Rubenstein TED Talk - Shelby Stephens

I have definitely enjoyed watching and reading the TED Talks from my classes this past year. They are just as informative and scholarly as they are interesting. I was glad that something finally told me what “TED” stands for, as I have often wondered. While I have always found the TED Talks intriguing, "Transformational Leadership Using TED Talks" by Lisa DaVia Rubenstein did not exactly leave me wanting more. The article itself was quite dense and wordy. While I do agree with Ms. Rubenstein’s thesis that educational leaders should and can become more effective through the use of this “new professional development paradigm”, I do not think that it was as successful or convincing of an argument as it could have been. This is mostly due to her open-ended and inconclusive summaries of different articles. A collaboration of ideas and results with the cited presenters in a cohesive manner could have definitely strengthened her thesis and argument for an alternative method of making educational leaders more effective.

            I can do, however, understand what Dweek and Molden have to say in their portion of the article about individuals’ motivation in terms of fixed (or entity) versus malleable (or growth) mind-sets. I can identify with the fixed or entity mind-set. Whether it has been in regards of my education and work or even with my hobbies like playing the piano or guitar, I have always sought out tasks or songs that I knew I could accomplish and avoided tasks that might challenge me.

            My favorite article summary detailed within Lisa DaVia Rubenstein’s article “Transformational Leadership Using TED Talks" was Dan Meyer’s 2010 article “Math Class Needs a Makeover”. Meyer presents a method of actually helping students to develop patient problem-solving skills. By removing scaffolding from textbooks, it will challenge students to think harder about the concepts to be learned and prompt growth of the malleable or growth mind-set. This, when applied to leadership processes as suggested by Dweek and Molden, along with the wealth of information and techniques that is TED Talks, should certainly be able to produce the “new professional development paradigm” that Ms. Rubenstein was theorizing about.