Just Before the Dawn

It has just happened again to two of my students. Long ago I observed that many students who have hard struggles with learning often seem hopeless just before they begin to succeed. When I start to think that continuing success will never happen, it does. I usually don't bother to tell either parents or students that success will come just when they think it never will. They don't believe me anyway, and they don't remember my prediction when it does come true.

One year when I was teaching a class for learning disabled students I had a student who couldn't read, write, or do math at the age of nine. He talked out of turn incessantly. To help Daniel remain calm, I even had him work standing up by one side of my desk. Near the end of the school year he began to read and write a little, but still had difficulty with waiting his turn to respond. He was with an older class the next year, but he was still in the combined music class that I taught. During Black History Month I decided to teach the class to sing, "Didn't My Lord Deliver Daniel?" I told the class the story of Daniel in the Lion's Den and then sang the song with them. By this time Daniel had talked out so much that I mostly just ignored it. I thought he would never change. The week after we sang that song I noticed that Daniel didn't talk out even once. I wondered if he felt well. I never remember hearing him talk out again. He was quite gifted in music and often performed in school variety shows. Later on, I heard that he was competing for scholarships in junior high.

Jean Piaget, a famous French researcher in educational psychology, observed his own children very closely in order to formulate his system. His theory predicts that there is a regression just before the individual integrates a new behavior at a higher level. It seems as though old strategies have to change before new and better ones can begin.

"It's always darkest just before the dawn," an old saying goes. When a student repeats the same old mistakes over and over again it's easy to give up and stop trying to help. It's easy to feel frustrated or even angry when a student fails to complete homework or messes up a test for the nth time. The conclusion that the student is just too unintelligent, lazy, or inattentive springs readily to mind.

We can be impatient with ourselves too. Well-practiced bad habits are hard to change. Those TV shows that replace needed sleep, the extra cup of coffee before starting work, the mention of somebody's hidden faults in conversation, or the occasional angry outburst can seem impossible to overcome. "Oh, well," we think, "that's just the way I am. I'll never be any different. Besides, other people do it too, and I know somebody who is even worse." The list of excuses can be quite long. Every once in a while, especially at the beginning of Lent or of a new year, we try again to overcome the old bad habit, but then backslide and give up one more time.

Moral of the story: When discouragement darkens the horizon, keep trying. The dawn is coming. In fact, it's probably a lot closer than you think.

Mary Sue Laing, M.Ed.
Resource Teacher, St. Ambrose School
newskill7@msn.com

by Mary Sue Laing, M. Ed., New Skill, Inc. Academic Tutor