As I gain more experience in my profession, I am starting to elevate the way I see myself. I want to transform from an educator to a consultant.

Why do I say that? A teacher has myriad roles and responsibilities to fulfill every day. Most times, his heart is willing, but his hands are tied.

ENOUGH!

Do I want to subject myself to this hapless helpless victim mentality at the start of a new year? The Stoic philosophy advises us to focus on what we can control.

With the limited amount of time I have with each kid, I could diagnose the one challenge that will create a positive domino effect if I impart him/her the useful skills to handle it.

So, this week, I started out with one of the weakest kids in my class in regard to English proficiency. I went through some words in the Dolch List. Even though they are basic words, he couldn’t read some of them.

My high-quality intervention?

I consolidated the words he couldn’t read. I then taught him how to prompt Meta AI to write a short 70-word story that comprises these words. The story was about his passion for art, so it was customised for his reading interest.

Subsequently, I told him to use an online text-to-speech platform called TTS Maker so that he could listen to the words being read aloud. When he encounters unfamiliar words in context and listens to the pronunciations often enough, he will master them in due time.

I could be giving this boy the coping mechanism to bolster his resilience so that he could live with being dyslexic.

Next week, I hope to work with two other boys similarly. I want to help a young man with ADHD and dyslexia turn his negative self-beliefs into positive self-talk. I also hope to help another young man vocalist the steps involved in solving Maths questions so that he doesn’t give up on them easily.

I don’t know if I’m offering high-impact interventions, but at least I’m being more intentional with the time I have.

What high-value work have you ever produced in limited time? How do you strive for accuracy and achieve an one shot one kill impact?