March Madness is alive and well in both the men and women's college basketball tournaments! My bracket was busted way beyond repair when I picked the wrong early upsets like picking Ohio State over Dayton. Three of the twelve seeds upset the five seeds, and that has never happened before. I only picked one of them right. I had Michigan State winning the whole thing. That was in the NCAA Men's Tournament. But that is not what this post is about.
I want to talk about who is still playing basketball in April. If you are a Golden Gopher basketball fan like I am, last night's game was a real nail biter. Bobby Knight was the analyst and could not say a nice thing about the Gophers almost all night long. He really got on Richard Pitino for the way he handled the last play of the game and the last play in overtime.
On a side note, years ago I asked Coach Knight what he thought when he brought his Indiana teams into Williams Arena, better known in these parts as The Barn. He told me he loved playing in The Barn because his teams always beat the Gophers! I have another Bobby Knight/Bill Musselman story but that is irrelevant to this post!
I want to talk about how there are only two Big Ten teams playing yet in April. Wisconsin is in the Final Four. The other Big Ten team to be playing for a national championship is our own Minnesota Gophers tomorrow night in Madison Square Garden for the National Invitation Tournament (NIT).
Granted, the NIT is not The Big Dance they wanted to be playing in, but with a win tomorrow night they can still hang another national championship banner in Williams Arena!
Had they gotten into the NCAA Tournament, they would have been a low seed and probably be watching that Final Four like every other team in America except for Florida, Kentucky, Wisconsin and the University of Connecticut, better known as UConn, on Saturday.
I think playing these extra five games has helped the Gophers tremendously! The younger players have five more games of experience in which to build their confidence. Joey King has played very well and you can see the self-confidence building in his game. DeAndre Mathieu has shown the entire country just how quick and fast he is. I have watched him grow into a very good point guard, which the Gophers have needed for a long time. Mo Walker has also shown a tremendous increase in his presence around the basket and his ability to shoot from outside the Paint. Andre Hollins has also shown what he is capable of doing on any given night. He still needs to be consistent, and hopefully that will come in his senior year. I am anxious to watch them play next year.
Whatever happens tomorrow night the Gophers can call coach Richard Pitino's first season a successful one. Granted, they didn't make the NCAA Tournament, finished only 8 and 10 in the Big Ten conference, but could end up with a 25 and 13 record and a national championship. That spells a successful first year for me.
Another fun part of watching the game last night was how much the announcers talked about and showed Rick Pitino during the game. It was fun to see him sitting behind his son watching him cheer for the Gophers. I am sure there will be more of that tomorrow night in the National Invitation Tournament Championship Game in Madison Square Garden in New York City! That is fun to say!
Go Gophers!
I look forward to your comments.
Later,
Mike Patrick U of M '80 Basketball Season Ticket Holder for thirty-three years!
Showing posts with label self-esteem. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self-esteem. Show all posts
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Gospel For Teens
Once again, my favorite TV Show, 60 Minutes, came through with another piece I feel compelled to share because of the lessons I learned from their expert journalism. Vy Higgenson is running a program in Harlem that is changing young lives through teaching them to not only sing Gospel, but the history of the music and how it can change their lives. I have always contended education is about opportunity, and good material taught by good teachers. Gospel for Teens fits that bill.
It is such a good piece with so much to learn, they took two segments of the show to tell the story. Granted, this is the Summer rerun season and this story originally ran this Spring, but it was new to me. If you have already seen it, just delete this post. But, if you missed it this Spring, check out these two video segments from tonight's show:
Segment Two:
I often say how my post material comes to me. I do not have to go looking for it. It has happened again tonight.
I look forward to your comments.
Later,
Mike
P.S. To my Facebook friends who want to see the videos, just go to my blog by clicking here. While you are there, please subscribe to it, follow the directions, you will receive an email every time I post, and you can check out some of my old posts. You will find some of them educational, entertaining and occasionally even humorous. Thank you.
It is such a good piece with so much to learn, they took two segments of the show to tell the story. Granted, this is the Summer rerun season and this story originally ran this Spring, but it was new to me. If you have already seen it, just delete this post. But, if you missed it this Spring, check out these two video segments from tonight's show:
Segment Two:
I often say how my post material comes to me. I do not have to go looking for it. It has happened again tonight.
