AChristian

The second and third chapters in this book focus on how positive and negative behaviors and incidents affect productivity and the impact that every interaction counts.  As one might expect, negative people can hinder and cause great damage to any organization, even schools.  Positive people and interaction can improve orgnizations and make them more productive.  The statistics in chapter 2 are very compelling. 

I have seen negative behavior at work in my classroom from students and the impact causes students to become angry or give a comeback and others to shut down.  The older students often thinks its funny and say that it doesn't bother them but I think it really does.

Chapter three focuses on the fact that every encounter or interaction we have has an impact, be it good or bad.  Praise and recognition for hard work and effort builds people up and makes them more productive.  Negative criticism does the direct opposite and cuts much deeper. 

As a teacher, there are little things that can be done to make classrooms a more positive place.  Verbal praise in front of other students builds a positive atmosphere.  Teaching students to say positive things to classmates also helps.  When correcting papers, indicating the number of correct answers instead wrong answers is a positive approach we can utilize.  I think the "Good News" cards we send also help tremendously.  I know that we are all over taxed time wise and we don't take the time to recognize students or each other as much as we could or should.  Just having a positive outlook or frame of mind and deciding to keep the negative comments to ourselves will help.  There are a lot of negatives in and around schools today but we as educators have got to stay focused on the positive things we do that impact the live of students.

The author of this book,Tom Rath, worked with his grandfather, Donald Clifton, to write this book.  Tom's grandfather was dying of cancer at the time.  The fist draft of the book was completed only a few weeks before he died.  Donald Clifton was a psychologist and decided one day that his profession needed to look at what is right with people instead of what is wrong.  Through his case studies he began to look at the positives and not the negatives.  The first chapter simple explains the meaning of the title.  Interactions with others that are positive fill our "bucket" and negative ones "dip" water from our "bucket."  When we interact with others in a positive way we add water to their "bucket" and when it is negative, we "dip" water from their bucket.

This book has caught my attention.  There is not enough in the first chapter for me to apply anything to my personal life but I like the book.