Taking Camp Staff Training From Good To Best ... - Vision Realization

Behavior
For the sake of this discussion, it is assumed that the knowledge has been transferred very well and the attitude is truly
present. In other words, the person is capable of successfully teaching the concept (in theory) to others and their hearts and souls are
dedicated to using that owned knowledge. Both are a very tall order indeed without even getting to the behavior part yet.
Knowledge + Attitude = Dedicated Novice
Explanation and Examples
Having the knowledge to do something and the attitude/desire to do it is rarely enough. A dedicated novice wants to
succeed, but doesn’t have the practice time necessary to do it. Let’s look at a few examples of this to get a better
understanding and appreciation for this fact.
A genius child wants to ride a bicycle. She understands everything about the physics of it and wants to ride so badly
she can taste it. She gets on the bike, starts off down the street, and her first experience likely isn’t a very pretty one. The
adult equivalent is skateboarding. Try this out and you’ll see that competence takes a while!
How about a less physical skill like teaching. Good teacher trainings involve academic study at a university with
practical experience teaching gained after a couple years. Teachers in training work first under another teacher and then in a
classroom by themselves with a mentor available when needed. This extended process involving years is necessary to
produce a teacher capable of successfully instructing children.
How about a profession where there is more of a mix like a surgeon. There are a lot of physical elements to the job
as well as knowledge. The best practice is to train for 3 or 4 years in a university followed by a residency (practice) for
another 3 or 4 years. Even after that, folks are usually more comfortable with a surgeon who has a little gray hair and a few
hundred surgeries under their belt.
Now let’s look at something we’re more familiar with – camp counseling. They likely came to camp with the
physical skills necessary, but the social and emotional benefits of a camp experience are the focus here. The standard
practice is to hire university students (who are usually heavy on the knowledge side) and train them for a week with more
knowledge and some behavioral training. For the most part, even at the end of orientation, counselors are dedicated novices.
If they had the skills necessary, the evidence presented in this resource for camps, PET, Fortune 500 trainings, and others
would be different.
The best practice training method for behavior is apprenticeships. It’s what works for teachers and doctors.
Counseling psychologists are also trained through extensive internships and practicums. Daniel Goleman, of Emotional
Intelligence fame, set out to determine the best practices in improving people’s emotional intelligence. His results are exactly
what I’m telling you throughout this presentation (http://eiconsortium.org/research/guidelines.htm). Most sports involve
practice, practice, practice. Insurance companies give better rates to older drivers (up to 25 usually), because they’ve had
more practice and are better. Imagine the teenager who studied the DMV manual (knowledge) and passed the test with flying
colors, really wants to drive (attitude), and sets out. Teenagers get in a lot of wrecks and a best practice is drivers’ education.
Specific studies that demonstrate the point
Training takes a lot of time and is best done through modeling and scaffolding – see next sections. First, let’s look
at mutual fund managers at time when the stock market wasn’t doing so well. These figures are averages taken from Fortune
magazine.
Fund manager tenure – 3/00 – 3/01
o Average fund -17.13%
o S&P 500 -21.61%
o