The Making of [an Educator] Athlete

In this episode I unpack Loehr and Schwartz’s (2001) publication titled “The making of a corporate athlete,” which provides some suggestions relevant to educators interested in performing at their best by focusing on rest and recovery.

If teaching were like a sport where
educators are paid Millions a year how
would you physically and mentally
prepare yourself to perform at the
highest levels over an extended period
of time today's article which is titled
the making of a corporate athlete which
is by Jim lore and Tony Schwartz
explores this idea in corporate culture
but we're going to talk about what this
might potentially look like for computer
science Educators talked a lot about how
educators can prevent burnout and in
many of the interviews I asked the
guests how they iterate on their own
abilities as an educator as a researcher
or whatever one of the reasons why I
asked that question is because I took a
sports psychology class during my
undergrad and it has heavily shaped how
I look at teaching one approach to
teaching is helping students be able to
develop expertise over an extended
period of time because in all my roles I
saw students over many years I didn't
think about just like what am I going to
do for this particular quarter semester
or year to help a student understand the
subject area but what am I going to do
over multiple years or even a decade to
help them improve as a musician as a
computer science student whatever and
many of the guests have talked about the
importance of social emotional learning
but some of them have even pointed out
that you know this doesn't just apply to
students this also applies to Educators
we need to take care of ourselves and if
we want students to be able to perform
at the highest level over an extended
period of time throughout their K-12 and
potentially Collegiate tenure what about
Educators so the authors begin this
article talking about how most of the
coaching that they see for c-suite
executives and people who are just like
high performers in corporate culture
Focus almost entirely on like cognitive
capacity and don't necessarily look at
the person holistically the authors
describe something known as the high
performance pyramid which they think is
a more holistic approach that you could
take to performing at high levels we're
going to talk about this in relation to
education but at the bottom of the
pyramid is physical capacity which quote
builds endurance and promotes mental and
emotional recovery end quote above that
is emotional capacity which quote
creates the internal climate that drives
the ideal performance State end quote
and above that is mental capacity which
quote focuses physical and emotional
energy on the task at hand end quote and
then finally is spiritual capacity quote
which provides a powerful source of
motivation determination and endurance
end quote and spiritual capacity might
be different than what you're thinking
so stay tuned to learn more about each
one of these four different areas of the
high performance parent mid here's a
really interesting quote in the section
that is titled ideal performance date
quote in training athletes we have never
focused on their primary skills how to
hit a serve swing a golf club or shoot a
basketball likewise in business we don't
address primary competencies such as
public speaking negotiating or analyzing
a balance sheet our efforts aim instead
to help Executives build their capacity
for what might be called supportive or
secondary competencies among them
endurance strength flexibility
self-control and focus increasing
capacity at all levels allows athletes
and Executives alike to bring their
talents and skills to full ignition and
to sustain high performance over time a
condition we call the ideal performance
State end quote now this is really
interesting if we kind of look at what
this might look like for educators I
would argue that this is very different
for most Educators a lot of PD and
administrators tend to treat Educators
as if they don't know something so they
go for like the lowest possible an
entry-level educator just stepped out of
college or maybe even a student teacher
and if you just look on like social
media like tick tock or whatever you're
gonna find a bunch of Educators who have
recently been posting what their PD
experiences are like we're the kind of
talk down to as if like adults can't
figure out how to socialize or work on
their own the main point of this is that
instead of focusing on like the very
basics of here's a transition statement
that you can do to get from one lesson
to another we could instead focus on
here's how to prevent burnout here's how
to set appropriate boundaries between
work and home life so instead of
focusing on like wrote basics of
pedagogy that you could learn in a 100
level course administrators PD providers
etc for districts might actually focus
on other areas like what do you do to
prevent burnout how do you try and set
appropriate boundaries between work and
home life how do you oscillate between
high performance in the classroom and
Recovery outside of the classroom what
strategies do you use to kind of do a
mental reset in between classes or
lessons all of these are topics that
could be discussed in District level PD
plcs Etc but instead at least from my
experiences and what I have seen from
other Educators it focuses on other very
basic things that again you could learn
in a 100 level course or by reading like
a magazine article about education
because topics tend to like skin the
surface on what you could actually
discuss in education which is one of the
reasons why I started this podcast is to
actually dive deeper into literature and
talk about what does this mean for
educators rather than just focusing on
the same basic stuff that is often
shared in like blog posts and whatnot
