Advice from a professional 7th grader

Hey, what’s up everybody? This is my good friend Diego.

Diego: Hi.

And this is Seth from sethperler.com.

Diego is one of my students this year, and he’s a seventh grader at a middle school here in Boulder.

For today’s blog post, I wanted to ask him what advice he would give to himself a year ago.

Before we dive into that, I want to find out a little bit about Diego.

We know you’re a seventh grader. What have been some of your favorite subjects over the years?

Diego: I don’t know… probably art, definitely, because—I don’t want to brag—but I think I’m pretty creative.

Let’s see… I’m not really sure what else.

Do you feel like math is a strength?

Diego: No, science actually. Yeah, probably science more than anything else.

I’m not really good with history and that stuff.

Writing… sort of.

Reading… yeah.

All right. What have been some of your biggest struggles throughout school?

Diego: Probably one of them has been my study habits.

Last year, I would scare myself by imagining what would happen if I failed a quiz.

Normally that didn’t end very well.

It just really didn’t work out for me.

How would you scare yourself?

Diego: I would stay up really late until I was on the edge of losing my sanity.

I’d think about every possible scenario of what would happen if I failed the test.

How did that work for you?

Diego: It was very effective at scaring me, but not very good for studying.

Although I would study and get an okay grade, it really wasn’t working for me.

If you could travel back in time to last year, what advice would you give yourself about study habits?

Diego: Probably… don’t stress so much, and don’t study the night right before the test.

That will ruin you.

It’s not good for anyone to be that stressed.

I find it’s really hard when I’m working with students to get them to make the shift.

Let’s say there’s a test on Friday.

I try to get them into the habit of studying a little on Monday, a little on Tuesday, and continuing throughout the week instead of waiting until the night before—or not studying at all.

How did you convince yourself to change that habit? Habits are hard to change.

Diego: Eventually I got to the point where it was the night before a quiz, and I was about to do what I normally did, which was scare myself.

Then I realized it wasn’t a good idea.

So I decided that for the next quiz, I would actually study before the night before.

So you studied farther in advance.

Did that work better?

Diego: It worked a lot better.

My grades went up.

What happened to your stress level?

Diego: It definitely went down.

I’m a lot less stressed than I was last year, so that’s an improvement.

Cool.

Let’s do two more pieces of advice.

What advice would you give yourself from last year in terms of your mindset or attitude about school, teachers, or anything else?

Diego: Last year I had kind of a negative mindset toward school.

I kept thinking, “I’m going to fail. I’m not going to do very well.”

For some reason, I thought that mindset was going to work for me, but it didn’t.

It was really hard to change my mindset to something more positive because mindsets are really hard to change, just like habits.

So what advice would you give yourself now about your mindset?

Diego: I’d tell myself to think more positively and look for the bright side.

Like what?

What’s a more positive mindset toward studying, a class you don’t like, or homework you don’t want to do?

Diego: Well, when I get home I can take a break first.

Maybe I could set up a reward for myself for thinking more positively.

I’m not really sure.

What is your attitude now?

Diego: I think it’s pretty good.

It’s definitely more positive than last year.

Are you less resistant now?

If you don’t want to do homework or study, are you better able to tell yourself, “All right, Diego, just do it anyway”?

Diego: I’ve probably been a little less stubborn.

It’s hard to change, huh?

But I think it’s actually been a tremendous difference.

Today you just started doing what you needed to do.

That’s a big change.

Do you know how that happened?

Was it gradual?

Diego: I have this thing coming up where, if I don’t finish everything, I’ll have to repeat the grade.

I definitely don’t want that.

So I decided I was tired of skipping assignments and getting the bad grades I was getting.

I decided it was time to take charge of the situation.

Cool.

That’s a great answer.

There are lots of different ways people approach change.

To me, this sounds like a maturity choice.

You reached a point where you said, “I’m done with this. I’m going to step it up.”

That’s really hard to get people to do.

Parents can’t force you to make that choice.

I can’t make you make that choice.

If anything, trying to force it often makes things worse.

You kind of have to come to that decision on your own.

Let’s do one more.

What advice would you give yourself about communicating with teachers and advocating for yourself?

Diego: I’d tell myself to actually listen to the teachers.

And if I had any problems, I’d talk to them instead of waiting until the last second to deal with things.

What do you notice when you’re proactive and ask teachers for help?

Diego: For one thing, they’re kind of surprised because I normally don’t advocate for myself very well.

They’re much more positive about helping me, which is a good thing.

Do you feel like they also give you tips about succeeding in their class that you wouldn’t have known otherwise?

Diego: Yeah.

When you actually talk to the teacher, they’ll give you advice if you ask for it.

For example, I had a couple of late assignments and needed an extension.

Normally I wouldn’t ask, and I’d end up getting a zero.

Instead, I asked for an extension, got both assignments turned in on time, and received full credit.

Awesome.

One last question.

What advice would you give to a middle school student with ADD who is struggling in school?

Let’s say they’re in sixth grade.

Diego: I don’t know.

It’s hard for me to control myself sometimes, so I’m not really sure what advice I’d give.

That’s kind of a hard question to answer.

We’d probably have to think about that one.

Do you find that getting help from people makes a difference?

Diego: Yeah.

I think that’s something you’ve really learned.

A lot of people don’t want to ask for help.

Diego: Yeah.

It’s kind of a weird feeling because you don’t really want anyone helping you.

Then you have to admit the truth—that you actually do need help.

That’s hard.

But once you do it, it’s actually not as bad as you think.

Yeah, it’s often the fear of asking that’s the hardest part.

All right, everybody.

I hope you’re having an awesome day, and we’ll see you soon.

Any final words?

Diego: Nope.

Be well.