How Do I Teach My Students To Not Buy Into the Hyperactive Hive-Mind?

00:00:00.000 | [MUSIC PLAYING]

00:00:03.400 | All right.

00:00:06.800 | So we have a question here from Caroline.

00:00:10.880 | Let's see what we got there.

00:00:12.040 | So Caroline asks, how would you teach students

00:00:17.080 | not to buy into the hyperactive hive mind?

00:00:20.920 | She says, I work as a lecturer in academia in the UK,

00:00:23.240 | and the students we have are constantly

00:00:24.520 | emailing for support rather than finding out

00:00:26.360 | information for themselves.

00:00:29.760 | So Caroline, typically my recommendation there

00:00:33.360 | is sender filters.

00:00:36.440 | So that's an idea from my book, Deep Work.

00:00:39.360 | But essentially, you have various communication channels

00:00:44.160 | that each come with a description of how

00:00:47.000 | they should be used.

00:00:48.560 | And then you just give this information

00:00:50.360 | to the people that are going to be interacting with you.

00:00:54.040 | So with students, I think this is quite straightforward.

00:00:56.440 | You can be pretty clear about it.

00:00:57.820 | OK, for this type of question, this

00:00:59.600 | is how you ask it, for this, this is how you ask it.

00:01:01.600 | This should happen at office hours.

00:01:03.060 | This you can take me--

00:01:04.060 | I have 10 minutes right after class.

00:01:05.720 | These type of quick questions, that's

00:01:06.920 | when you should ask me those type of quick questions,

00:01:08.520 | et cetera.

00:01:09.240 | You just have clarity.

00:01:10.200 | Here are the different ways to contact me or the staff.

00:01:14.040 | Here are what you should expect and how it actually works.

00:01:16.840 | The big fear people have is that, well,

00:01:19.040 | it's going to really annoy people.

00:01:20.500 | They'd much rather have constant access.

00:01:22.160 | For the most part, that's not true.

00:01:24.240 | Clarity trumps accessibility.

00:01:25.840 | That's one of the primary ideas behind a lot

00:01:29.040 | of my dealing with digital communications.

00:01:31.080 | As long as I know how to contact you,

00:01:33.440 | and it's not up in the air, and I'm not stressed,

00:01:35.520 | I need an answer, and I don't even

00:01:36.600 | know if Caroline's going to respond or not.

00:01:38.160 | As long as there's clarity, oh, this

00:01:39.440 | is when I ask these type of questions.

00:01:40.880 | Here's how it works.

00:01:41.800 | Great, I don't have to worry about that anymore.

00:01:43.800 | People tend to be OK.

00:01:44.960 | Then you'll have 2% of people who will be mad.

00:01:47.640 | But here's the thing, Caroline.

00:01:48.880 | 2% of people are going to be mad at you no matter what you do.

00:01:51.480 | So you might as well get that madness in exchange

00:01:53.800 | for something really worth it.

00:01:55.360 | So just be really clear for this type of communication.

00:01:58.200 | Here's how it works.

00:01:59.720 | When people go around that, you just

00:02:02.160 | push them back gently towards the thing

00:02:03.800 | that you've planned in advance.

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How Do I Teach My Students To Not Buy Into the Hyperactive Hive-Mind?

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