Follow up
Team Building: DON'T touch the color!
"Be the grownup you needed."
"Kids disengage for reasons related to the core experience of being an adolescent. They don't feel they belong; they feel overwhelmed or have fallen behind and can't see a way out; they face emotional headwinds they don't feel they can manage." p. 35 "One of the keys is that you believe they can grow-- thier disengagement is not a character flaw but a sign that they need our help. Another key ingredient is how you speak to them, in ways that convey status and respect, not frustration or contempt." p. 34
clue game
Discover the mode of engagment
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Complaining that school is pointless and waiting for instruction rather than taking initiative.
Showing up for social aspects but hating or ignoring class content.
School is boring and either to easy or to hard.
Student does the bare minimum and looks for the fastest way to complete work.
Comply with requirements rather than engageing with content.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Passenger
Nagging doesn't work. It diminishes kids’ autonomy, heightens their negative emotions, takes their attention away from the task at hand, often increases procrastination, and leads to worse performance in school. As counterintuitive as it sounds, try giving kids in Passenger mode more, not less, autonomy. Autonomy- supportive parenting and teaching approaches boost teens’ engagement in learning and achievement in school. Help kids find their spark or foster the ones they have. The content of their interest does not matter. Pursuing interest in or out of school helps to develop Explorer muscles. Some kids can't get out of Passenger mode not because they lack motivation, but because they lack the skills. Help struggling kids develop metacognitive learning and study skills to be successful in school. Help kids get their butterflies in formation. Reframe stress as your body preparing for something important, not a negative signal to run away. Step 1, use perspective talking to lay the groundwork (listen). Step 2, acknowledge (actually understand what they are saying). Step 3, explain (explanatory rationale). Step 4, use invitational language (you might try). Step 5, Be patient
clue game
Discover the mode of engagement
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Prefer support over being direct with tasks, goals, and problem solving.
Dive deep into interests outside of school.
Driven by internal curiosity and interest in topics.
A state of high engagement.
Persists through challenges to build resilience.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Explorer
Kids in Explorer mode have agentic engagement. They take the initiative to shape a more supportive learning environment for themselves, which requires a degree of self-awareness about their own interests and desires. To explore, kids need non-task-oriented time, time to engage in transcendent thinning, reflecting on the meaning of what they are learning and experiencing. With the right support, kids in Resister mode can often quickly pivot to Explorer mode. Kids can build their Explorer muscles in small and big ways, from asking for more interesting work in the classroom to diving deep into an interest outside of school. Parents play a vital role in supporting exploration outside of school, since many schools do not yet train teachers or design learning environments to support agentic engagement. Help them study smarter, make plans, and organize tasks, rather than doing it for them. Allow extracurricular activities (like sports or arts) even if grades are low, as these keep them engaged.
clue game
Discover the mode of engagment
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Forgetting tasks, procrastination, and "playing sick" to avoid school.
Arguing, disrupting class, or questioning "why" they must do something.
They have belonging uncertainty, not sure if or where they belong and don't know what to do about it.
Disengaged emotionally, cognitively, and often behaviorally at school.
Often labeled as difficult or lazy. They do not believe in the school system.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Resister
Kids in Resister mode have agency, but it's pointed away from their learning in school. They often need more serious interventions to overcome very real barriers to engagement. The key to helping kids in register mode is establishing trust and building connections. They won't take advice from you without that foundation. A key approach is taking resisting kids’ emotions seriously, choosing an emotion-coaching approach. Kids in Resister mode need us to help them get to the why of their resistance. Bullying, mental health struggles, and overwhelm are three common ones. Once you have established trust and connection, and have gotten to the bottom of what’s going on, you can help kids identify their strengths, interests, and values and imagine a future possible self they are excited about. When kids move from Resister mode to a Resister identity, they are at risk of “costly coping”-- numbing their frustration through things such as self-harm, drugs, or alcohol. They risk falling into learned helplessness. Imagine, identify, reflect, interpret
clue game
Discover the mode of engagment
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Striving for the best grades, score, or achievement to make others proud.
