Continued from Post No. 026
I think that writing sentences over and over can have value. But the value is not from negative reinforcement. The value is not because the student is aware he will experience the pain of writing sentences if he misbehaves. That he's risking being bored, coerced, missing recess, and being subjected to injustice if he doesn't shape up.
The value is a positive impact on the student. It is a critical step in the three-part process leading from thought, to language, to action. A future post will explore this three-part process, and the importance of timing it. This post will exlore the second step, language, and how writing sentences has to do with the power of expressed language, the resistance to command, and the momentum of habits.
Power of Expressed Language
Definition: Expressed language is language that is spoken and/or written. Unexpressed language is language that is thought.
When something is articulated and spoken or written it has a power in and of itself to make an impact. In the case under discussion, a student is writing down language that has to do with the future, such as, "I will not pass notes in class."
This language has power. What power will be discussed later. For now, think of it as potential power. It is language that is charged up like a battery.
Resistance to Command
Definition: A command is a statement to someone to do, or not to do, something.
One who is commanded cannot be compared to one who is not commanded. There's a natural resistance within a person to following a command. In our case, the student is being commanded not to pass notes in class. Thus, the student has a part of him that is resisting this order, and feels drawn to passing notes in class.
Momentum of Habits
Definition: A habit is a repetitive activity a person does without overmuch examination of his motive and with minimal conscious effort.
Something which is done four or five times can become a habit. Thus, habits have a momentum of their own. An object in motion tends to stay in motion. A habit tends to reinforce itself. When the reinforcement is synchronized, the habit begins to resonate and the resistance to comman increases till the threshold level where the resistance then falls to zero, and then to negative levels.
Now, lets return to our student writing his one hundred sentences to illustrate these three ideas: power of expressed language, resistance to command, and momentum of habits.
To be continued
I think that writing sentences over and over can have value. But the value is not from negative reinforcement. The value is not because the student is aware he will experience the pain of writing sentences if he misbehaves. That he's risking being bored, coerced, missing recess, and being subjected to injustice if he doesn't shape up.
The value is a positive impact on the student. It is a critical step in the three-part process leading from thought, to language, to action. A future post will explore this three-part process, and the importance of timing it. This post will exlore the second step, language, and how writing sentences has to do with the power of expressed language, the resistance to command, and the momentum of habits.
Power of Expressed Language
Definition: Expressed language is language that is spoken and/or written. Unexpressed language is language that is thought.
When something is articulated and spoken or written it has a power in and of itself to make an impact. In the case under discussion, a student is writing down language that has to do with the future, such as, "I will not pass notes in class."
This language has power. What power will be discussed later. For now, think of it as potential power. It is language that is charged up like a battery.
Resistance to Command
Definition: A command is a statement to someone to do, or not to do, something.
One who is commanded cannot be compared to one who is not commanded. There's a natural resistance within a person to following a command. In our case, the student is being commanded not to pass notes in class. Thus, the student has a part of him that is resisting this order, and feels drawn to passing notes in class.
Momentum of Habits
Definition: A habit is a repetitive activity a person does without overmuch examination of his motive and with minimal conscious effort.
Something which is done four or five times can become a habit. Thus, habits have a momentum of their own. An object in motion tends to stay in motion. A habit tends to reinforce itself. When the reinforcement is synchronized, the habit begins to resonate and the resistance to comman increases till the threshold level where the resistance then falls to zero, and then to negative levels.
Now, lets return to our student writing his one hundred sentences to illustrate these three ideas: power of expressed language, resistance to command, and momentum of habits.
To be continued
No comments:
Post a Comment