1 - "Become a Steno Athlete - The 4C's"
2 - "Win an Infinity Steno Machine!"
3 - "SimplySteno Open Enrollment - December Special - Save $200!"
4 - "Win a Steno Machine Bookmark From StenoDesigns!"
5 - "RPR Prep December Special"
6 - "Court Reporting Documentary Update"

Become a Steno Athlete - The 4C's! (back to top)

Concentration. Confidence. Control. Commitment.

A couple months ago I was watching highlights from a track and field competition. The focus from the sprinters really caught my eye. The way they stare down the lane before the race. They don't blink. They don't break eye contact. Even when they shake out their legs, their eyes are still focused on the prize - the finish line. I want my students to have that focus! So how do we get there? I did a little research and came across an article from Brian Mac, a track coach who works a lot on the psychology side of sports. Brian was kind enough to allow me to reprint one of his articles below, tweaking and adding sections to make them more pertinent to court reporting.

Concentration, confidence, control and commitment (the 4C's) are generally considered the main mental qualities that are important for successful performance in most sports. The same can be said for stenography. Yes, there is a physical aspect to both, but without the mental, the physical cannot perform to its full potential.

• Concentration - the ability to maintain focus
• Confidence - to believe in one's abilities
• Control - the ability to maintain emotional control regardless of distraction
• Commitment - the ability to continue working toward agreed goals

Concentration

This is the mental quality to focus on the task in hand. If the court reporter lacks concentration, then their writing abilities will not be effectively or efficiently applied to the task. Research has identified the following types of attention focus:

• Broad Narrow continuum - the writer focuses on a large or small number of stimuli
• Internal External continuum - the writer focuses on internal stimuli (feelings) or external stimuli (classroom distractions)

The demand for concentration varies with the situation:

• Sustained concentration - longer dictations, depositions, CART classes
• Short bursts of concentration - standard tests, drills, hardcopy
• Intense concentration - unfamiliar terms, names

Common distractions are: anxiety, mistakes, fatigue, other students, teachers, schools, negative thoughts etc.

Strategies to improve concentration are very personal - one size doesn't fit all. One way to maintain focus is to set process goals for each practice session or testing situation. You should set an overall goal, then a number of process goals (smaller steps) that will help you accomplish your task. For each of these goals the student can use a trigger word (a word which instantly refocuses the student's concentration to the goal) e.g. general writing requires the student remain relaxed with their feet flat on the floor and shoulders back - a trigger word could be "posture."

Routine is the goal. Once you create 3 or 4 trigger words, you would then make that your routine - to say those trigger words in your head before each writing session. Over time, this becomes your routine - it becomes a type of muscle memory. Properly structured, they can prove a useful aid to concentration.

Confidence

Confidence results from the comparison a student makes between the goal and their ability. The student will have self-confidence if they believe they can achieve their goal. You only achieve what you believe. And that belief gets created by knowing you are putting in the needed effort. Self-confidence cannot simple be manufactured - it needs to be created.

When an student has self-confidence, they will tend to persevere even when things are not going to plan, show enthusiasm and be positive in their approach. They will take their share of the responsibility in success and failure.

To improve self confidence, a student can use mental imagery to:

• visualize previous good performances to remind them of the look and feel
• imagine various scenarios and how they will cope with them

Good goal setting (challenging, yet realistic) can bring feelings of success. If students can see that they are achieving their short-term goals, and moving towards their long-term goals, then confidence grows.

Confidence is a positive state of mind and a belief that you can meet the challenge ahead - a feeling of being in control. It is not the situation that directly affects confidence; thoughts, assumptions and expectations can build or destroy confidence.

High self confidence

• Thoughts - positive thoughts of success
• Feelings - excited, anticipation, calm, elation, prepared
• Focus - on self, on the task
• Behavior - give maximum effort and commitment, willing to take chances, positive reaction to set backs, open to learning, take responsibility for outcomes

Low Self Confidence

• Thoughts - negative, defeat or failure, doubt
• Feelings - tense, dread, fear. not wanting to take part (like a readback session in class, or transcribing a bad test)
• Focus - on others, on less relevant factors (how others progress, classroom noise)
• Behavior - lack of effort, likely to give up, unwilling to take risks (rather play it safe), blame others or conditions for outcome

Control

Identifying when a student feels a particular emotion, and understanding the reason for the feelings, is an important stage of helping a student gain emotional control. A student's ability to maintain control of their emotions in the face of adversity and remain positive is essential to successful performance. Two emotions that are often associated with poor performance are anxiety and fear.

Anxiety comes in two forms - Physical (butterflies, sweating, nausea, needing the toilet) and Mental (worry, negative thoughts, confusion, lack of concentration). Relaxation is a technique that can be used to reduce anxiety.

When a student is fearful (fear of success, fear of failure), the fear often becomes the focus of attention. This then leads to a lack of concentration on the task, performance deteriorates and confidence in ability is lost which fuels the anxiety - a slippery slope to failure.

Commitment

Student performance depends on the student being fully committed to numerous goals over an extended amount of time. In competition with these goals the student will have many aspects of daily life to manage. The many competing interests and commitments include work, studies, family/partner, friends, social life and other hobbies/sports.

Within the student's focus, commitment can be undermined by:

• a perceived lack of progress or improvement
• not understanding the objectives of the teaching program
• injury
• lack of enjoyment
• anxiety about performance - competition from other students
• becoming bored
• student/teacher not working as a team
• lack of structure
• finances

Setting goals as a student will raise your feelings of value, give you joint ownership of the goals, and therefore make you more committed to achieving them.

