Bird Droppings July 6, 2010
Trying to see the world with a narrow lens
and or Doing is the way to learn

“You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird… So let’s look at the bird and see what it’s doing — that’s what counts. I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.” Richard Feynman, US educator & physicist (1918 – 1988)

My wife often picks on my old seventies glasses I used to wear, big wide lenses and frames. I recently went and got a new prescription and more modern frames and lenses much smaller, lighter and narrower. I was sitting outside this morning and perhaps it was the darkness. My field of vision is such I was seeing the entire frame around the lens in my glasses. It is hard to explain. My old glasses with the big wide lens I did not see the edges of the frame and lens as I am now. In these smaller narrower frames I can see the edges and am forced to view through a much narrower field. In my researching of Richard Feynman I have a feeling his view of the world was far beyond anything I could imagine. He opposed rote learning or unthinking memorization and other teaching methods that emphasized form over function. In his classes students had to see what the bird was doing and often the bird was a problem in quantum physics.
Walking in the doors of most any school you will find many teachers wearing very narrow glasses in terms of their attitude about education. They have a clear and concise view of what they are there to do and how they will do it period.

“How to teach, is to create possibilities for the construction and production of knowledge rather than be engaged simply in a game of transferring knowledge.” Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of freedom

Over the past few years as mandated testing has pushed school systems and state education programs into a teach to the test mentality it becomes difficult to be creative as state and federal mandates require students to achieve increasingly higher scores on specific tests, be it subject matter, and end of course tests and or graduation tests. So often teachers narrow their view so as to keep a job as far too often schools and systems look at the success rate of teachers based on test scores.

“The teacher who does not respect the students curiosity in its diverse aesthetic, linguistic, and syntactical expression; who uses irony to put down legitimate questioning (recognizing that freedom is not absolute, that it requires of its nature certain limits); who is respectfully present in the educational experience of the student, transgresses fundamental ethical principles of the human condition.” Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of freedom

So often many teachers limit the classroom to their own view or to the view of the text and teachers manual. A classroom should be about opening doors and windows not closing them. I got into a discussion while do some prints at a photo kiosk at a local retail store. I was using up my free digital prints coupons and got into a discussion with a young mother. She was not sending her daughter when she was old enough to public school because she did not want her exposed to all that went on. I explained my kids went to public school and immediately she responded and what kind of jobs were they able to get when they got out, she was assuming no kids went to college from our high school. She was surprised when I told her one had graduated from Georgia Tech and was now a chemical engineer, one had just graduate from Piedmont College and was going into the teaching field in biology, and one will be a senior at Mercer University going into nursing.
She responded she did not realize very many went on to college from our local high school. I proudly informed her about 71% went on to higher education. She proceeded to tell me she wanted her daughter to go to a “Christian School” and learn the right things. I mentioned how restricting and limiting that was, she offered she would take her to soup kitchens to volunteer and to expose her to the other side of life. I thought back to my illustration that I use quite often of looking at life through a toilet tissue tube. That is a good experiment to try save a toilet tissue tube one day and look through it. It very much limits your vision of the world.

“Teachers who do not take their own education seriously, who do not study, who make little effort to keep abreast of events have no moral authority to coordinate the activities of the classroom.” Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of freedom

I recall a seasoned teacher who was searching diligently for the instruction manual and transparencies provided with a course materials for a class in world history. She was irate stating that she could not teach without it. It was only a few minutes before she was spouting off about having taught college and high school for forty years and of course world history for most of those. I thought to my self how could someone who has been around a class for so long be unable to teach a day or two unaided by props, especially props that are so restricting as textbook materials generally are. While she had three degrees all were forty years ago and she had done nothing since for her own education. I recall a statement by Henry David Thoreau. He left teaching to be a learner so that he could be a more effective teacher. Every day I set foot in a class as a learner I become a better teacher. I am increasing my own view of the world, getting a bigger lens so to say versus the mother who wants to restrict her daughters to a view to looking through a toilet tissue tube.

“The more critically one exercises one’s capacity for learning, the greater is ones capacity for constructing and developing what I call ‘epistemological curiosity,’ without which it is not possible to obtain a complete grasp of the subject of our knowledge.” Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of freedom

The more we can learn and be exposed to real learning the more we can acquire knowledge. While I am using my relatively new glasses at the moment and I am do for a check up for the longest time I was switching back and forth with my larger frames sort of getting used to them. I like the wide view seeing so much more. I wonder why parents want to limit their children’s view of the world and or teachers narrow the view down through their selection and delivering of material. There is so much out there to see and hear and experience. Please keep all in harms way on your mind and in your hearts.
namaste
bird