On page 6, Finkel asks us to stop and reflect. More than that, the author asks us to actually write out our response to the following prompt:Thinking back over your whole life, what were the two or three most significant learning experiences you ever had? That is, list the moments (or events) in which you discovered something of lasting signifance to your life.
Okay, I've actually stopped reading the book at this point to do this writing exercise, and I hope you will too.
I thought about this over the lunch hour, and here's what I came up with.
1. Perhaps the earliest signifant learning experience that comes to mind is learning how to ride a bicycle. I was about 5 years old, and the road outside my house went down a hill. At the end of the hill were some bushes, and beyond the bushes was a pond. The thought of riding my bike straight into the pond always scared me, but even when I forgot to apply my brakes, the bushes always stopped me.
2. In high school, I took Calculus and ended up getting an F. Instead of blaming my teacher, I decided that when I took math in college the following year, I would take Calculus. Although my program only required me to take Algebra, take Calculus I did, and this time I studied hard and earned an A.
I guess the first lesson has to do with overcoming fear, and the second lesson deals with accepting the challenge to live up to my potential. In both cases, I learned to rely on myself -- not expecting others to be there to save me, and not allowing myself to be the victim.
What about you guys? How did you answer this prompt?
Bret
2 comments:
The most profound learning moment came when I was in the Peace Corps. I was walking in the "campo" (the countryside), visiting farmers with one of my colleagues. We came upon a house in the middle of a field. There was only one small boy at home. He was perhaps six years old. He was playing in the dirt outside the home. We talked with him for a few moments and walked on. As we walked away, my colleague asked me what I noticed about the house. I mentioned the fact that it was one room, made of mud and sticks, etc. He interrupted me and asked if there was a fire. There wasn't a fire going, and I told him. He asked me if I knew what that meant. I was puzzled and admitted that I didn't. He said, "That means there's nothing to eat today. You don't build a fire and waste charcoal if there's no food." As a person who has never missed a meal involuntarily in my whole life, that was a profound moment. I have never felt the same attachment to "stuff" since then, and every day,I realize how lucky I am to be born where I was.
I have recorded one of my childhood memories of what has stayed with me into adulthood learning: When I was seven, living in Germany, we had a German teacher who would come into our classroom once a day to teach us of her customs, language, etc. My German teacher told our class stories of German culture,of heroes, heroines, black forests, beasts. Always being somewhat of a daydreamer, I became fascinated with her stories, and drew doors on a piece of paper, pretending to fly through them to these places she was teaching me about. I was a heroine, for a while. “Sie sind ein schlechtes madchen!” my teacher scolded me, pounding her hand on my desk. Even in German, “You are a bad girl,” wasn’t exactly good, but she scolded me and said it was for my own good. Pondering this much later, as I tried to connect with the ambiguity of words, I learned that in the dictionary, to be a “bad boy” means One who flouts convention, or fails to reach
acceptable standard. If I was a boy, as my father wished I could have been, I would have been “good” the way I flouted convention; I felt that I would have made him proud. And if I was a “bad girl,” as my German teacher said,wouldn’t that make me closer to being a boy? The world has always been a complex place to me, filled with ambiguities about my identity and where I fit in. I realize, as a teacher, that students are also still trying to figure out who they are in this world, too. I made a vow never to scold students publicly, as I was scolded, but to share knowledge and stories in a human and gentle manner. The world is full of ambiguities and I am always reminded that what is "good" or "bad" to one, may not necessarily be so to another.
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