nothing against that there's definitely
a space for it but how do you as an
educator actually iterate on your
abilities over time rather than learning
a new activity or a new lesson that you
can do what do you do to refine your own
teaching practices one approach that
they talk about very early with a lot of
athletes and a lot of high performance
c-suite Executives Etc is an oscillation
between stress and Recovery quote in a
living laboratory of sports we learned
that the real enemy of high performance
is not stress which paradoxical as it
may seem is actually the stimulus for
growth rather the problem is the absence
of disciplined intermittent recovery
chronic stress without recovery depletes
energy reserves leads to burnout and
breakdown and ultimately undermines
performance let's talk about the first
part of the pyramid which is physical
capacity and how that might be benef
official for educators to focus on if
they want to perform at higher levels
over an extended period of time without
burning out quote energy can be defined
most simply as the capacity to do work
our training process begins at the
physical level because the body is our
fundamental source of energy the
foundation of the performance pyramid
end quote so the authors talk about how
if you're trying to build muscle that
you need to give time in between your
workout to allow the muscle to rest if
you do not stress the muscle so you do
not work out then it can lead to
weakness atrophy Etc just think about
like if you're ever put into a cast or
something unable to kind of like move
your arm it's going to like
significantly change your muscle size if
you're unable to do that for an extended
period of time like months or years
however if you were to only work out 24
all sorts of problems with the muscles
as well so it's important to not only to
stress or strain something but to also
recover from that so if we talk about
this in relation to education it's
extremely important to take some time to
step away from teaching don't take
papers home to grade don't respond to
emails on weeknights and weekends
actually take your sick days especially
when you're not feeling well and
actually take your paid time off and on
fall winter spring and summer breaks
actually take breaks but what about in
the micro stage in terms of being able
to recover from one lesson to another I
don't know about for you but I had some
classes that were like consistently
great to work with and some classes or
some individuals who were consistently
challenging at times I realized early on
that I needed to be able to just kind of
like come up with some sort of a mental
reset in between those classes because
if I had a very difficult student in one
class I didn't want it to kind of like
carry over into the next class than have
a bad attitude or something which will
cause students to have like a bad
experience in that class one of the
things that I started doing was like
many little workouts in between my
sessions to kind of like process the
energy so I do like just like push-ups
or I do like really slow like diamond
push-ups or something just to kind of
get that energy out and to kind of relax
another thing that I do is just like a
very short meditation I just sit and
focus my breath and focus on my
circulation and my blood like feeling
the timing difference between my
heartbeat and my wrist that for me is
very calming there are many little
ritual that you can do in between each
one of the classes and the authors talk
about how this is very important for
athletes and for corporate athletes but
we can apply this to Educators one of
the things they talk about is like if
you miss a shot or miss a goal as an
athlete it can be devastating but then
you're expected to perform like
immediately you got to get right back
into it depending on what kind of sport
you're doing so if you like botch a
serve when you're playing tennis or
something you can't be stuck in that
mindset and be like oh I messed up
instead you have to press F5 and just
kind of like mentally refresh and then
try another serve same thing for
teaching in between each one of your
classes or even if you're working with a
difficult student and then you walk over
to the next student right next to them
and they're a great student you want to
make sure you're not in that mental
space where you're still like I'm
frustrated but are instead more calm and
are able to like assist the student so
the authors mention that the players who
are able to have these little mental
refreshes in between moments of high
performance this quote allow players to
avoid negative feelings Focus their
minds and prepare for the next Point by
contrast players who lack between point
rituals or who practice them
inconsistently become linear they expend
too much energy without recovery
regardless of their talent or level of
Fitness they become more vulnerable to
frustration anxiety and loss of
concentration and far more likely to
choke Under Pressure end quote now
imagine if we focus on this more in our
plcs this I think would be very
beneficial for educators what kind of
strategies do you use to press F5 in
between difficult moments when teaching
let me know in the comments I'm
genuinely curious imagine if you watch
into the teachers lounge or like the
copy room or whatever and Educators were
talking about their workouts how they're
recovering from their workouts what they
do to mentally refresh in between
lessons how they're trying to practice
good sleeping and eating rituals Etc
what if that was kind of a focus that
Educators had in the social spaces
wouldn't that also have a positive
impact on student performance if the
educators are performing better because
they're taking care of themselves how
might that help that's one of the things
the authors talk about in a little bit
further down in the same section and I
