Cultivating Mental Silence

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Sunk cost...a fallacy?!

Sunk cost...a fallacy?!Well...I was kind of hoping to have posted to my blog before now. As I write...it's been more than a month. In between that time and now the school year has started. I'm finding the start of this school year to be a complicated one. Mainly because of the amount of testing I have had to engage in with both my own students and the students in my colleague's class. NOTE: My colleague and I departmentalize...so I teach Literacy to both my students and his.Truth be told...through this testing...I have gained interesting insights into who my students are as readers but...in my estimation...at a great cost...that being the amount of time it has taken to complete the testing. It has been hard not to see the time spent testing as a sunk cost (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunk_costs), which has caused a significant amount of stress and anxiety on my part. I know that these feelings are self-generated and I am trying to come to terms with them. To that end, I have expressed my concerns to others (my wife, family members, colleagues at school).The testing is completed...for now...and I am trying to get things in my classroom back into a place I would like them to be. The testing will "come back..." two more times this year. I need to try to figure out how not to see "this" as a sunk cost situation. I need to figure out how not to get stressed or anxious about these moments. I need to figure out how to leverage them...get them to work both for me and the students I work with. Only then will mental silence...during these moments...be found!