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Why Students Need a Teacher Who Believes in Them with Aaron Walker
Description
Aaron Walker, a Nashville entrepreneur and founder of View From The Top coaching, tells principals why a growth mindset in students starts with adults who believe in them. Raised poor, he says happiness is a choice, and he explains how teachers can build confidence in kids whose parents may not.
Walker describes the scholarship he gave for eight years to the eighth grader at his old middle school who tried the hardest, chosen by teachers rather than by grades. He also shares how his mother banned the word can't and why he says work-life balance is impossible.
What you'll learn
- Tell a struggling student you believe in them, because Walker says nothing is more powerful than a teacher saying it.
- Praise what a student can do instead of listing what they can't, as Walker says a dieter should think about the salads they can eat.
- Start an award for the student trying the hardest, with teachers voting on effort instead of grades.
- Replace can't with try, as Walker's mother did: you might not be able to do it, but you're going to try.
- Join a mastermind group so you see problems through more than one lens.
Chapters
- 0:00 Summit preview and who Aaron Walker is
- 3:58 From pawn shop teenager to life coach
- 10:29 Making good decisions before a crisis forces them
- 12:23 Happiness is a choice: growth mindset and purpose
- 17:00 How teachers build belief in students
- 19:22 The scholarship for the eighth grader trying hardest
- 23:41 Focus on strengths, not what kids can't do
- 24:54 The book View From The Top and masterminds
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Questions this episode answers
How can teachers help students from poverty build a growth mindset?
Walker says teachers have kids six to eight hours a day, and parents may not offer encouragement, so teachers can say, I believe in you. He urges educators to build relationships, care about students and encourage their strengths.
Is happiness a choice?
Walker says happiness is a choice, not a trait. He says some personality traits can't change but much behavior can, and he points to Carol Dweck's book Mindset on the difference between a growth mindset and a fixed mindset.
Why should a principal join a mastermind group?
Walker has been in mastermind groups for two decades. He says each person sees life through one lens, and when you gather people with different experience the group's IQ goes to genius. Jones adds that his principal mastermind gave a member five different answers in one morning.
About Aaron Walker
Founder and president of View From The Top, a life and business coaching resource, and co-author of The Mastermind Blueprint.
Links and resources