agree with this I really genuinely think
that there's a lot of things that could
be discussed around education that
aren't necessarily typically discussed
again how do you take care of yourself
like here's a quote from one of their
participants quote I really do believe
that we when you learn to take care of
yourself you free up energy and
enthusiasm to care more for others end
quote I totally agree so let's talk
about how we might do that with the next
part of the high performance pyramid
which is the emotional capacity and the
authors describe emotional capacity as
quote to the internal climate that
supports Peak Performance end quote so
again if it's important for students to
focus on SEL some of the interviews that
I've done on this podcast have raised
the question of well shouldn't Educators
also do that here's a quote that kind of
relates to that quote just as positive
emotions ignite the energy that drives
high performance negative emotions
frustration impatience anger fear
resentment and sadness drain energy over
time these feelings can be literally
toxic elevating heart rate and blood
pressure increasing muscle tension
constricting vision and ultimately
crippling performance end quote now one
way you can focus on this is again to
focus on SEO another thing is this
five-step ritual that the authors
describe so the first step is to become
more aware of what your body is
signaling to you so what's the physical
tension how is your heart rate do you
have a tightness in your chest Etc if so
the authors recommend taking some time
to close your eyes and take several deep
breaths so you can focus on inhale and
exhale one of the things that Andrew
huberman talks about is parasympathetic
breathing where you take two inhales in
your nose and a long extended exhale
where you completely get rid of
everything in your lungs when you take
those inhales who try and take as big of
breaths as possible to expand your lungs
and then that second inhale expands it a
little bit more so it expands the little
sacs that are on your lungs and it will
calm you down so that's one approach
that you can do for this the authors
then recommend next focusing on not just
your breath but how you can relax your
face the tension in your face muscles
Etc the next thing that they recommend
is to focus on softening your voice and
speaking slowly and then the last step
that they recommended in a moment where
you're like having a negative emotion
like let's say with a student or
administrator or teacher or whatever is
to imagine yourself in that person's
shoes what are they feeling right now
what are they thinking and then
reframing some kind of response in a
positive way so these are some potential
steps that you could do to kind of
respond in negative situations but what
approaches do you use let me know in the
comments I'm always happy to learn some
new approaches and I think it's
important for educators to share them
note that if you try and do something
like this feel forced or robotic so over
time things can become better with more
practice one of the things that the
officer mentioned is that many athletes
will try and develop some kind of ritual
to get themselves into a state of high
performance like if as an example many
will put on like headphones and whatnot
before they're going to perform and they
have like the same playlist that kind of
gets them into a mindset ready to go and
they might even like visualize what
they're going to do what is this
performance going to look like and go
through like every single motion when
they are about to perform what might
that look like for educators how can you
get yourself into a mindset to teach
like as an example when I used to teach
Drumline when I would drive to
rehearsals I'd listen to recordings of
drum lines that were professional level
when I was working with a high school
group that got me excited on my drive
out to go work without Drumline or you
might have a specific playlist that just
kind of gets you pumped up excited
energetic ready to teach or maybe it
calms you down maybe you have a playlist
in between your classes like during your
lunch break like a meditation playlist
you take some time to recover there just
kind of relax instead of just go go all
the time and I say that as somebody who
is recording a podcast when it is over
so if you see me sweating that's why
some of the other things that the office
talk about in this particular section is
how body language can influence emotions
but I've heard since then that there's
some research that kind of debunks that
but another thing they do mention that I
have heard a lot of positive things
about is just having close relationships
this can be relationships within the
domain of Education this can be
relationships outside of that it's
beneficial honestly to have some friend
groups that are outside of what you do
for a living it can help with just like
taking your mind off of it so you're not
just constantly sitting around talking
about work and if your friends are all
Educators perhaps talk about something
else it just helps with recovery so the
next part of the pyramid is mental
capacity the authors mention that this
is where most of like the coaching and
training kind of takes place the focus
on the cognitive side of things Sun Tzu
has a quote that roughly translates to
something like a general's most
important asset is their ability to
focus or their attention the ability to
focus is extremely important think about
how that relates to students learning if
students are hungry or have a sibling
who is in the hospital or were unable to
sleep last night because their parents
were arguing the entire night or any
number of factors that might impact
students ability to focus think about
how that impacts their ability to learn
or to create now look at other Educators
think about some of your colleagues or
