What do a Frisbee and a skating rink have to do with breakthrough learning?
Different groups learn differently
I was on the ice at the university skating rink, in one of my very favourite roles – as a skating instructor to international students. These amazing people had moved away from their families and homes in warm climates, to study in Canada. They were seeing snow for the first time. And they had boldly signed up for skating lessons.
Teaching 5 and 6 year olds how to skate, is all about setting boundaries around their fearlessness and very short attention spans.
Teaching graduate students is completely different. They are fearful and want a lot of detail.
The power of leaning into instinct
We were near the end of the semester, and on that day, I knew the class could do more than they were letting themselves do. So I brought a Frisbee to the rink. It was magical!
As soon as the focus shifted to catching the Frisbee, they completely forgot about being on skates, and just moved. The excitement whenever someone realized they missed it by going too fast or going too far was genuine and contagious.
That’s when I saw the power of leaning into something we do almost by instinct, as a vehicle to help strengthen our newer skills.
Same approach for learning in meetings
Another time I did this was in team meetings. Everyone knew to be on the lookout for our company’s core values in action. And in the meeting I would ask someone to share something they observed either in alignment and misaligned with a core value. As project managers, they were always ready with an observed pattern or piece of data.
What they were really practicing in the meeting though… was storytelling.
Exercise to strengthen learning
So here’s an exercise to help you strengthen your development muscle:
- Today, identify one skill that you are currently helping someone with (maybe it’s budgeting or scheduling)
- Then come up with a theme that would be really familiar to them (perhaps a hobby or their college major)
- Through this week, blend the theme with the skill whenever you talk about it. Perhaps you find connections and examples together.
- At the end of the week, reflect on what was easy and what was hard, and if you feel differently about training that skill.