Often plagued by perfectionism and haunted by a fear of failure.
Follow instructions perfectly but rarely take risks to explore their own interests.
High-performing students who meticulously satisfy system demands for top grades and accolades.
Are cognitively enaged in class.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Achiever
Kids in achiever mode need to feel they matter unconditionally, beyond their A+ performance Kids in Achiever mode do a lot. We can help them make time and space to reflect on what they really care about. A first step is helping them carve out downtime. Real downtime is also needed to foster creativity and imagination. If kids seem like they are daydreaming, let them. This is how new ideas are born. We can encourage transcendent thinking by asking open, big-picture questions about school or life. Remember the goal is the dialogue this spurs, not getting the right answer to the question. Kids in Achiever mode don’t like to fail, so they avoid it. Encourage productive struggle and small risk-taking to build agency. Encourage curiosity over results by focusing on what they care about rather than just their grades. Help children understand that mistakes are part of learning and that self-worth is not tied to a report card. All kids operating in Achiever mode are missing something: a level of self-awareness and proactivity that could help them be brave, take risks, and think about their own interests and goals in the educational process, not just the goals that teachers and schools set for them.
Navigating the Modes
Modes are not identities. They are dynamic and fluid, and kids move among them. Our goal is to make sure they don't get stuck in one, moving from a moment in a mode to an identity. Always see possibility and growth. Help your children spend time in explorer mode, ideally at least once a day. Parents have tremendous influence over their children's approach to learning. Discussion and encouragement are powerful, free, and easy to use tools available to them. Keep the channels of discussion open– to maintain relational health– because kids won't be able to hear the strategies we outline in the next chapters without it.
Follow up
Alyson Amos
Created on April 15, 2026
Start designing with a free template
Discover more than 1500 professional designs like these:
View
Character Clues Game Education
View
Character Clues Game Education Mobile
View
Pixel Challenge
View
Piñata Challenge
View
Character Clue Game
View
Character Clue Game Mobile
View
Corporate Challenge Game
Explore all templates
Transcript
Follow up
Team Building: DON'T touch the color!
"Be the grownup you needed."
"Kids disengage for reasons related to the core experience of being an adolescent. They don't feel they belong; they feel overwhelmed or have fallen behind and can't see a way out; they face emotional headwinds they don't feel they can manage." p. 35 "One of the keys is that you believe they can grow-- thier disengagement is not a character flaw but a sign that they need our help. Another key ingredient is how you speak to them, in ways that convey status and respect, not frustration or contempt." p. 34
clue game
Discover the mode of engagment
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Complaining that school is pointless and waiting for instruction rather than taking initiative.
Showing up for social aspects but hating or ignoring class content.
School is boring and either to easy or to hard.
Student does the bare minimum and looks for the fastest way to complete work.
Comply with requirements rather than engageing with content.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Passenger
Nagging doesn't work. It diminishes kids’ autonomy, heightens their negative emotions, takes their attention away from the task at hand, often increases procrastination, and leads to worse performance in school. As counterintuitive as it sounds, try giving kids in Passenger mode more, not less, autonomy. Autonomy- supportive parenting and teaching approaches boost teens’ engagement in learning and achievement in school. Help kids find their spark or foster the ones they have. The content of their interest does not matter. Pursuing interest in or out of school helps to develop Explorer muscles. Some kids can't get out of Passenger mode not because they lack motivation, but because they lack the skills. Help struggling kids develop metacognitive learning and study skills to be successful in school. Help kids get their butterflies in formation. Reframe stress as your body preparing for something important, not a negative signal to run away. Step 1, use perspective talking to lay the groundwork (listen). Step 2, acknowledge (actually understand what they are saying). Step 3, explain (explanatory rationale). Step 4, use invitational language (you might try). Step 5, Be patient
clue game
Discover the mode of engagement
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Prefer support over being direct with tasks, goals, and problem solving.
Dive deep into interests outside of school.
