When Red first heard the phrase "soft skills" she didn't know what it meant. So, Black explained that it was a term used to describe essential skills, such as critical thinking and problem solving, communications, and conflict management (vs."hard skills" which refer to tangible and technical skills). Black then mentioned that the Texas Education Agency (TEA) often refers to them as "21st Century Skills" – sarcastically adding how she's old enough to remember they were important in the 20th Century, too.
The soft skill topics list below are important for students ranging from middle school to adult education, as well as all employees. That's why we included them in ALL of our Career and Technical Education curricula. What's more, unlike more traditional curricula, they've been developed to allow students to see the relevancy of each topic and how these skills are transferable – between their personal lives and the workforce, and from industry-to-industry.
But don't believe us, check out a few samples! We've linked the high school versions of Money & Math, Motivational Interviewing (Red's favorite because of the worksheet), and Teamwork and hope they'll give you a better feel for our approach.
- Introduction Of Red & Black … And Life's Detours
- Appearances
- Career Opportunities
- Communications
- Conflict Management
- Constructive Feedback
- Critical Thinking & Problem Solving
- Diversity
- Education
- Employability Skills
- Intellectual Property
- Interpersonal Studies
- Leadership
- Money & Math
- Motivational Interviewing
- Negotiating
- Policies & Procedures
- Project Management
- Relationships
- Resume & Professional Portfolio
- Rights Of Employees & Responsibilities Of Employers
- Safety
- Teamwork
- Technology
- Values & Priorities
- Vocabulary
RED+BLACK - Same Parents ... Different Lives
We think this "teaser" is remarkable! Why? Because Red's actually brief and to the point when she explains the similarities that she shares with her sister, Black.
Curious about the "Back Story" to our animation teasers? Red's daughter, Sawyer, told us we needed to do some very short animated "teasers" … so Black said, "Great.You want to work in video production. Take the final working versions of our animation and start creating them!" So, she did!
P.S. – For those of you who've met us or seen us at speaking engagements, we'd love to know if you think the animators have accurately captured us! (You can email us at Banter@RedandBlackBooks.com.)
School sports may be different this fall – but nothing stops parents from showing their support.
DAY 10: We're sure that, over time, we'll be introducing more sections. (People keep asking if we've thought about doing podcasts, and we have – but that topic is a post onto itself.) But for now, there's only two more sections to mention:
- About Business – Interested in working with Red & Black (for example, as part of your marketing strategy, in terms of personal and professional development of your employees, or maybe you're looking for speakers with extensive experience that can address an assortment of critical topics), or maybe you're just curious about our approach to business? Then this section is for you.
- About Events – We all know large in-person speaking engagements are temporarily "on hold" but years of speaking engagements before thousands of people definitely prepared us for webinars and other online events. To learn more, check out this section.
So, now what? Now that we're done introducing our individual sections, we'll be "feeding the beast"… in other words, loading new content every day!
We hope you enjoy our site and look forward to your feedback. If you need more information on a specific area of interest, please refer to our Contact information, but general comments and feedback can be sent here.