even yourself what happens when your car
breaks down and you're like an hour late
to work or maybe you got into an
argument with your significant other and
it was unresolved because you went to
work all of those things that you might
be thinking about in the background are
going to have an impact on how you teach
your attention is going to be elsewhere
and it's not going to be on teaching to
the best of your abilities so if as
Educators we can talk about how you
develop that Focus again maybe it's a
ritual like listening to a specific
playlist before you start teaching to
get yourself into a mindset or maybe
it's just a parasympathetic breathing
that I mentioned in between each one of
the lessons or in between students just
kind of mentally reset okay now I'm
ready to go again but what approaches to
use to focus let me know in the comments
one of the ones that I personally use is
meditation or attention training as I
like to call it where I will often just
focus on an object to just like look at
it or just listen or just feel the
sensations in my body like what does my
circulation feel like Etc there are so
many different ways to meditate it's not
just about clearing your mind but some
of them are about like just focusing on
your breathing what does it feel like
going in and out of your nose what
temperature is it is it cooler when it
goes in or is it cooler when it goes out
Etc and again the authors mentioned that
it's extremely important to focus on
alternating between stress and renewal
this is emphasized throughout this
article and I'm gonna emphasize it
throughout this podcast here's a quote
quote have you ever suddenly found the
solution to a vexing problem while doing
something mindless such as jogging
working in the garden or singing in the
shower that's the left brain right brain
switch at work the fruit of mental
oscillation end quote so if you plan in
oscillations between work and non-work
or stress and Recovery it's like you're
almost taking one step back for the
recovery period to be able to take two
steps forward that is something that we
need to be able to figure out how to do
when the day is planned for you class
periods were not up to me when the
school started and when it ended was not
up to me when my lunch break was was not
up to me but what was up to me was what
I did in those five minutes in between
each class or what I did on my lunch
break when I would go and have a walking
meditation along a bike path and if you
don't have those options like if your
lunch break is full and you don't have
passing periods between your classes
which one of my schools didn't literally
back to back to back one of the things
that I would do is just kind of like
take a step back while students were
working just take a minute just observe
that's a form of recovery where you're
just kind of mentally giving yourself
some time to breathe and then continue
to walk around the room and facilitate
but what works for you how do you
oscillate between stress and Recovery
when you're teaching throughout the day
let me know another strategy that the
authors talk about is the use of
visualization so many athletes will
visualize before they are going to
perform something like a serve or
whatever they will visualize what that
serve is going to look like with the
high various similitude so make it as
lifelike as possible how might we
actually use that in education for
example if you're going into a meeting
with an admin or maybe you are an admin
and you're meeting with an educator what
would it look like if you took a few
minutes beforehand to kind of visualize
how you want to present yourself in that
meeting and how you want to speak to the
other individuals in that meeting how
are you going to bring up a topic Etc
I've heard many people who are like in
meetings throughout most of the day like
c-suite Executives and whatnot talk
about just how much of a difference 5 to
particular meeting if you just take the
time to kind of visualize what you want
to look like mentally prepare for it and
plan for it what might you do same thing
can apply for lessons visualize what
will this intro look like how will I
spark curiosity and joy and wonderment
you just take a couple minutes to do
that visualize what that would look like
how might that impact your teaching or
how might that impact the parent
conferences that you might have or the
communication that you might have with
parents that are difficult having taught
at the University level and failed some
students from a class that prevented
them from graduating for an entire year
those conversations are difficult so
spending some time to kind of prepare
for an advance and think through how are
you going to manage emotions and whatnot
and respond when somebody else does not
manage their emotions well it can make
all the world of a difference whether
it's parent conferences performance
reviews a lesson whatever so how do you
prepare for those moments let me know
now the last area is called spiritual
capacity and the authors clarify that
they refer to spiritual capacity as
quote the energy that is Unleashed by
tapping into one's deepest values and
defining a strong sense of purpose end
quote so that's very different than when
I initially thought it was going to be
when I first read the heading for this
so many of the guests who have been
interviewed on this podcast talk about
how they find great fulfillment and joy
working with other students and how this
is kind of their sense of purpose or
their why for what they do that's great
but there are some other poaches that
you can also use like just taking breaks
again oscillating from stress to
recovery having rituals that kind of
help center yourself like working out
before you start teaching or even at the
end of the day like one of the things I
would do when I'd come home was I'd do