I look forward to your comments.
Later,
Mike
P.S. To my Facebook friends who want to see the videos, just go to my blog by clicking here. While you are there, please subscribe to it, follow the directions, you will receive an email every time I post, and you can check out some of my old posts. You will find some of them educational, entertaining and occasionally even humorous. Thank you.
Sunday, May 16, 2010
Music In The Schools
The world is full of very creative and artistic people. Once again, one of my favorite television shows, 60 Minutes, did a piece on one of them tonight. Bob Simon's piece on Conductor Gustavo Dudamel shows what he is doing to give elementary students an opportunity to learn how to play an instrument in an orchestra. As this piece shows, and many experts will tell you, it is all about opportunity.
You can view the piece by clicking here if it doesn't show up on this video:
Watch CBS News Videos Online
As anyone who has anything to do with schools these days knows, funding is being cut in many areas, especially the arts. Often times, entire programs are being cut. My youngest brother is also doing something about it in elementary schools in Southern California. I will write about his program in another post.
Studies show how important involvement in school is for young people. I believe this video shows how this opportunity improves a young person's confidence, self-esteem and personal responsibility. Plus, it teaches them an entirely new set of skills. I cannot say it enough times, "It is all about opportunity."
I look forward to your comments.
Later,
Mike
P.S. I am sorry I have missed a few weeks. I just spent another thirty-eight days in the hospital. I am still a little weak, but I am back!
You can view the piece by clicking here if it doesn't show up on this video:
Watch CBS News Videos Online
As anyone who has anything to do with schools these days knows, funding is being cut in many areas, especially the arts. Often times, entire programs are being cut. My youngest brother is also doing something about it in elementary schools in Southern California. I will write about his program in another post.
Studies show how important involvement in school is for young people. I believe this video shows how this opportunity improves a young person's confidence, self-esteem and personal responsibility. Plus, it teaches them an entirely new set of skills. I cannot say it enough times, "It is all about opportunity."
I look forward to your comments.
Later,
Mike
P.S. I am sorry I have missed a few weeks. I just spent another thirty-eight days in the hospital. I am still a little weak, but I am back!
Thursday, February 14, 2008
DQ Girl
I started speaking to young people way back in 1975 when Martha Brown, a nursing school instructor at Abbott-Northwestern Hospital's now-defunct school of nursing, asked me to speak to her nursing students about living with a spinal cord injury. I spent three years going to that school once every three weeks to impart my wisdom about life in a wheelchair.
When I think about it now, I wonder what I thought I was doing being just twenty years old, and having only been disabled for four years! What did I know? How was I an expert? All I know is, it launched my speaking career.
That disability awareness presentation has evolved into a self-esteem presentation that challenges every one of my audience members to reach their potential and to recognize just what their capabilities are — no matter how old they are. We all have capabilities we don’t even know are there. We just have to find them!
Sometimes finding our strengths are easy, and other times we go through our whole life and never find them.
Everywhere I go, unbelievable things happen. Here is one of those stories.
One summer evening several years ago, I was in a Dairy Queen with a friend and his two boys getting a treat after one of the boy’s little league baseball game. We were waiting to receive our order when a young lady behind the counter handed me a receipt with a note on the back that read:
I’m getting help.
It’s working too. THANKS,
I think you saved my life.
from,
Then she wrote her name and the high school she attended. I looked up in amazement and she was standing behind the counter, smiling and shaking her head up and down! I couldn’t ask her what it was that made her feel that way because she was very busy, the restaurant was packed, and at just that time our ice cream came and my friends were leaving the counter to go eat. I shared the note’s contents outside the restaurant with my friend and have wondered about her ever since that night.
I did three presentations the day I visited her large suburban high school. In the first program there were approximately 150 kids. In the second, there were maybe 300 students. After lunch, I came back to the auditorium to find a 500 seat room overflowing with about 700 young people, many of whom had heard me once or even twice already that day. The aisles were full, the stage had steps all along the front and they were full; people lined the walls. The Fire Marshall would not have approved!
