For as much fun as people poke at Bruce Lee for being a movie star, the man had some great insight into life. In one of his most famous quotes Bruce Lee suggests that we as people be like water. As a martial artist, Bruce Lee was talking about the need to adapt to your given situation. Learning and perfecting the martial arts requires the practitioner to always be evolving, questioning why, and learning new concepts. In other words you become water. You adapt to the situation that you are in and become the best version of you that you can.

So what does this have to do with teaching? Well let’s face it. Not every lesson or classroom is perfect. No matter how hard we try, something always comes up. Maybe a piece of technology breaks. Maybe a student decides that they want to try out their stand up routine that day. As teachers I think it’s important that instead of freaking out about the mishaps, we instead be like water and adapt to the situation. Freaking out and complaining doesn’t fix a problem. By adapting to a bad situation and finding ways to fix a problem you not only get your lesson back on track, but you also model for your students what real world problem solving really looks like.  So be like water my friends.