Montessori alum at work

"Washington Post to be sold to Jeff Bezos"

that's the headline in the Washington Post.

My version of the story is not a People Magazine gossip gab about a famous Montessori alum.

Instead, the Post story describes Bezos for its readers and that characterization includes elements typical of  Montessori graduates:

• entrepreneur,
• innovator,
• creative,
• inventive,
• curious,
• cerebral,
• demanding,
• asks challenging questions,
• charming,
• happy,
• 'the ultimate disrupter'
• driven

Here are some excerpts from the article:
.....
“I don’t want to imply that I have a worked-out plan,” he said. “This will be uncharted terrain and it will require experimentation.”..."At times, Bezos has been openly disdainful of Wall Street’s demands for ever-rising quarterly profits. He told Fortune magazine last year, "The three big ideas at Amazon are long-term thinking, customer obsession, and willingness to invent."

.....

Under Bezos, the company’s drive into new businesses has been relentless.

.....

Friends and competitors have described Bezos as cerebral, demanding, curious, and given to asking challenging questions. He shows little tolerance for those who are poorly prepared, but can be charming and quick to laugh. 'If Jeff is unhappy, wait five minutes,' his wife has said of him.

......

In naming Bezos its “Businessperson of the Year” in 2012, Fortune called him “the ultimate disrupter…[who] has upended the book industry and displaced electronic merchants” while pushing into new businesses, such as TV and feature film production.

His drive and business creativity have earned him favorable comparisons to the late Steve Jobs, Apple’s co-founder and a confidant of Don Graham and his late mother, Post Co. chairman Katharine Graham. Earlier this year, Harvard Business Review ranked Bezos as the second best-performing chief executive in the world during the past decade, following only Jobs, who died in 2011.

facts vs. understanding

"No, you're probably not smarter than a 1912-era 8th grader." -- that's the provocative title of a Smithsonian magazine article.

Thanks to POS parent Tom Bair for sending this along.

True Grit

Is academic achievement the be-all and end-all?

 

Is IQ the best predictor of success in school and in life?

 

 

Kipp, NYC actually uses a grit report card.

 

Here’s the research behind the importance of grit – as well as a layman’s intro to the idea.

"Who is successful here and why?"

What is the single best predictor of success in life (and in school)?
Not social intelligence,
not good looks,
not good health,
and not IQ...

...it is grit. What is grit?

Hear Angela Duckworth talk about grit.

for parents

From the Challenge/Success web site:

We know that parents want what is best for their kids, but knowing what’s best isn’t always easy. What many of us are doing right now, with the best of intentions, is focusing too much on short-term results instead of raising adults whose talents are fully realized, recognized, and valued in a 21st-century economy. Research tells us what children need is emotional support, parental supervision, adequate sleep, healthy eating habits, physical and intellectual challenges, resilience, and time to reflect, play, and plan. With our Challenge Success Parent Education Program, parents benefit from hearing university-based research translated into practical, everyday strategies that they can use to be better parents and raise kids who will thrive. We currently offer parents a number of live  and online classes and videos, school and community presentations and a series of parenting guidelines.

raising successful children

"Raising Successful Children" from Madeline Levine.  Here are a few phrases to tease you:

"HANGING back and allowing children to make mistakes is one of the greatest challenges of parenting."

"Mastery of the world is an expanding geography for our kids..."

"This may seem counterintuitive, but praising children’s talents and abilities seems to rattle their confidence." 

 "If you can’t stand to see your child unhappy, you are in the wrong business."

"...the tools they will need to handle the inevitable, difficult, challenging and sometimes devastating demands of life."

 "it is always a telltale sign of overparenting when they talk about how 'we’re applying to Columbia.'"

"Parents also have to make sure their own lives are fulfilling. There is no parent more vulnerable to the excesses of overparenting than an unhappy parent." 

helicopter parents

This clip from the tv show Portlandia takes helicopter parenting to a new low!  Thanks to Post Oak High School director, James Moudry for sending this along.