The school had more than 2,000 students so they let the teachers choose if they wanted to attend my program or not. The kids heard my program, went to their next class and asked their teacher if they could go hear me again. Word started spreading and before I knew it, the place was overflowing. It often happens that way; I have to prove myself in every school to a new group of young people.
This young lady was in one or more of those programs. Each program was different. I don’t know what it was I said she picked up on but it hit her in a way that made her write, “ … I think you saved my life.” Parents, teachers and all other adults don’t always know what young people hear, or for that matter, when they are even listening! That is why we need to think about the consequences of what we say and do. The things we say to our children are very important. They may not tell you it’s important, but it is.
We need to listen to them too. We as adults, as parents, as teachers need to validate their feelings. She needed to understand the problem wasn’t the issue; the issue was how to deal with the problem. I tell them it isn’t a matter of degree. It is a matter of doing the right thing.
It is a matter of learning a problem-solving process. Young people already have a process in order, but many times they don’t realize what they are capable of doing. We as adults, as parents, as teachers, need to help guide them, to be an integral part of their lives. You are very important to your children. They may not tell you how important you are, but deep down — they know, because “Kids are COOL!”
Note: A version of this originally appeared in a monthly newspaper entitled Family Times. It was a periodical for parents in the Twin Cities. I wrote a column for them in the mid-nineties entitled Kids are COOL!
When I think about it now, I wonder what I thought I was doing being just twenty years old, and having only been disabled for four years! What did I know? How was I an expert? All I know is, it launched my speaking career.
That disability awareness presentation has evolved into a self-esteem presentation that challenges every one of my audience members to reach their potential and to recognize just what their capabilities are — no matter how old they are. We all have capabilities we don’t even know are there. We just have to find them!
Sometimes finding our strengths are easy, and other times we go through our whole life and never find them.
Everywhere I go, unbelievable things happen. Here is one of those stories.
One summer evening several years ago, I was in a Dairy Queen with a friend and his two boys getting a treat after one of the boy’s little league baseball game. We were waiting to receive our order when a young lady behind the counter handed me a receipt with a note on the back that read:
I’m getting help.
It’s working too. THANKS,
I think you saved my life.
from,
Then she wrote her name and the high school she attended. I looked up in amazement and she was standing behind the counter, smiling and shaking her head up and down! I couldn’t ask her what it was that made her feel that way because she was very busy, the restaurant was packed, and at just that time our ice cream came and my friends were leaving the counter to go eat. I shared the note’s contents outside the restaurant with my friend and have wondered about her ever since that night.
I did three presentations the day I visited her large suburban high school. In the first program there were approximately 150 kids. In the second, there were maybe 300 students. After lunch, I came back to the auditorium to find a 500 seat room overflowing with about 700 young people, many of whom had heard me once or even twice already that day. The aisles were full, the stage had steps all along the front and they were full; people lined the walls. The Fire Marshall would not have approved!
The school had more than 2,000 students so they let the teachers choose if they wanted to attend my program or not. The kids heard my program, went to their next class and asked their teacher if they could go hear me again. Word started spreading and before I knew it, the place was overflowing. It often happens that way; I have to prove myself in every school to a new group of young people.
This young lady was in one or more of those programs. Each program was different. I don’t know what it was I said she picked up on but it hit her in a way that made her write, “ … I think you saved my life.” Parents, teachers and all other adults don’t always know what young people hear, or for that matter, when they are even listening! That is why we need to think about the consequences of what we say and do. The things we say to our children are very important. They may not tell you it’s important, but it is.
We need to listen to them too. We as adults, as parents, as teachers need to validate their feelings. She needed to understand the problem wasn’t the issue; the issue was how to deal with the problem. I tell them it isn’t a matter of degree. It is a matter of doing the right thing.
It is a matter of learning a problem-solving process. Young people already have a process in order, but many times they don’t realize what they are capable of doing. We as adults, as parents, as teachers, need to help guide them, to be an integral part of their lives. You are very important to your children. They may not tell you how important you are, but deep down — they know, because “Kids are COOL!”
Note: A version of this originally appeared in a monthly newspaper entitled Family Times. It was a periodical for parents in the Twin Cities. I wrote a column for them in the mid-nineties entitled Kids are COOL!
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