Extract for the Purple View
The Purple View Book Extract:
“Everything we do at The Homework Club is designed to create a learning environment that students can enjoy.”
In the initial interview I look for patterns in Life through sports, home and school. What you are really seeing is peoples natural tendencies. In an ideal World we shouldn’t realise that we’re learning at all. One of the difficulties that I have with the conventional system is that we try to stamp these out. A great example of this is the 4-year-old Kid who doesn’t read well but uses the pictures in the book to give them a sense of what the story is about. When someone covers over the pictures they take away this visual way of taking in information which is that natural tendency of a visual learner. So the next 3 chapters are going to talk about these 3 natural ingredients that everybody has - which are potential, personality and aptitude.
Blue represents a Person’s true nature and potential within. It’s seen to be the colour of faith, truth, confidence and being exceptionally deep in nature.
We use Red as it’s seen to be the colour of energy, happiness, passion, determination, love, power and desire. We tend to have very negative associations with personality expression in the conventional school model - the negative associations with red are anger. We see this side of the personality apparently when people feel constrained in their behaviour and self-expression.
We have now successfully combined potential, personalities and aptitudes into 4 simple ways of working. The next 3 sections in this book are going to describe the outcomes and amazing results that happen when you use this approach.
We use Yellow - Yellow is seen to be the colour of joy and intellect - we classically find people clever because of their skills - classically I believe we see people as “normal” when they have one of two multiply intelligence, linguistic or mathematical - these are what I generally assess. But I believe truly clever people have a grasp of their multiplicity. Your aptitudes alone are not enough to make you smart. You have to realise them and approach tasks in the best way for you.
The box - everyone has this idea that they would like to all “fit-in” and be the same as everyone else - it’s like a giant box we all belong to. So I decided with this method to create one “box” but the difference is that everyone is different in the box and has their own place. They can still be themselves while fitting in. I think of it more like a house with all the doors and windows open where everyone can just come on in - a box still seems a little constraining. But the yellow box in the middle of this picture is one where everyone can be happy as how they really are.
This yellow "box" for me is now the Expression Developist™ Concept, the next instalment of The Purple View that I am currently writing and will be available very shortly! Why we need a new objective in education.
In the mean time enjoy The Purple View. Link to The Purple View
Dr Naoisé O'Reilly (Expression Developist™)
This August 2012 – Didn’t get the results you needed? Looking for alternative options? Book in now!
From Wednesday 15th August 2012
Didn't get the results you needed in the Leaving Certificate? Worried that you won't get your top choice course? What are your options now?
At the Confidence Club we believe everything in life happens for a reason - 9 times out 10 if you didn't get the course you had applied for it probably wasn't for you anyway! Hard to believe I know when your 17 but with 15 years experience of working in education I know see things very differently to what I did on my own results day - hard to believe that I was disappointed with well over 500 points! I could have done almost any course I wanted in the country that day except the one I had picked - and now I know I never would have been satisfied in life...
At the Confidence Club our aim in our Workshops is to help students to choose the best path for them - find the perfect career based on their Personalities, Apttitudes and Potential. Everyone has to follow their dreams and we would like to see them do this from as early an age as possible, we start at 5! The career might be a highly academic one that needs many traditional school subjects or it may be one that is totally outside the box and needs many skills not covered currently in mainstream education - we don't mind as we cover what's needed! But not everyone is as lucky to start with us at 5 and so we are here too to help older students find their true path even when it means changing direction ..
To meet us this August complete the Booking Form
Dr Naoisé O'Reilly (Expression Developist™)
Expression Developist™ – A new genre of education
Expression Developist™
A new genre of education. We focus so much on success of results - but what are results and what is success? What are the real points of learning?
Expression: It exists in all ways, verbal, mathematical, physical, artistic, interaction, emotional, musical, facial, genetically, kinaesthetically and so on. It is simply a way to communicate.
A Developist is someone who takes ideas that already exist but moulds and utilises them in a new profound way to help achieve new approaches, ideas, inventions, initiatives and many, many more possibilities. Taking the ideas of the world to a new place.
To very simply and importantly learn to express oneself in a way that takes them to success in whatever field they have aptitudes. Reaching your true potential by being able to communicate with the world in your unique way.
Your true expression will of course be fundamentally made up from your personality. No two people express themselves in the same way and hence no two people learn to do this in the same way. Expression is the fundamental basis for all education. On the flip side, Lack of expression can also be seen as the root of all difficulties within this environment.
Dr. Naoisé O'Reilly (Expression Developist™)
The Homework Club’s journey into Confidence Club
As We re-locate to Dublin City Centre this August it seems a good time to reflect on All that We have created and achieved here at The Homework Club in just over 3 years.
