“If You Really Want to Live, Be Extraordinary”

I have moved “Thought Provoking Perspectives” to The John T. Wills Chronicles information portal @ http://johntwillschronicles.com I want to share a profound message taken from a novel Chapter Excerpt FROM “If You Really Want to Live, Be Extraordinary” written by Jo Lena Johnson & Dr. Lee Roy Jefferson. I encourage you to read the featured article on the The John T. Wills Chronicles in its entirety.

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Whether you are a student, parent, teacher, church leader, business owner, or simply a concerned citizen, Mrs. Raglin demonstrates honor, commitment, leadership, integrity, love of teaching and learning. A few pages of her wisdom are worth their weight in gold!

Six Things I Really Want Teachers to Know

1. As a teacher, you are always a learner.

2. You can’t teach kids you don’t take opportunity to know—and for whom you don’t allow opportunity to know you.

3. Because people and actions are always connected, there is no way for you to mistreat a child and not have it come back to you.

4. Students should be prepared to take care of the world one day, just as you and I as children were taught to do our part in taking care of the world. Teaching should be a revered position. It’s not to be taken lightly when you are training a mind for optimal results in knowing, being, and doing.

5. Students have the right to learn how to think. If you don’t teach them how to think, they won’t know how to live. Thinking is what is going to save them—and all of us. It’s not always all about teaching subject matter at the start. What is ultimately important for your students is that they master the ability to process information: to know through understanding. Once exposed to information, knowledge comes as a result of analyzing, synthesizing, and never failing to evaluate what one hears, sees, and even thinks.

Students can’t learn how to think by simply memorizing someone else’s ideas. If you teach them how to think and imagine they will be able to choose what information will be useful for their own future…livelihood, well-being, career, citizenship, humanity. Students need to have a point of reference in the things taught and required to learn, to be able to relate those things to something they already know, care about—have already “studied”—or can use. What they read and learn—and the way it is presented—should be something that will forever help students make good decisions. And, believe me; that is your grave responsibility.

6. Low self-esteem leads to rebellion. There is probably nothing worse in school for a child than sitting in a room where everyone else knows “stuff” he/she doesn’t know. When children don’t know such things as decorum and are doubly embarrassed by not having academic skills, it makes them unable to think logically in the moment. Yes, they act out in the classroom, but they will act out even more so in life without mastery of big and little things. You are creating a monster when you don’t teach a child. There is joy for children in learning, and there is a joy for real teachers in watching children learn—watching them become able to understand and explore…observe someone else’s creativity and, in doing so, gain access to their own. To teach is to help a child discover self, personal talents, goals—along with connections to others and the use of the gift of life only for good.”

Mrs. Raglin explains in detail in the feature. It is a must read.

Chapter Excerpt FROM “If You Really Want to Live, Be Extraordinary”
Jo Lena Johnson & Dr. Lee Roy Jefferson
http://www.jolenajohnson.com

A Father's Day Message!!!

With Father’s Day upon us - I wanted to share a few thoughts concerning this special day. First, let me start by saying that I was abandoned by the guy who was responsible for my being. With that said, I never have nor will I ever call him my father because I never saw him as a man. Now, I understand that he did have the necessary equipment to procreate, which mean there is a difference between making a baby and being a father. Any male can create a life but it takes a unique soul to be a father because that man acknowledges the responsibility which begets, raises, and nurtures a child. This is a gift that life denied me but there was a special man who assumed that role - my Granddaddy. I would always say to him that he was the greatest gift God could have given to me.

To honor him I featured this great man in my novel “Just a Season”. I fondly remember the most lasting impression Granddaddy made upon me. It was “I raised you to be a man and as a man you don’t know what you will have to do, but when the time comes - do it”. The result of not having this guy in my life as a father created a yearning deep within me to be a father and to make sure my child had this special gift in his life. Thankfully, God blessed me with a wonderful son allowing me to realize this dream and if I must say I was a “GREAT FATHER”. Then as if in the blink of an eye God took him - twenty years later and it still hurts… WOW!!!

I am sharing this for two reasons: One, I want each man to know that fatherhood is an amazing blessing. Two, to say to mother’s that it is very important to have a man in the life of your child be it the child’s father or a male to nurture the life of that child. I often hear this statement from women - “I am a strong woman, independent, and successful”, which maybe true but if you have a son you cannot raise him to be a man. I say this in the same vain that your daughters need a father also and I said father not just a man in their lives.

Fathers who are able to develop into responsible parents are able to engender a number of significant benefits for themselves, their communities, and most importantly, their children. Involved fathers offer developmentally specific provisions to their sons and daughters throughout the life cycle and are impacted themselves by doing so. Active father figures have a key role to play in reducing behavior problems in boys and psychological problems in young women. For example, children who experience significant father involvement tend to exhibit higher scores on assessments of cognitive development, enhanced social skills and fewer behavior problems.

Increased amounts of father-child involvement have also proven to increase a child's social stability, educational achievement, and even their potential to have a solid marriage as an adult. These children are also more curious about the world around them and develop greater problem solving skills. Children who were raised without fathers perceive themselves to be less cognitive and physically competent than their peers from father-present families. Mothers raising children without fathers report more severe disputes with their children. Sons raised without father’s shows more feminine attributes but no less masculine characteristics of gender role behavior.

I submit that the absence of FATHER’S is a direct result of the condition of many families, the devastation of our communities, and dare I say our society. We have entered a new era of “HOPE” and I pray that males will make this profound transformation into manhood. Forget about all those things that may have caused the unholy condition you face, accept your responsibility, honor your children, and be a man. Because regardless of what you believe because the reason we live is to continue the species and as African American’s we are losing the battle.

www.justaseason.com