College football coach Lou Holtz once said, “Ability is what you’re capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it.”

In the classroom, the same is true. How well we create learning experiences for our students is largely determined by our mindset.

The following quote by Haim Ginott hung on a filing cabinet in my classroom for years. (In a post full of quotes, why not start with a couple, right?)

“I’ve come to a frightening conclusion that I am the decisive element in the classroom. It’s my personal approach that creates the climate. It’s my daily mood that makes the weather.”

The way we approach our classes and our students will decide a lot about how students think, feel and act as they walk out the door.

I wrote a lot about mindsets in my book, Ditch That Textbook. In fact, one of the four main sections of the book is dedicated to ditching old, ineffective textbook mindsets for new ones. Here are 12 points about mindsets of educators from the book. (Note: Feel free to copy or save these image files and redistribute them on social media or elsewhere if you’d like.)

1. Asking students to do something instead of telling them to do it is a small gesture, but it can save and build relationships over time. Adults tell students what to do all day. Even as an adult, if I got bossed around all day, I’d get sick of it quickly. This is a small step to humanize the teacher-student relationship.

2. Education today is driven by methods effective for producing good little factory workers, but the kind of work people do in today’s workforce is non-routine, interpersonal, and analytical. Call me crazy, but something doesn’t add up. The world is changing, and so are its demands on its workers of the future — our students. We can’t keep preparing them for a world that doesn’t exist anymore.

3. Don’t get lost in the glitter of the next big thing in educational technology. The real “next big thing” is sitting in your classroom ready to learn. It’s the next generation. Don’t forsake it for the flash. So much teacher training focuses on the flashy tools and less on what we can do with them. If it doesn’t improve learning, it probably isn’t worth it.

4. It’s my turn to step up in this cycle of teacher support that goes like this: Get help. Give help. Repeat. As a new teacher, I was starving for ideas for my classroom. I was blessed to have several veteran teachers step up — some virtually through blog posts and online resources. This cycle of support only works if we feed into it.

5. Education must be relevant to our students’ future lives. Technology must be an inalienable right to students. Technology will be so intertwined with their future that we really don’t have much choice. If we want students to thrive in this digital age they’ll face, they must be able to use the best tools and the ones they’ll be using.

6. When schools tell students to put technology away, it’s like asking a doctor to save a life with one hand tied behind his back. Pencils are tools. Compasses and protractors are tools. We don’t force students to put them away because they might abuse them. Technology is a tool, not a problem. The only problem is how it’s used.

7. Teachers often say they’re overworked and underpaid, and we are. But maybe the overworked part is partially our fault. Let’s stop overboiling the water. Water boils at 212 degrees Fahrenheit (100 degrees Celsius). Making it hotter doesn’t make it work any better. At some point, our extra hours and extra work produce diminishing gains. It’s like we’re overboiling water. We need to know when to stop.

8. Students are either renters or owners of their education. The renters come to our classes because they have to be there. The owners act as dedicated caretakers of their educations. How do we get the renters to sign the deed and own their educations? Handing students their educations isn’t going to serve them in a world that expects them to proactively produce. It’s not easy, but we need to produce students who own their educations.

9. Maybe we need to focus less on asking the right questions and start asking the relevant questions. The right questions are the ones that teachers are supposed to ask. They’re often content-focused and not student life-focused. If we can make our questions relate better to students’ real lives, they’ll be hooked.

10. I have come to appreciate and respect the sanctity of the class period. Class time is precious. I can’t afford to waste time on fancy tools that don’t advance my students’ education. The school year — 180 days for me — seems short in some ways. There’s a lot I want to do and a finite amount of time. I must be judicious with the tools I allow in my classroom. They have to help us be more efficient or effective or they’re wasting our time.

11. The transition to student-led learning isn’t easy. Students’ attention will stray. They will abuse time and resources. Count on it. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t turn over control. I really struggle with this one, but I continue with it because I know this is where the future of meaningful education is headed. I still fear misuse and misguided efforts. But if students don’t handle that control as students, how will they handle it as adults?

12. If our students want to find themselves when they open a yearbook, wouldn’t they want to find themselves in our instruction as well? As a former yearbook adviser, I know how important it is to emphasize that students can relate to their yearbooks. My class has to be the same. If my students don’t see themselves in my classes, they’ll check out.

[reminder]Which of these resonates with you most? Why? Would you change any of them?[/reminder]