In his book The Element: How finding your passion changes everything,Sir Ken Robinson asks his readers ‘Do you feel lucky’? Referencing the work of Dr. Richard Wiseman and his book The Luck Factor Robinson states that people who believe themselves to be lucky often exhibit certain attitudes and behaviours, while people believing themselves to be unlucky exhibit the opposite traits.

The four principles of lucky people:

1. Lucky people tend to maximize chance opportunities.
2. Lucky people are very effective at listening to their intuition, and do work (such as meditation) that is designed to boost their intuitive abilities.
3. Lucky people expect to be lucky, creating a series of self-fulfilling prophecies because they go into the world anticipating a positive outcome.
4. Lucky people have an attitude that allows them to turn bad luck into good.

Believing that I am lucky helps me to be courageous during times of uncertainty. As a lucky person I know everything will turn out in the most positive way. Being lucky is about attitude and perception - when I get a ‘NO’ in life, I realize that something else is saying ‘YES’! In this way, I am always lucky. 

As an adult educator I am curious about how education can begin to foster attitudes of ‘I am lucky’ among students? How can we create a culture of ‘I am lucky’ in the classroom? How can the shifting of attitude impact learners, and how do we go about guiding the process?

How many lucky things have happened to you today? If you cannot think of anything, then perhaps it is time for you to shift your attitude and perception.

Good Luck!

- Lindy Garneau, The Professor`s Apprentice 

I was introduced to the work of Sir Ken Robinson in the fall of 2010. His work in the area of creativity and education has inspired me to create change in the way I encourage creativity and imagination in the classroom and in the personal lives of the students I work with. In his book The Element: How finding your passion changes everything, he writes:

“Creativity is a step beyond imagination because it requires that you actually do something rather than lie around thinking about it. It’s a very practical process of trying to make something original. It may be a song, a theory, a dress, a short story, a boat, or a new sauce for your spaghetti.”

As educators it is our responsibility to model creativity and imagination. This is the best way to teach. This means that we must think creatively about our pedagogies, and about how to best structure our learning environments so as to create the best spaces and places for learning – and then, we must actually do it.