.
In brief, Gladwell sees success as
a combination of factors: luck,
environment, and, most importantly,
effort. Be warned: The book is
packed with research references,
and you will find yourself mining
those as well. But the examples
he provides of both success and
tragic failure are powerful as well.
Why do the Chinese do so well at
math (you’ll be surprised)? Why
did the Beatles become a major
musical force? Bill Gates, and other
computer software geniuses—what
was their secret? What separates the
best classical musicians from those
who never achieve at the highest
levels? It might be 10,000 hours
of effort. And, Chris Langan, “the
world’s smartest man,” who never
got a college degree—his story has a
strong AVID connection.
PAGE 14
Carol Dweck
Perhaps the most significant current
voice on effort creating ability,
Dweck has written voluminously
on the subject and provides a
great deal of research to back
up her points. She is currently a
professor of psychology at Stanford
University, and is also a frequent
lecturer throughout the world.
She has worked with sports teams,
educators, and others, to develop
an understanding that IQ, social
circumstances, and environment
are only a part of the picture in
our intellectual destiny. A few of
her articles and interviews worth
reviewing are: “When Bright Kids
Get Bad Grades;” “The Secret to
Raising Smart Kids;” “The Perils
and Promises of Praise;” “The
Effort Effect;” and (excerpted from
her book) “Developing a Growth
Mindset.”
A good start for a site team is “The
Perils and Promises of Praise.”
(Educational Leadership, 2007).
Please see the review of her book, on
the previous page.
ACCESS
VOLUME 15
FALL 2009
Book Review
Proust was a Neuroscientist by Jonah Lehrer
By Mark Bennett
Help Desk Manager, AVID Center
“It’s never too late to change your
mindset. Mindsets are beliefs—
powerful ones and ones that shape
our motivation—but beliefs can be
changed.” – Carol Dweck
What a splendid affirmation for
those of us on the rails, those of us
with fixed habits and notions about
who we are, what learning is possible
for us and what we can change in
our lives. Certainly if “old dogs” like
me can learn new tricks then our
AVID students are in great shape.
Lehrer, like Dweck, offers up the
argument that our brains/minds are
malleable, that the new scientific
field of neurogenesis provides
cellular evidence that “we evolved to
never stop evolving.”
Not too long ago the neuroscientific
community was under the sway of
a theory that argued we were born
with a fixed number of neurons, that
there were very real limits to brain/
mind change. Kind of like Dweck’s
“fixed mindsets.” But Lehrer shows
us that neuroscientists are now
rediscovering what a few of our great
artists of the past knew, and what
Dweck’s research has shown, that
the “growth mindset” is possible
and real. Lehrer writes, “The mind
is never beyond redemption, for
no environment can extinguish
neurogenesis. As long as we are alive,
important parts of the brain are
dividing. The brain is not marble, it
is clay, and our clay never hardens.”
This is a short and pithy work, eight
chapters focusing on eight artists:
1- Walt Whitman: The Substance
of Feeling; 2- George Eliot: The
ACCESS
VOLUME 15
FALL 2009
Biology of Freedom; 3- Auguste
Escoffier: The Essence of Taste;
4- Marcel Proust: The Method of
Memory; 5- Paul Cezanne: The
Process of Sight; 6- Igor Stravinksy:
The Source of Music; 7- Gertrude
Stein: The Structure of Language;
8- Virginia Woolf: The Emergent
Self. Lehrer argues persuasively that
we are indeed change incarnate.
In the second chapter Lehrer argues,
“Our situation provides the raw
material out of which we make
our way, and while it is important
‘never to beat and bruise one’s wings
against the inevitable,’ it is always
possible ‘to throw the whole force
of one’s soul towards achievement of
some possible better.’ You can always
change your life... As Eliot wrote,
‘we are a process and an unfolding.’”
From beginning to end Lehrer
makes the case that grand human
imaginations make a difference
and see truths about ourselves that
even science doesn’t see right off.
In the splendid last chapter he
summarizes Woolf’s work on the
self, “Just as a novelist creates a
narrative, a person creates a sense of
being. The self is simply our work
of art, a fiction created by the brain
in order to make sense of its own
disunity... Modern neuroscience
is now confirming the self Woolf
believed in. We invent ourselves
out of our own sensations. As
Woolf anticipated, this process is
controlled by the act of attention,
which turns our sensory parts into a
focused moment of consciousness.
The fictional self—a nebulous entity
nobody can find—is what binds
PAGE 15
these separate moments together.”
Lehrer makes clear that
neuroscience, though it is far from
creating a “grand unified theory of
consciousness,” has confirmed the
ideas of all these imaginative artists.
In his coda he states that it’s time for
us to integrate art and science into
an “expansive critical sphere.” Both
are useful and excavate truths, and
both are necessary.
And now I’m wondering, when
will AVID create curriculum that
encompasses the arts and music?
Isn’t it time?
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Advancement Via Individual Determination
Did You Know ...
Please see page 6 for an
accompanying ELL article
• More than 65% of school-age English-language learners (ELLs) in
the United States were actually born in the U.S. (Swanson). That
is more than 2.9 million non-immigrant children learning English
as a second language in our schools.
• A significant portion of our adolescent ELL population are
considered “long-term” ELLs— students who have been
schooled in the U.S. and have received English language
development support for at least seven years and still maintain
the ELL label (Olsen).
• If you are an English-language learner in the United States you
most likely speak Spanish as your first language, achieve at
significantly lower rates on math and reading assessments, are
likely to graduate high school at a rate of 64% (Swanson), and
graduate from college at a rate of 10% (Koelsch).
• If you are an English-language learner attending high school in
the United States you are most likely enrolled in remedial math
and literacy courses, are tracked into low-level core classes, and
have teachers with relatively low expectations of you (Koelsch).
• As your middle and high school non-ELL peers follow a trajectory
of increased academic vocabulary and literacy proficiency, your
ELL trajectory will fall further and further away from theirs,
creating a huge gap between you and them (Koelsch).