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I Think You Can

  Robert Rosenthal came to teachers with a new test called the Harvard Test of Inflected Acquisition. This test he informed the instructors could accurately predict kids that would excel in the coming year. The test was administered and the teachers were given the names of potentially high-achieving students.  Rosenthal expressed to them that these kids were special and that even if they might not done well in the past they showed unusual potential for growth. 

 

The test proved itself right. Those students it selected scored better and improved more. The 1st graders gained 27 IQ points as for only 12 for the rest of the class. In 2nd grade, the potentially high achievers gained 17 points versus only 7 by the rest of the class.

  The result might be right but the test wasn’t.  Rosenthal selected the kids at random.  Nothing was different about them.

  What really changed was how they were viewed by their teachers. Instead of seeing them as average, they viewed them as special. And that viewpoint changed how they treated them.

 The teachers treated these kids kinder with more warmth, gave them more learning material, and called on them more in class. When the students made a mistake, they gave them the benefit of doubt and were quicker to presume they needed better feedback. This change in how they were treated changed how they performed.

  I think this is akin to what Paul tells us in 2nd Corinthians 5:16-17:  “Therefore from now on we recognize no one according to the flesh; even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know Him in this way no longer. Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come.”

  Instead of looking at people in the worldly, fleshy light, we should see them in the way Christ does as one with the potential for growth. That will change how we treat others and that can change what they become! 

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