Modeling Technique

PROF ANDERSON: Hi, class. This is
William Anderson,

and I'm making this short video

about a learning technique
called modeling.

Now, this is a
technique that you've

actually been using since

the time you were a young child.

The best way to
explain this is to

actually do a modeling activity.

What I'd like you
to do is go ahead

and pause the video and get

yourself a piece
of scratch paper.

Now, hopefully, you've got your

piece of scratch paper now,

and I want you to think
about somebody that you

really have a lot of
respect or admiration for.

It could be somebody you
know or somebody you don't,

could be a celebrity, an
individual from history.

I could even be
somebody from fiction.

But think about what is
it about this person

that causes you to
have so much respect

or admiration for them.

Now, in a moment, I'm going

to ask that you pause the video,

and I want you to write down

a list of things
on your piece of

scratch paper that cause
you to respect this person,

just a list of
things about them.

Now, if you can't think of

five to ten things about

this person that cause
you to respect them,

go ahead and think of
two models instead.

Sometimes people
ask, is it okay if

I don't really have a
particular person in mind?

Yes, the point here is

you're effectively
developing a model,

a list of characteristics that

cause you to respect
and admire somebody.

Go ahead and pause the video,

take as much time as you need

to come up with
five to ten things

that cause you to respect
or admire someone.

Now that you've got that,

I want you to think about how

much each of these
elements relates to you.

Are they descriptive of you?

I'm going to ask that
you in a moment,

you're going to grade
yourself in each of

the elements on a
scale of one to ten.

Now, before you get
started, five is average.

If one of the
things you put that

cause you to respect somebody
is that they're honest,

a five would be very rarely lies

because the average person

actually is really quite honest.

A six would mean
this person also

or that you also don't even
tell lies of convenience.

If your friend calls
and says, Hey,

you want to hang out today

and you just don't feel like it,

you wouldn't say, Oh,
I'm sorry, I'm busy.

You would actually
tell them the truth.

I just don't feel like it.

Getting up into the eights,

an eight would be in

addition to not telling lies
or lies of convenience,

you also don't tell
lies of omission.

Lies of omission
sometimes occur when we

leave out a detail to make

us look better than we
would otherwise look.

We give people a
false impression.

A nine or a ten, this
would be somebody

who if somebody around

them tells a lie, they
would correct it.

Or if based upon what you said,

somebody got a false impression,

you would go out of
your way to correct it.

It's a defining
characteristic for you.

Now, on the flip side,

if everything you say is a lie,

that's probably not a one.

That's probably around a
three. Or maybe a two.

Getting down into that
one or maybe two,

all of a sudden now you're
intentionally spreading lies.

Dishonesty is a defining
characteristic of who you are.

Most of us, for most
characteristics,

will find ourselves 4-6 with an

occasional three or
seven or two or eight,

and then a rare one or ten.

What I want you to do is you're
going to pause the video,

take a little bit to grade

yourself on a scale of

one to ten for each
of these elements.

Again, you are not grading

the person that you described,
you're grading yourself.

Hopefully you got that done.

Now the next part of

the modeling activity is
for each of these elements,

you're going to identify

a specific behavioral
change that you can

make to improve by one.

For example, if you put that you

respect somebody because they're

generous and you think

that you're above
average and generous,

so you gave yourself a six.

What is a behavior
change that you could

make that would bring
that six to a seven?

In what way could you make

a new habit that
can improve this?

Well, in generosity, perhaps
if you have a friend that

struggles in math and
you're good at math,

maybe taking time and
volunteering to help teach

them factoring or some
other aspect of math.

Or if you're really
good working on cars,

you know that a
tune up nowadays is

basically changing spark plugs,

a relatively easy task if
you know a lot about cars.

If you have a friend
or a neighbor

that's going to be going to

a mechanic shop and paying

a significant amount of money

to get their spark
plugs changed,

maybe say, listen,

let's go over to the
auto parts store.

I'll show you what
you need to buy

and I'll teach you how to
change your spark plugs.

Finding those little habits
that you can change,

all too often
people think, well,

I'm just being who I
am. This is just me.

But actually, what we are doing

are habits that we have

developed through
choices that we've made.

Now, in this modeling
activity that we're doing,

we're doing it for
respect and admiration.

But really, this same
technique can be

used to improve any
aspect of our life.

If you want to become
a better student,

you don't need to buy
one of those books that

say how to get straight
A's in school.

Instead, look around you.

There are people around
you that are already

very good students.
What do they do?

What are some of the
habits that they have that

enable them to be good
students? Do they study more?

Many of them probably get

good night sleep
because rest is so

critical to our cognitive
functioning and

our ability to
retain information.

Or if you play in

athletics and you play
a particular sport,

you know that watching

other people that are
really good at that sport,

you can say, what are they

doing that make
them so good at it?

This learning technique actually

dates back to our infancy.

