Basically, this is a book full of stories written on the teaching and learning of the timeless and universal principles taught in the bestselling book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Yes, I know it is a really old book, but it does not mean that the content is irrelevant and outdated today.
I have always wanted to buy this book ever since I read about it in the other book, The 3rd Alternative, by the same author, Stephen R. Covey. I finally got my hand on it last month during MPH warehouse sale in Petaling Jaya Old Town. And for the record, I ONLY bought two books this time. Finally I manage to control my habit of buying too much and reading too little previously.
Having said that, both books are really interesting, and I am pretty sure about it since I am now reading the second book, title as below:
Well, I probably going to write a blog post about it too, but no promise, but highly probable.
Now, back to the topic.
If you have read the The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, this is a book on the real life stories of how all the principles were taught to elementary school children around the world and the amazing results it brought to them. And of course, a little of how-you-can-do-it-too was also outlined in the book. In case you have not read The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, I would highly recommend you to do so immediately. I am speaking from my personal experience of having read all the major personal development and self help books you can find in the major bookstores.
Again, back to the stories.
Having inspired by the stories shared by the author in the book, I was determined to teach them to my kids in the school. But before I can teach the principles, I must first learn, apply and practice them in my life. Without it, I am sure the teaching will not be effective as the children will sense that I am incongruent. Thus, I began by writing a diary on ways that I have applied them in my life. By writing them and sensing them as a integral part of me, I felt much more confident when I was teaching them in school later.
An important point to take note.
The 7 Habits are not something new that I am teaching in school, they are not "one more thing" to teach. Instead, I am taking the "ubiquitous" approach as discussed in the book. It means that it is taught in everything a teacher teach in school. For instance, when I was teaching topic related to goal setting, I inserted the principle of "Begin With The End In Mind", when I was disciplining them to take initiative to keep the class clean, I related it to the habit of being "Proactive".
Honestly speaking, I have not done much on the teaching of the principle. And of course, the results are yet to be seen. And most importantly, I dare not claim that I could live harmoniously with all the 7 Habits, in fact, I am far from it. But what I am saying here is that, instead of waiting for everything to be perfect to start something, I would rather learn and grow along the journey.
"The most important thing we do is to teach the children to do 'the right thing', if we take this work and it goes in the direction we think it's going to go, we don't need to worry about test scores--they will come."
Muriel Summers