“Meeting standard…”
Shared by Breanne Smedley
It’s fitness testing this week in my classes.
Usually the thought of “fitness testing” conjures up some sort of strong feeling for people.
It’s either met with excitement, or, more commonly,
“Do we have to?”
“I’m not good at push-ups!”
“I don’t want to run!”
Because, inherently, this type of physical testing is designed to push you to your limits in order to see what you’re capable of.
And pushing yourself to your limits is uncomfortable, and hard.
Yesterday, we started with push-ups.
I demonstrated the standards for a correct push-up, explained how the flow of testing will work, and told my students,
“It doesn’t matter how many you do, I just want you to do as many as you can. Your goal is go to to failure. Until you can’t do a single push up any more.”
Without fail, there’s always a couple of kids that raise their hands.
The question is always the same.
“How many do I need to do to get a B?”
Before I can reiterate that I don’t want them to focus on the grading standards, that I’m not even grading the initial round, repeat students blurt out,
“I think it’s like, 20.”
As I start testing students, I notice start to notice a trend.
There are students who start their push-ups and look strong. Easily breezing through multiple reps with perfect form.
I count their reps.
“…18, 19, 20.” Then they stop.
“Why did you stop?” I asked. “You looked like you could have done a lot more than 20!”
They just kind of shrug their shoulders, but look like they feel pretty good about those 20 push-ups.
Then there’s the students who truly do as many push-ups as they can.
Towards the end, each rep is a maximum effort.
Red in the face, arms shaking.
Using everything they have to see if they can push out one more rep.
Not concerned with the “standard,” these students stop when they’ve reached their personal capacity.
When they finish, they collapse on the ground and tell me their arms feel like jello.
It all comes down to how we judge our accomplishments.
Based on a standard that someone else set for us, or based on our own self-improvement.
Based on what our peers are doing, or based on what we set out to do.
Letting other’s set the pace for us, or letting our own progress be our “pace car.”
If our standard for performance is always based on what others are doing and telling us, our performance will always be inconsistent.
Our self-worth will always be conditional, tied to standards that may, or may not be in line with what we are actually capable of.
If that student had blurted out “36!” as what it takes to earn to “meet standard” on the push-up test, I have a feeling I would have recorded a lot of 36s yesterday, rather than 20s.
When we realize that we are far more capable than the external and internal “standards” we live by, we can truly break free.
Break free of the standards that hold us back, and live free to accomplish more than we could imagine.
#MindfullyEvolving
Comments
Post a Comment