On the QT: When the Going Gets Tough

March 10, 2009

On the QT Newsletter, When the Going Gets Tough

 

Did You Know? In these tough economic times employers are looking to employees who have the ability to weather adversity ... they need and want employees who are resilient, people who can adapt quickly, change directions, and bounce back. They want workers who can solve problems, focus on the positive, support their teams, and maintain job performance. When the going gets tough, employers want a resilient workforce. Besides helping students succeed in the workplace, resiliency is one of the most important qualities students need to cultivate in these challenging economic times. In fact, there is a strong correlation between resiliency and academic performance. Today’s activity will help your students get their arms around what resiliency looks and acts like and some ideas on how to build their resilience.

 

Try this:

 

Write the word resilient on your white board and ask students to define the term.

 

Share a short story about a time when you, or someone you know, bounced back from a difficult situation.

 

Ask students what qualities help a person build their resiliency.

 

Distribute the Personal Resiliency Worksheet. (It is a portion of the Resiliency Quiz by Nan Henderson.)
After students have completed the activity, ask volunteers to share personal qualities that have helped them deal with difficult situations.

 

Add an Experience: The way we learn best is through experience. Getting students out of the classroom and connecting with others will help them relate to the information to what they are learning in class and apply it in real world situations. Today’s experience assignment prompts students to learn more about resiliency via an interview. The directions and information are included on this Resiliency Interview assignment sheet. By making this short assignment, students will learn more about resiliency, build their communication skills, and improve their networking abilities -- top skills employers seek. (This activity is an abbreviated version of a resiliency assignment by a UCSB professor.)

 

Quik Quote: Drs. Angela Duckworth and Martin Seligman (2006) found that the correlation between self-discipline and achievement was twice as large as the correlation between IQ and achievement.

 

This email was brought to you by a grant from the California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office VTEA 1-B Work-Based Learning Collaborative (#01-157-011).
Please contact Susan Coleman (scoleman@occ.cccd.edu) or Rita Jones (rjones@occ.cccd.edu) of Orange Coast College Career Education with any questions.
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