Muay Thai which is like kickboxing so I
had a bag where I could just kind of
mentally press the reset button by just
doing a few rounds hitting the back even
if I wasn't frustrated it was just a
good release and a good cue that hey I'm
done with my teaching day and now I'm
going to focus on Leisure or my
dissertation in that case so what
approaches do you use to develop
spiritual capacity now I want to leave
you with a quote at the very end quote
in a corporate environment that is
changing at warp speed performing
consistently at high levels is more
often and more necessary than ever
narrow interventions simply aren't
sufficient anymore companies can't
afford to address their employees
cognitive capacities while ignoring
their physical emotional and spiritual
well-being on the playing field or in
the boardroom high performance depends
as much on how people renew and recover
energy as on how they expend it on how
they manage their lives as much as on
how they manage their work when people
feel strong and resilient physically
mentally emotionally and spiritually
they're performed better with more
passion for longer they win their
families win and the corporations that
employ them win end quote if you were to
replace like Corporation with District
that quote is so relevant to today and
to many Educators I imagine whatever you
are doing in education whether you're an
admin an educator paraprofessional
curriculum developer whatever if you
were to start thinking of your position
your career in a way that you might
think of it as if you're making millions
a year which I hope you are and you had
like millions of fans who are cheering
you on when you have a great lesson or
you develop like a great lesson plan
you're constantly watching the public
eye and you just want to perform at your
best all the time what kind of
approaches would you use ironically I
imagine you'd probably step away from
and learn to recover more from what
you're doing as an educator and again I
say this as somebody who's wearing a
shirt that says granny for XP and it is
recording in 95 degree plus temperature
in my house because I am committed to
creating content regardless of how hot
or cold it is in here just think of me
as the non-binary version of one punch
man I'm always training no matter how
hot or cold it gets if you don't get
that reference that's okay now normally
in these episodes I'd like to end with
some lingering questions and thoughts
but I've actually talked about different
ways that I've recovered in many other
episodes that I link to in the show
notes but I also collaboratively talked
about some of these approaches that I
use with Jen manly over the summer for
csta's conference so what I'm going to
do in the show notes is I'm going to
include a link to some resources that we
provided these resources are pretty
robust there's a lot of different ideas
and approaches that you can use so I'm
going to link to the content that was in
that particular session so make sure you
check out the show notes at
jaredoleiri.com as always if you enjoy
this particular episode just let other
people know share an episode share the
link to my website or leave a review
whatever it just helps more people find
the free content that I create and
there's a bunch of it on my website a
bunch of Computer Science Education
bunch of drumming and a bunch of gaming
stuff thank you so much for listening to
this episode I hope you are much cooler
than I am right now stay tuned for an
episode next week until then I hope
you're all staying safe and are having a
wonderful week

Article

Loehr, J. & Schwartz, T. (2001). The Making of a Corporate Athlete. Harvard Business Review, 120-128.

My One Sentence Summary

This article provides some suggestions for performing at your best by focusing on rest and recovery

Resources/Links Relevant to This Episode

Other podcast episodes that were mentioned or are relevant to this episode
- How to Get Started with Computer Science Education
  - In this episode I provide a framework for how districts and educators can get started with computer science education for free.
- Recommendations for Preventing Burnout in Education (Part 1)
  - Building off the previous episode on depression, suicide, and CS education, this episode is a supercut of guests responding to how they take care of themselves and stave off burnout.
- Recommendations for Preventing Burnout in Education (Part 2)
  - Building off the previous episode on depression, suicide, and CS education, this episode is a supercut of guests responding to how they take care of themselves and stave off burnout. If you have not done so yet, I highly recommend listening to last year’s supercut on the same topic, but with different guests.
- Recommendations for Preventing Burnout in Education (Part 3)
  - Building off the previous episode on depression, suicide, and CS education, this episode is a supercut of guests responding to how they take care of themselves and stave off burnout. If you have not done so yet, I highly recommend listening to last year’s supercut on the same topic or the episode from two years ago to hear perspectives from other guests.
- The Role of Deliberate Practice in the Acquisition of Expert Performance
  - In this episode I unpack Ericsson, Krampe, and Tesch-Römer’s (1993) publication titled “The role of deliberate practice in the acquisition of expert performance,” which debunks the notion of innate abilities within a domain and describes the role of deliberate practice in achieving expert performance.
- More episodes related to burnout
- More episodes related to mental health
- More episodes related to self care
- More episodes related to social and emotional learning (SEL)
- All other episodes
Resources for preventing burnout in CS education
Find other CS educators and resources by using the #CSK8 hashtag on Twitter