Here’s the cart for my workshop I just created entirely on my own, from design to production. It may not look like much, but making it was a very big step on my path to becoming a doer.

We all see things that bother us many times a day, every day.

The interesting question is, what do we do about it?

First, I’ll tell you what I used to do.

Like most people, I often ignored the problem. When I decided to “do” something to solve the problem, I actually didn’t “do,” most of the time. Instead, I delegated it to someone else. By “delegate,” I mean that I either bought the solution (e.g. buy Halloween costumes for my kids), or I asked someone else to solve the problem (e.g. ask our handyman to fix the kitchen cabinet door).

Now, though, I’m on a personal mission to become more of a doer – to try to actively solve problems myself, rather than ignore or delegate.

My motivation at first was to set an example for my kids. After all, I want my kids to be consummate doers. I want them to change the world for the better. I want them to have a “can-do” attitude borne out of a combination of chutzpah and competence.

However, as I continue this transformation, I realize the wonderful benefits of doing to me in my everyday life – not just for world-changing innovation.
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My kids love this – it’s one of the funnest tunnel systems you’ll ever see, and it’s critical to an understanding of World War II. It’s the Maginot Line, on France’s border with Germany, and we’ll be watching a History Channel documentary video on it next week.

These days, it’s difficult to find an expert who thinks television is good for children.

And yet, it’s pretty obvious, even to the biggest TV critics among us, that television can provide information in a far more memorable way than any other medium.

The problem of television for children does not lie in the technology itself. Instead, it lies in both how television is used by children, as well as the specific TV content that they view.

I’ve found a way to make television very educational for my children, and to virtually eliminate the downside that comes from spending many hours a day passively watching. In other words, television in our house is a huge learning asset, not a necessary evil.

Here’s how I do this:
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Marco’s in geode heaven at Jeff Smith’s basement outside Pittsburgh.

Two years ago, Marco’s (8) passion was geodes – hollow rocks with crystals inside. Sometimes, it still is, but last year, he also got into the solar system and gardening.

These days, Nico (5) has joined in our deep dives, and it’s World War II, with a little tangent on prison escapes (POW camps and Alcatraz). It looks they’re getting pretty deep into woodworking in the near future, too.

If you just scan these topics – geodes, the solar system, gardening, World War II, prison escapes, and woodworking – you might conclude that my boys are hopping around, skimming the surface of many topics.

Actually, that’s exactly wrong. I take my boys very deeply into their passions – I call these journey’s “deep dives.” Every time we go on a deep dive, I’m fully prepared to go deeper indefinitely, without stopping. I have no plans for a next topic. I’m encouraging my boys to be totally undiversified learners, guided by their passions, not by any sort of checklist.
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credit: buzzle.com

“I’ve never let school interfere with my education.” – Mark Twain

These doer kids who I’m studying (see my first article on them, Doers Don’t Watch TV) are incredibly action-oriented. They’re articulate. They ooze potential, yet they seem very self-assured and happy. In short, I can’t imagine a group of older kids that I’d rather my young kids emulate.

They’re some the world’s best makers, software hackers, entrepreneurs, and social innovators. I’ve been interviewing parents of doer kids from two groups:

• Thiel Fellows – kids under 20 who entrepreneur Peter Thiel’s foundation has chosen to get $100K over two years to pursue their innovative ideas full time rather than go to college
• Young Makers from the maker movement, in which kids and adults build fun physical things like robots and clothes with LED lights

Also, I’ve carefully read the stories of the amazing kids profiled in Tony Wagner’s great book, Creating Innovators.

So, these kids must all be superstar students at their schools, right?

Actually, they’re not. Most of the kids in these groups get little, if any inspiration from school. For the most part, they do attend school, but they don’t enjoy it, and many aren’t even particularly good at it.
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