Many people (teachers, parents, other students, mentors) can contribute to an court reporting student's levels of commitment with appropriate levels of support and positive feedback, especially during times distraction, hardship or poor performance.

Successful emotional states

The following are emotional states experienced with successful performance:

• Happy - felt that this was my opportunity to demonstrate an excellent performance. Felt I could write anything.
• Calm and nervous - Felt nervous, but really at ease with these feelings. I accepted and expected to be nervous, but felt ready to start.
• Anxious but excited - Felt so ready to write, but a little nervous. Nerves and excitement come together in a good way.
• Confident - I remembered all the successful practice sessions and previous good writing days.
  
  

Win an Infinity Steno Machine! (back to top)

You've heard about the Infinity writers - technologically advanced - the lightest machines available - why wouldn't you want one?!? And now you have a chance to WIN one! To get entered, your first step is to "Like" the Infinity Writers Facebook page - https://www.facebook.com/infinitywriter Once you've done that, read over the contest details. The highlight - they want you to create a little video about your court reporting experience. Easy enough - you live it each day, right? So get over there and "Like" the page right now.

If for some reason you don't win an Infinity writer, you can still get an amazing deal! Right now they are offering a 12% discount on their writers. Check out the Infinity website for details - Infinity Writers

SimplySteno Open Enrollment - December Special - Save $200! (back to top)

Thinking of joining the SimplySteno Plus online program? Join our online court reporting program before January 15th, 2013, and save $200 off the starting amount! Get your first 3 months for just $510 (instead of $710). After that, it's just $360 every 3 months. That's a savings you can't beat! Once you join, you have till March 15th to actually start. Now's the time to sign up and save some money on your court reporting education! SimplySteno has shown that you DO NOT need to be at a campus to succeed. Studying court reporting at home is no longer just a second option - it's the first choice for many. I invite you to read my testimonials and ask me about our successful students.

SimplySteno offers 100% daily structure - each day is planned out for you down to the minute. No wondering which dictations to do or what to do WITH them! We incorporate finger drills, faster dictations, slower dictations, name drills and other goodies into each lesson, along with a theme for each day. Steno practice isn't always exciting, but we've done our best to make each lesson one you look forward to doing! How do you know what to work on if you never see your test results? You don't! We grade your tests and send them back in an average of 3 days along with helpful comments.

For value, SimplySteno can't be beat! Depending on your payment plan, you'll pay less than $1500 a YEAR. Some programs charge close to that each MONTH! And we'll proudly put SimplySteno up against any teaching platform out there. Daily structure - audio and video libraries - on-demand turbo testing - constant feedback - it's all there. Check it out today!

Win a Steno Machine Bookmark From StenoDesigns! (back to top)

Heather Fairless is a court reporter and the owner of StenoDesigns, where they have some very cool gift ideas for those in the court reporting field! Heather was kind enough to offer up a couple of her steno machine bookmarks (pictured below) for a StenoLife contest.

Want to win one? To enter the drawing, just drop me an email at Marc@Stenolife.com with the answer to this question -

About how long has Heather been involved in court reporting?

To get the answer, just visit the StenoDesigns website - www.StenoDesigns.com - go to the Contact/About page and read all about why Heather started StenoDesigns. And while you're there, check out Heather's other items in her online store - some great ideas with the holidays right around the corner! December 21st is the last day to enter - a winner will be selected on December 22nd. Good luck!

RPR Prep - December Special! (back to top)

I heard a rumor that there were some testing issues during the last couple RPR exams :) I won't get into the fine details - I'll just make this special offer to those taking the next exam...

3 Week RPR Prep Program (no academics) - $90 (normally $139.95)
5 Week RPR Prep Program (no academics) - $150 (normally $229.95)

All the stars are going to align for this next RPR exam, so take advantage! Here are the restrictions to this offer...

1 - You must be taking the RPR exam on January 26.
2 - The program is for your use only - not to be shared.
3 - The program will be sent by download link to your computer - not mailed on CD.
4 - This is only to be used on a personal computer - not a school computer.
5 - You may keep and use the RPR prep program as long as you like, but may only turn in tests for grading from December 1st to January 25th.

We've been providing our RPR prep programs for almost 10 years, with great results. I suggest you check out the RPRprep website and see what we have to offer. Let's nail that next RPR exam!

Court Reporting Documentary Update (back to top)

The last thing I want to do is jinx our documentary, but I must say that filming is going even better than expected! In the course of the last 4 months, we've conducted over 50 interviews with court reporters, captioners, teachers, students and more. We've met up with most of the influential members of the court reporting community and picked their brains. We've filmed in Philadelphia, Long Island, Portland and more, with Orlando, Dallas, Beverly Hills, Vancouver and Nashville on the radar for next year (I'm sure we'll wedge some other shots in as well).

When we first started this project, I thought I had a pretty good idea of which direction we'd be headed. Now that we're into it, it's zigging and zagging in all kinds of interesting ways. It's exploring the steno culture on a much deeper level than I anticipated, which is a good thing! As we continue to explore that, we'll also be getting more into the world record attempt as filming continues. Looking forward to meeting up with Mark Kislingbury early next year and finding out what makes him tick!

If you'd like to follow our progress, please check out our website - www.CourtReportingMovie.com, and "Like" our Facebook page - Court Reporting Documentary.

Infinity Steno Machines - The writers you've been waiting for.
RealLegal - Complete resources for court reporters.
LiveDeposition - Live deposition streaming done right.
StenoDoctor - Authorized steno machine service provider.
SimplySteno - Simply the best online teaching platform.

Thanks!
Marc Greenberg

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