When we were babies,
we modeled we had

our parents and older siblings

and the people
around us as models,

and we were constantly
trying to learn what do

they do and then mimicking that.

You have this slide

here I just noticed says

it's an extra
credit opportunity.

That is old information.

It is not extra credit.

It is actually required
assignment in the course.

You're going to actually
do a modeling exercise,

and there are two speeches.

You were to select
only one of them,

either Ronald Reagan's
1988 GOP convention speech

or Bill Clinton's 2000
Democratic Convention speech.

There will be links to both of

these speeches on
the Moodle page.

Again, you only select one.

There are a couple of

reasons why these two
individuals were selected.

For one thing, they're old.

The reason that's a good idea.

Sometimes people have said,
can I use Barack Obama?

He was a good speaker, too.

Yes, he is an excellent speaker.

But the thing about
Ronald Reagan and

Bill Clinton is that because
they're from an earlier era,

the policies they talk about

probably aren't going to
get your blood to boil.

Your focus here is
to evaluate them

as speakers, not their policies.

Ronald Reagan, he was very
big on fighting communism.

Now, you may like communism
or dislike communism,

but you're probably not going to

get really upset
about what he says.

Bill Clinton talked about

a change in how
government works,

that government would
serve the people

rather than some of
the interests that it

had and could be used as

an effective way to solve
some of our social problems.

Now, some of you might agree

or disagree with some of the
policy ideas that he had,

but it's probably not
going to get your blood to

boil because both of

these presidents talked
about doing things that are

a little bit more integrated

now or have been
completely rejected.

Barack Obama is going to talk

about things like the
Affordable Care Act,

or commonly referred
to as Obamacare.

Whether you like Obamacare
or dislike Obamacare,

you probably have a
strong opinion about it,

and that's going to make it

more difficult to evaluate
him as a speaker.

Others have asked, can we
do Martin Luther King?

As I mentioned
earlier in the term,

Martin Luther King is a
personal hero of mine,

and ordinarily, I would say,

absolutely, he was
such a great speaker.

However, we are actually
going to be using

Martin Luther King's I Have

a Dream speech for an
activity later in the term.

As a result of that,

I want to avoid having you do

that one because we may take
a lot of your material.

Please go ahead and just use
one of these two speeches.

Again, either Ronald
Reagan's 1988 GOP Convention

speech or Bill Clinton's 2000

Democratic Convention speech.

Now, each of these two
gentlemen spoke to

their party conventions
at a number of years.

Please use these specific ones.

In 1988, Ronald Reagan
was leaving office.

He was never going to
run for office again.

In 2000, Bill Clinton
was leaving office.

He was never going to
run for office again.

As a result of this, I

think you're really getting
a sense of their oratory,

a sense of how good of
a speaker they were.

Speaking of which,
another reason for these

two is that they were
sensational public speakers.

Regardless of what
you think of them

as a president or
their policies,

they were very effective at

communicating their
message to the people.

When Ronald Reagan left
office after two terms,

his approval rating was 63%.

63% is astonishing.

To put that into perspective,

Barack Obama eventually
reached 51%.

Donald Trump, his approval
rating currently,

as this video is being made,

his approval rating
is in the 30s.

Barack Obama spent a
lot of time there.

George W Bush spent a lot
of time in the 30s or 40s.

Bill Clinton, when
he left office,

despite a $40 million effort

by the opposing party,
the Republican Party,

to embarrass him, humiliate him,

ruin his reputation,
when he left office,

his approval rating was 68%.

That's one of the highest
approval ratings of

a two term president that

we've had since
we've kept track.

These two are sensational
communicators.

Please select one of those two.

Now, I know that some
of you might have

an emotional reaction to

Bill Clinton right now
because of Hillary.

Bill Clinton and Hillary

are two very
different candidates,

two very different speakers.

Please keep that in mind.

Another reason for
choosing these two is

Ronald Reagan is a conservative

Republican Bill Clinton
is a liberal Democrat.

As a result of that,

if you have a strong
political view

either of the political
right or the political left,

you can choose one of
the presidents that,

you know, you can at least
tolerate what he has to say.

In this modeling exercise,

which elements you choose
are entirely your opinion?

I don't want you to think, well,

they talk about eye
contact being important,

so I'll select that as
one of the elements.

Select eye contact if you

believe that that's one of

the reasons that makes
them such a good speaker.

In the activity we did
during this video,

we focused on respect
or admiration and

this focus on what makes
these two such good speakers.

What makes somebody such
a great public speaker.

There is an example modeling
exercise on the Moodle page.

If you would like to see
how these are formatted,

go ahead and go to
the Moodle page,

click on the model example link,

and the example uses
President Obama as the model.

Another reason why
it's best not to

use him for this exercise.

Go ahead and look at it.

I think it's relatively simple.

Most of these modeling assignments
are about a page long.

That concludes this video.

Thank you very much
for listening.