Random H.E.A.R.T. Videos

Each time this page reloads, you'll see a video displayed at random. Each video has an accompanying blog post; click on the link below the video to learn more about each one! To browse them all, visit the H.E.A.R.T. Playlist at YouTube:

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The puzzle of motivation

Understanding your own motivation(s) is a great way to grow: if you can get in touch what really motivates you, then you can set your goals and find the strategies that will be powered by your inner drive. Dan Pink offers some really great insights into motivation in his book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us (highly recommended!), and you can also learn a lot from this video. Autonomy, mastery, and purpose: these are three words that, in my opinion, could and should change our whole approach to school and to learning.

There's also a transcript of the talk you can read.

The puzzle of motivation by Dan Pink

What makes us feel good about our work?

There is so much to learn from Dan Ariely's video about motivation, and what he says here about "work" applies very well to school work. You can see what you think about that! Here is the transcript if you prefer to read or to read while you listen.

Dan Ariely: What makes us feel good about our work?

One of the experiments that Ariely describes is named after a classical myth: Sisyphus!

[...] And this other condition we called the Sisyphic condition. And if you remember the story about Sisyphus, Sisyphus was punished by the gods to push the same rock up a hill, and when he almost got to the end, the rock would roll over, and he would have to start again. And you can think about this as the essence of doing futile work. You can imagine that if he pushed the rock on different hills, at least he would have some sense of progress. Also, if you look at prison movies, sometimes the way that the guards torture the prisoners is to get them to dig a hole, and when the prisoner is finished, they ask him to fill the hole back up and then dig again. There's something about this cyclical version of doing something over and over and over that seems to be particularly demotivating.

Here is Sisyphus with his rock as shown in a Greek vase painting from the sixth century B.C.E., and you can read more about Sisyphus at Wikipedia. I hope this class does not make you feel like Sisyphus toting that rock... if it does, let me know, and we will figure out a solution! :-)

(Greek vase, circa 530 B.C.E.)

The Science of Character

This video is by Tiffany Shlain, and I first learned about her work because she is the daughter of one of my all-time favorite authors, Leonard Shlain (Alphabet versus the Goddess).

The Science of Character

Shlain begins with Peterson and Seligman who worked on creating a taxonomy character strengths (rather than weakness or illness). They also looked at human relationships and how we can respect and value the character strengths of other people. Also, keep an eye out for the discussion of Carol Dweck's growth mindset. The film also discusses Adele Diamond's work on the brain's prefrontal cortex and self-regulation.

Shlain singles out seven character strengths that are really important in education: curiosity, perseverance, gratitude, optimism, social intelligence, and enthusiasm (enthusiasm is one of my personal favorites). These are all qualities that can be learned... which means you have to practice them. And learn from your mistakes, too.

Become the best version of yourself! Who do you want to be...?

Find out more at Tiffany Shlain's website: Let It Ripple, which is the source for this poster:

Widget: H.E.A.R.T.

I've made a randomizing widget for all the H.E.A.R.T items here at the blog! This includes the same items as in the Reading and Time widgets, plus additional items.

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I made these widgets with Randy Hoyt's wonderful RotateContent.com.

Here is the 200-pixel-wide version (good for blog sidebars):

<script type="text/javascript"> var display = " " </script><script type="text/javascript" src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/heart/heart200.js"></script>

And here is the 400-pixel-wide version:

<script type="text/javascript"> var display = "random" </script><script type="text/javascript" src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/heart/heart400.js"></script>

There is also an iframe version that you can use in Canvas or similar environment that does not allow direct use of javascripts; you can adjust the height variable as needed; I have only created an iframe version of the 400-pixel-wide widget:

<iframe src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/canvas/heart.html" width="450" height="800"></iframe>

Time Widget

I've made a randomizing widget for the Time items here at the blog!

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I made these widgets with Randy Hoyt's wonderful RotateContent.com.

Here is the 200-pixel-wide version (good for blog sidebars):

<script type="text/javascript"> var display = " " </script><script type="text/javascript" src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/heart/time200.js"></script>

And here is the 400-pixel-wide version:

<script type="text/javascript"> var display = "random" </script><script type="text/javascript" src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/heart/time400.js"></script>

There is also an iframe version that you can use in Canvas or similar environment that does not allow direct use of javascripts; you can adjust the height variable as needed; I have only created an iframe version of the 400-pixel-wide widget:

<iframe src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/canvas/hearttime.html" width="450" height="800"></iframe>

Reading Widget

I've made a randomizing widget for the Reading items here at the blog!

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I made these widgets with Randy Hoyt's wonderful RotateContent.com.

Here is the 200-pixel-wide version (good for blog sidebars):

<script type="text/javascript"> var display = " " </script><script type="text/javascript" src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/heart/reading200.js"></script>

And here is the 400-pixel-wide version:

<script type="text/javascript"> var display = "random" </script><script type="text/javascript" src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/heart/reading400.js"></script>

There is also an iframe version that you can use in Canvas or similar environment that does not allow direct use of javascripts; you can adjust the height variable as needed; I have only created an iframe version of the 400-pixel-wide widget:

<iframe src="https://widgets.lauragibbs.net/canvas/heartreading.html" width="450" height="800"></iframe>

Next Chapter

I was inspired by a quote poster I saw at Twitter (see below), so I decided to make it a poster with a photo by François Philipp at Flickr. What a great metaphor!

You can't start the next chapter of your life

if you keep re-reading the last one.