JOHN Mighton was not a born genius, in fact he
was just an ordinary kid, who barely passed calculus in a first year university
course and received disappointing marks in creative writing. Today, Mighton is
an award-winning playwright, an author, the brain behind the pioneering knot
and graph theory in mathematics and an internationally-recognised math
teacher.Mighton attributes his success to years of rigorous training and
holding a strong passion for what he does.
“People with expert abilities are generally
made, not born and often their abilities arise out of a great deal of
repetitive practice and imitation and copying of other peoples’ styles and
ideas,” he said.“For instance, chess masters repeatedly play small sets of
moves, memorise thousands of positions and obsessively study the games of the
masters.”Mighton first studied philosophy at university, but his interest in
writing and math reignited in the 1980s. “I read Sylvia Plath’s Letters Home,
and saw how she turned herself into a writer through sheer determination,” he
said.At that point, Mighton went through rigorous self-training until he became
proficient in writing poetry. His secret was to “break a task down into a
series of steps” and practice until he became perfect. He followed the same
strategy with math and years later pursued a PhD in mathematics from the
University of Toronto.
Anders Ericsson, a psychology professor at
Florida State University, and his colleagues studied expert performances in
soccer, surgery, piano playing, software design, writing, chess and other
pursuits. Their findings proved that expert performers are nearly always made,
not born. It is only when a task is repeated many times to perfection that
people excel. However, the concept of deliberate practice emphasised by
Ericsson, involves more than just repeating a task; it includes setting goals,
obtaining necessary feedback, correcting past mistakes, and focussing on the
process as well as the outcome.
Continued practice increases the production of
myelin around our nerve fibres, explains Daniel Coyle in his book The Talent
Code. Myelin is an insulated sheath that wraps nerve fibres and enhances signal
strength, accuracy and speed. In turn, our sensory responses become more
proficient and our thoughts more fluent.
“The more we fire a particular circuit, the more
myelin optimises the circuit, and the stronger, faster, and more fluent our
movements and thoughts become,” wrote Coyle.
Coyle’s findings also suggest that targeting the
root cause of a problem by repetitious practice is effective because that’s the
only way myelin will wrap around a circuit. “… the best way to build a good
circuit is to fire it, attend to mistakes, then fire it again, over and over.
Struggle is not an option; it’s a biological requirement,” he wrote.
Since wrapping myelin around a big circuit
requires a lot of time and energy, people must love what they do, otherwise
they will never work hard enough to be great, according to Coyle.
DrNasrullahManji, a Harvard graduate and a
gastroenterologist in the US, says that his passion for the life sciences
coupled with hard work helped him reach his mark in life. “Any success comes
with having the ability to use your skills and talents. And that only happens
when you work really hard at it,” he said. He gave me the example of Michael
Jordan, a former professional basket ball player, who practiced for hours a day
to reach his pinnacle of success.
He believes high achievers usually possess a
burning desire to go over and beyond the bare minimum in life and they often
ask themselves the following question: “How can I design a better mouse trap? —
How can I make this better?”
Patricia Lovett-Reid, senior vice-president at
TD Waterhouse Canada Inc., an author and host of Money Talk, a personal finance
show that runs on Business News Network in Canada, is another shining star who
attributes her success to sheer determination, hard work and a passion for what
she does. Lovett-Reid reached up a corporate ladder without having a university
degree and being a single parent in her mid 30s.
Like Manji, Lovett-Reid is of the opinion that
people must have the internal flame, that ‘can-do’ attitude in order to
succeed. “There’s got to be something inside you that forces you to say: I’m
going to do it,” she said. “Sometimes we have self-limiting beliefs about
ourselves … and when we get out of our own way, the sky is the limit.”
When asked whether she believes in the phrase,
practice makes perfect, she said: “I don’t believe in perfection, in fact
perfection I think is delusional to some extent, but I do believe the more
effort you put behind it, the better you will be at it. That takes time — that
takes energy.”
She says it takes a certain amount of courage to
follow one’s passions. “I often think about it [life] like a screenplay. If you
think about a screenplay every once in a while there are pivotal moments where
you can see the play can go in either direction and I think that’s the same way
in life — it could go in either direction and it takes a lot of courage to not
go down the safest path but to follow what you really believe in,” she said.
Though Lovett-Reid cautions that people should
have a back-up plan in life — just in case Plan ‘A’ does not pan out, they at
least have the option to resort to Plan ‘B’.
But is passion alone enough? Some kids can have
passion oozing out of them, but unconducive school and home environments can
hinder their self-confidence and affect their academic performance and in turn
their chances of being successful. So what role can teachers and parents play
to ensure passion is developed and nurtured in children?
Lovett-Reid says that children are by-products
of their environments and it’s important that parents encourage kids to do
their best — as that’s what really matters at the end of the day. “Every single
day we’ve said to our children as they walked out the door: ‘We love you, have
a great day, remember you don’t have to be the best, you sure have to do your
best,’” she said.
According to Mighton, parents and teachers need
to understand the psychological needs of children. “We believe guidance
destroys creativity and understanding, but the research in cognition proves the
opposite,” he said. “To teach someone you need to access what they know and
don’t know and later fill in those remaining gaps.”
In 1998, Mighton created (JUMP) — a free
tutoring service in Toronto to help children achieve their full potential in
the subject. His teaching principles focus on the same methods he’d used to
teach himself; a teaching approach which involves breaking problems down into
levels.
“When a student can succeed at something, I
eventually create problems that look much harder but they are only simple
extensions of the same idea,” he said. “So when a child successfully completes
this harder problem, he is ecstatic.” By understanding children’s psychology,
Mighton not only stimulates and challenges children, but also boosts their
self-esteem.
Mighton’s first miracle student was close to
failing grade eight math, a weakness reinforced by his teacher. But under the
influence of Mighton’s teachings, the boy was later offered a scholarship at
the University of Waterloo and pursued a PhD at another university.
Mary RenckJalongo in an article entitled,
“Beyond benchmarks and scores: reasserting the role of motivation and interest
in children’s academic achievement,” published in the Childhood Education
publication in 2007, wrote: “If we want [children] to use their minds well, it
is reasonable to help them understand how their minds function.”
Jalongo also points out how positive emotions
often lead the way and they influence motivation, interest and ultimately,
academic achievement — just as much as cognitive ability. A child needs to feel
positive emotions such as happiness, excitement and a sense of challenge when
he or she is learning, according to Jalongo.
But some critics may still argue that genes
ultimately determine academic achievement and in turn talent and success.
Surely, innate intelligence acquired through genes plays a role. But the question
that still remains vague is: how much of a role do genes really play?
Young Mozart, for instance, displayed all the
characteristics of a child prodigy. He successfully transcribed music after
hearing it only once. But let’s not forget that the young musician also
compulsively practiced. By his sixth birthday, Mozart had practiced 3,500 hours
of music under the guidance of his mentor father, estimates Dr Michael Howe in
his book Genius Explained.
Ample research suggests that passion,
persistence and patience are all important ingredients to unleash talent. The
findings above suggest that the learner must be self-motivated and have a
desire to get better. And parents and teachers must act as strong supports
along the way.
Mighton, in his book The End of Ignorance:
Multiplying Our Human Potential wrote: “Like the chemical solution that changes
colour with the addition of a single drop of reagent or the ant colony that
begins to forage for food with the arrival of a few ants, the brain can acquire
new abilities that emerge suddenly and dramatically from a series of small
conceptual advances.”
The writer is a member of the Professional
Writers Association of Canada.
ainemoorad@post.com
