You just watched a lesson on the experiences of the U.S founding fathers. That a dual purpose grid objective. Now in this next video Mitch is going to make a more explicit connection between academics and character. This time he's teaching about early American infrastructure projects. Like the building of the Erie Canal and he's talking about hope and optimism. Before we get to the actual footage, let's listen in to his rationale about why he's picked these particular character skills. >> This group of kids for lack of better term, subscribes fully to the ideas, definitely the ideas of grit, because like I said, they work, they work their tail off. Most of, most of these kids are honestly, they're taking AP US History, and either AP Chem or AP Stat, so they have, like the, the grit piece. >> Yeah. >> They buy into it. And they, and they talk about it You know just in terms of their, their day. The grit stuff feels more action oriented to the kids like this is what I'm doing. Like I'm doing something and I can, I can, I can make myself do more, like I can say I can drive myself to do more. Optimism to me is a little, like in, in my interpretation is a little bit more of a belief. And, I think sometimes they have a hard, they, like, I think sometimes they have a harder time believing, than they do doing. >> Yeah. So Mitch says, they have a harder time believing, than doing. It is definitely a struggle, for so many students. Okay, so let's watch the clip. You'll hear one student reference a hiking trip that her class went on back in 6th grade. As an aside and as we discussed earlier, field lessons are awesome macro-structures when they intentionally tie in character. This young woman is still talking about this field trip six years later. [BLANK_AUDIO] Thoughts? Go ahead. I said the Americans who created things like the railroads and the Erie Canal were geniuses because they created effective means of transportation. And they created a faster way for this to be transferred in the sea. For this to be transferred in the sea. >> I said they also allow everyone to prosper because, if you were in a close by region, and you can also use it, so it was a good source of transportation and I guess trading also? >> I like that. [INAUDIBLE] >> What's the biggest risk you ever took? Yeah. >> Taking the the nine-mile hike in Utah. >> Ooh. Damn. >> Okay. Okay, okay, okay, okay, why was it a risk? >> because I don't like walking so for me walk nine miles up a mountain is kind of a step forward. >> Why did you do it? >> We'll I earned the trip. And it was a part, of the reward. >> Okay. >> So, I mean, it was, it was torture, but it was in the form, of the reward, so. >> Okay. >> I earned it. >> Did you get anything out of it? >> [LAUGH] >> Learning how to hike up a mountain. >> Okay. >> But not, I'm not doing that by myself. Okay, and I understand that. Did you, did you get anything else out of it? >> I guess, in like mentally? >> Sure... >> perseverance. because I do have a lot of that. >> I agree, I agree. Can you make some form of connection between you taking a risk, taking a challenge, and getting something out of it, to this whole idea of how, how this, this sort of national transportation system started to come together? It was a big risk to open all of the means of transportation. I mean not open but, like, create >> Yeah. >> the means of transportation. because, I guess, people could have taken advantage of it. Like, in a bad way. So, in this case, it sort of worked out because now we have more and tons of transportation, but, it was just a risk that happened to work out. >> Can someone, so I think Aryanne's got a really, she's taken us somewhere. What are, what were the risks? What were the risks Janelle, what were some of the risks? >> One of the risks was basically it had never been done before, so they didn't know what to expect when it was completed like, they, they had it all planned out. But like, along the way, like, they caused like a lot of environmental problems and everything. >> Mm-hm. >> And like, we're still kind of like, [INAUDIBLE] >> Oh, yes we are. >> so, they didn't, they didn't know fully to expect. So, they just went big, like, off of hope. Like, they basically, basically went off of hope, like they hoped they were rich. >> So, it's a huge risk. And you, you brought up A big idea. The H word. >> [INAUDIBLE] >> What? >> Hope. >> Hope. >> [LAUGH]. >> Hope. Sometimes, I know, you, it was, it was a whole four minutes ago. Sometimes, when you, when you going to take these kinds of risks... I mean, I Aryanne how, did you, how'd you, how'd you really get up the mountain? I mean one foot in front of the other, I guess. But how'd you really get up the mountain. >> Train. >> Yeah. [LAUGH] God help... >> What? [LAUGH] Wait, say what you just said. >> God helped me up the mountain. >> Okay, so some form of what? >> Motivation, yeah. >> Motiviation, belief, sometimes when you take on a massive undertaking you gotta have a little bit of belief, you gotta have a little bit of this. What's blind faith? What is, what's blind faith? Richard. >> Like having faith in something that you don't know what the outcome is going to be. >> Right. So when you invest like, many of you said, bajillions, you don't know how it's going to turn out. You gotta have a little bit of that. You gotta have a little bit. There's just so much to like about this example. The more explicit the connection, the better. Americans believed they would build the Erie Canal, so they built it. Aryanne believed she would get up the mountain, so she got up the mountain. Remember, Dr. Solegman said: people who have a lot of optimism try harder and that changes the outcome. So in effect Mitch is saying, hey, you're in AP U.S. history and it's hard. I believe in you. You need to believe that with effort you can do it too. Let's work on the strategies that will get you to your goal. It's a great intersection of optimism and growth mindset.