Our main purpose for re-locating is to have access to many more Students and to focus on what We really love and have developed from Our experience over 3 and a half years.
I have attached some short video clips that sum up some of what We have achieved and some of the outstanding feedback We had from the Students We have worked with. As there are 500+ Student feedback comments it’s not possible to include them all. But I wished to attempt to give You a sense of what We have developed in this short amount of time.
In setting up The Homework Club I always wished to create an environment where We all continued to learn. The hugely committed Tutors and Students needing support. I would like to think that Everybody has expanded Their horizons by being part of this experience - including Me.
In just 3 and a half years We have not only helped and supported these Students in Their lives and education - We have taken Our experiences to create 2 more projects to take all of Our dreams in. The Purple Learning Project, www.purplelearning.ie and Confidence Club, www.confidenceclub.ie
In setting up The Homework Club there have been 2 main differences in Our approach to education. Firstly, the way We have gone about making education accessible to all of Our Learners. We have achieved this by using Our own unique learning method - now known as The Purple Learning Project. This is now the outreach element that is allowing us to take Our methods back into all education environments through Our own Workshop experiences.
Secondly, We have always had different objectives and perceptions of what success is for Students. We have always felt that not only are students always good at something but They should be able to use these talents to be good at everything. The Confidence Club is about allowing us to step away from the traditional expectations of success in education and allowing all Our students to fulfil Their dreams - no mater how crazy they may seen now.
Our first Confidence Club Workshop takes place this August.
Confidence Club Workshop August 2012 – Primary to Secondary School Transition.
Parents, Positivity and the exams – what are Your roles?
So we forget that it's not just the exam students who are stressed up and down the country today - so are their whole houses, family homes, parents and siblings - they have been walking on egg-shells for weeks now!
There have been many tears since the mock results and some schools may not have helped by sending home letters in the last few weeks advising students to drop down in levels - at this stage of the game that is pointless - no one should drop a level - JUST GO FOR IT!
Chances are you need the points at that level, so a "pass" Leaving Cert is no use to you - schools seem to be out of touch with this reality! So you have this shot make it a good one and if it doesn't work out then worry about what to do next but it's very important at this stage to remain positive and put all the doubts in a large black box well out of the way.
In 1925 Dr. Elizabeth Hurlock showed in a study that students who were prasied and encouraged got vastly different results from those who were not or were critisised...
By the end of the fifth day, the results showed:
Those given praise – 71% improvement
Those criticized – 19% improvement
Those ignored – 5% improvement
This is huge and has been known since 1925 so why are we still giving students such a hard time at such critical stages in the exam process? What I have to explain to parents on repeat loop at this time of the year is that your daughter or son is not the same person they were in February of this year - 4 months is a lifetime in the development of a person between the ages of 15 and 18... so much has happened, they have changed their appearance, their friends, their music taste and so on - they have been learning so much information and working so hard to understand how to study, how to answer questions and most of all they have learnt from their mistakes in the mocks! So why would you think they were the person they were 4 months ago and would get the same result now?
So steps of what you can all do for the next 2 and bit weeks:
1: Totally believe in your child - defend them to anyone who doesn't and stick up for them - It will mean the world to them!
2: Somehow mange to teleport them to where they need to be - stress free and for them to always be early - Know their schedule for them, they have enough to think about!
3: Just make sure they have nice clothes to wear, snacks, water, tool kit - batteries for their calculators - rememebr to just hand it to them! They won't remember their heads right now..
4: Feed them really well - all their favorite foods and make sure they eat well between the end of the exam and the start of the next or the start of study for the next day..
5: Make them finish at least 30 minitues to an hour before bed time - have some nice time, a walk is fantastic.
6: Make sure they don't sleep surrounded by study notes - clear the sleeping space.
7: Make sure they take off the first Saturday of the first exam week - it's a very intense three day start with major subjects and not always their best specialist subjects - they need to pace themselves for their good topics the following two weeks - it's a lot of pressure and they need to totally step out for one day! Go to the mountians, beach, walking, cycling, film anything just away from it all.
8: Let everything go - people become very controling of silly things when they are stressed - where did this go - why was this moved - ignore ... get siblings to ignore and not lose the plot too!
9: Repeat point one it's the most important one - believe in them - don't go on about alternatives right now - they have to go for their dreams in full right now and really see them to achieve this - the alternative is an August conversation not a June one!
10: Tell them they are great at least 50 times a day! more if you can squash it in ...
Dr. Naoisé.