Driven by internal curiosity and interest in topics.
A state of high engagement.
Persists through challenges to build resilience.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Explorer
Kids in Explorer mode have agentic engagement. They take the initiative to shape a more supportive learning environment for themselves, which requires a degree of self-awareness about their own interests and desires. To explore, kids need non-task-oriented time, time to engage in transcendent thinning, reflecting on the meaning of what they are learning and experiencing. With the right support, kids in Resister mode can often quickly pivot to Explorer mode. Kids can build their Explorer muscles in small and big ways, from asking for more interesting work in the classroom to diving deep into an interest outside of school. Parents play a vital role in supporting exploration outside of school, since many schools do not yet train teachers or design learning environments to support agentic engagement. Help them study smarter, make plans, and organize tasks, rather than doing it for them. Allow extracurricular activities (like sports or arts) even if grades are low, as these keep them engaged.
clue game
Discover the mode of engagment
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Forgetting tasks, procrastination, and "playing sick" to avoid school.
Arguing, disrupting class, or questioning "why" they must do something.
They have belonging uncertainty, not sure if or where they belong and don't know what to do about it.
Disengaged emotionally, cognitively, and often behaviorally at school.
Often labeled as difficult or lazy. They do not believe in the school system.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Resister
Kids in Resister mode have agency, but it's pointed away from their learning in school. They often need more serious interventions to overcome very real barriers to engagement. The key to helping kids in register mode is establishing trust and building connections. They won't take advice from you without that foundation. A key approach is taking resisting kids’ emotions seriously, choosing an emotion-coaching approach. Kids in Resister mode need us to help them get to the why of their resistance. Bullying, mental health struggles, and overwhelm are three common ones. Once you have established trust and connection, and have gotten to the bottom of what’s going on, you can help kids identify their strengths, interests, and values and imagine a future possible self they are excited about. When kids move from Resister mode to a Resister identity, they are at risk of “costly coping”-- numbing their frustration through things such as self-harm, drugs, or alcohol. They risk falling into learned helplessness. Imagine, identify, reflect, interpret
clue game
Discover the mode of engagment
Find out who it is with the clues. The fewer you use, the better detective you'll be!Explorer, Achiever, Passenger, Resister
Hint 3
Hint 5
Hint 1
Hint 2
Hint 4
Striving for the best grades, score, or achievement to make others proud.
Often plagued by perfectionism and haunted by a fear of failure.
Follow instructions perfectly but rarely take risks to explore their own interests.
High-performing students who meticulously satisfy system demands for top grades and accolades.
Are cognitively enaged in class.
Solve?
SURRENDER?
Achiever
Kids in achiever mode need to feel they matter unconditionally, beyond their A+ performance Kids in Achiever mode do a lot. We can help them make time and space to reflect on what they really care about. A first step is helping them carve out downtime. Real downtime is also needed to foster creativity and imagination. If kids seem like they are daydreaming, let them. This is how new ideas are born. We can encourage transcendent thinking by asking open, big-picture questions about school or life. Remember the goal is the dialogue this spurs, not getting the right answer to the question. Kids in Achiever mode don’t like to fail, so they avoid it. Encourage productive struggle and small risk-taking to build agency. Encourage curiosity over results by focusing on what they care about rather than just their grades. Help children understand that mistakes are part of learning and that self-worth is not tied to a report card. All kids operating in Achiever mode are missing something: a level of self-awareness and proactivity that could help them be brave, take risks, and think about their own interests and goals in the educational process, not just the goals that teachers and schools set for them.
Navigating the Modes
Modes are not identities. They are dynamic and fluid, and kids move among them. Our goal is to make sure they don't get stuck in one, moving from a moment in a mode to an identity. Always see possibility and growth. Help your children spend time in explorer mode, ideally at least once a day. Parents have tremendous influence over their children's approach to learning. Discussion and encouragement are powerful, free, and easy to use tools available to them. Keep the channels of discussion open– to maintain relational health– because kids won't be able to hear the strategies we outline in the next chapters without it.