To Preserve an Egg
April 13th, 2010
I doubt I’ll ever forget the challenge my fourth grade teacher presented to our class: Throw a raw egg off a two-story building without breaking it. Our imaginations were aflame with ways to meet this challenge. We discussed and shared ideas with one another. Each student conceptualized and developed a distinct solution to the singular problem of how to keep the egg intact. Some students used copious amounts of foam and packing material. I employed a parachute. Results varied. Some eggs survived, while others splattered. This experiment was the perfect metaphor for problems I’ve faced since—problems which I cannot resolve with easy answers.
Educational models will better serve students by emulating the egg-drop challenge. We should present students with situations for which there are no easy, prepackaged answers. Such situations are opportunities for the inherent genius within each child to surface and perform. Life will present students with myriad challenges. Kids who are now in grade school will someday lock themselves out of their home, try to find a treatment to heal a patient’s body riddled with cancer, design agricultural methods that enhance soil and maximize yield, and parent a child whose behavior no how-to book adequately addresses.
Inherent in each of these scenarios are problems for which there are no easy answers. It is, in fact, the absence of easy answers that ignites our creativity as we seek to confront challenges. Remember how you felt the last time you locked yourself out of your car or home? If you’re like me, your mind wove multiple possibilities for how you might solve the problem before you. Each educational discipline can and should mirror this kind of process: Present a difficult challenge, give students freedom and parameters within which they can address the challenge, assess students—not on the product (Did the egg break?), but rather on the process (To what extent did the student immerse herself and her creativity in the process that preceded the product?).
Educational models like this exist, but are in the minority. Most often, rather than challenging students with processes that at once agitate and nurture their natural learning sensibilities we fetter students’ native curiosity and creativity by first supplying an answer, then testing them on their ability to furnish that precise answer. This educational paradigm is antithetical to the thrill of learning which I and my classmates experienced in our quest to preserve the integrity of an egg. It would have been far easier for my teacher to merely show us how to build “the ultimate egg-dropper” from a design someone else had created. But this would have been akin to thievery on his part to short-circuit our fourth-grade ingenuity. What a gift it was that he didn’t rob us of our creative process.
Tags: creative process, divergent learning, educational reform
Causality
April 6th, 2010
“Now judge I had debts no honest man could pay
The bank was holdin’ my mortgage and they were gonna take my house away
Now I ain’t sayin’ that makes me an innocent man
But it was more `n all this that put that gun in my hand”
-Bruce Springsteen, Johnny 99
Why are so many people in America obese, depressed, addicted to drugs and pornography? From our mechanistic perspective we begin our explanation with, “Well, that’s because…” Be-CAUSE, or as the Middle English folks may have said, “by cause that.” Such statements tend to match a single phenomenon to a single cause. A poor diet causes obesity, for example. I’m a big fan of Jamie Oliver’s work to reduce childhood obesity and would be a fool not to recognize that a poor diet contributes to this national epidemic. But we need to openly consider other complexities that may exacerbate the problem per individual child. Human behavior is not mechanistic and is therefore not subject to the same laws of causality that govern the physical world. In light of this truth we need to take to heart the following:
1. People are not machines. We’re infinitely more capable and complicated. The adversity that caused Johnny 99 to go on a shooting spree could drive another person to start a software company.
2. Postulating causes for human behavior is natural. But postulating and attributing are two very different things. It is natural to form an educated guess. It is limiting to relationships to assume we know the source of another’s behavior.
3. Even if we could know with confidence why someone does something, this does not mean we now know what to do about it.
4. When human behavior persists despite an onslaught of effort and resources we may, in our disheartened state, concede that the problem surpasses our ability. Were we to be more inquisitive and less hasty to claim with conviction that we know the cause, I believe our efforts would prevail.
Best that we engage with people, behold and study them, serve their core needs to be seen, known, and empowered. Being authentically interested is the charge we must accept. Over time, with keen insight we may come to better understand be-cause.
Who Changed You?
March 30th, 2010
Susan was a junior at Knoxville High School. She was obese. She abused a variety of drugs. Her grades were terrible. She didn’t take good care of herself. One day the basketball coach invited her to film each of the varsity team’s games. Susan accepted his invitation. That season, whether they were playing at home or traveling to other schools, Susan was part of the team. The coach soon noticed a transformation in Susan’s character and behavior. She lost weight, raised her grade point average, started taking care of her physical appearance, and stopped using drugs.
While I can’t know all the factors playing into Susan’s transformation, what I suspect did not change her were the usual methods we employ to improve adolescent health: curricula, demonstrations, lectures, interventions and such. The coach handed Susan so much more than a camera, and so much less than a battery of prevention techniques. He saw, appreciated, honored, and trusted her.
Why do human relationships change us? How do relationships change us? Imagine knowing someone well—a former coach, a classmate, a teacher, a neighbor. We can’t prevent ourselves from being impacted by this person any more than we can keep from making our own impact on him or her. It’s the nature of human interactions. We are changed and go about changing others through some means of connection we’ve formed with the people in our lives.
I encourage you to ask yourself a question at the deepest level possible: Who made the greatest positive difference in my life as an adolescent? You may remember a coach who believed in you, a parent who, despite your highs and lows, stood by your side, or a teacher who inspired you to be more than you thought possible. Who was this person? What about her changed your life? What would you say to this person now? If you could thank her, what would you thank her for?
You may be one, and you aren’t alone, who didn’t have anyone there to support you during this critical time in your life. You may have always craved the consistent presence of a compassionate adult who was there to cheer you on. Describe that person. How would you want that person to support and encourage you? What things would he have done to impress upon you his firm belief in you? Write these things down. Make your description as specific as possible.
This exercise leads us to a second question: How can you be this person you just described to the teens in your life? I will venture a guess that the person or people who influenced you did not do so by virtue of what they said. Sure, you may recall some profound comments. But what made the words profound was the quality of the person who said them to you. They were profound because they were spoken in the context of a relationship. The trusted connection between you is what unalterably affected you for life.