Hard work, talent and a bit of luck!

[Sandy Hirtz]

I am a fan of Malcolm Gladwell, author of The
Tipping Point, Blink, the Outliers and What the Dog Saw: And
Other Adventures.  With an hourly speaking fee of up to $80,000 he must be worth listening to.

Regarding the Outliers, published in 2008.

1. Something that was affirmed by the book;
Gladwell's book, The Outliers, focuses on success and the hard
work, social context and cultural background that explains why some
people excel and others don’t.  Gladwell affirmed for me that success in the 21st century is less about sheer intelligence and more about collaboration and hard work to get to the level of mastery in a topic (which he says typically takes 10,000 hours). 

2. Something in summary
In "the Outliers," Gladwell is better at explaining the success of some than in a prescription for how to succeed.  Critical to success is 10,000 hours of work, connections and being in the right place at the right time.

2. Something Interesting
Gladwell credits the success of Chinese math geniuses to the their harder studies and greater patience in problem-solving, stemming
from a cultural legacy of long days of work in rice paddies; Gladwell
contrasts the Chinese proverb ‘No one who can rise before dawn 360 days a
year fails to make his family rich’ with the American agricultural
practice of letting fields lie fallow in winter, which led to a school
year with summer vacations — a practice that works for children of the
well-educated but fails  children of the less-educated who give up many
of their school-year academic gains over the summer.  As Edward Tenner
notes on Slate:
“Memo  to overscheduling, hovering, upper-middle-class mothers and
fathers: Keep up the good work .”

[Jeff Yasinchuk]

Thanks for this, Sandy!

[Al Smith]

I consider myself a 'Gladwellian' so my comments may be somewhat bias. I've read them all...without question, Outliers generated the most smoke by teachers in my school. We don't have a formal lit circle or professional reading club but we do meet informally and have 3 reading receptions hosted by the KSS Library each year. Outliers was provocative, not in its wisdom( it was really old news rewritten)but because it was simple. The points generated about sports teams and achievement triggered responses because they address the precepts teachers live with each day-achievement and measurement. Student groupings and other ideas were kicked around because Gladwell's theme was so age specific. Good fun, either way. - Al Smith http://www.kss.sd23.bc.ca/rc