"Can you imagine a fourth-grade class in America, alone, without a teacher, sitting there quietly and working on their lessons? I felt like my heart was being torn out. There was a fierceness in their desire to learn, despite how mightily everything was stacked against them.... I knew I had to do something." (pg. 32)
So my question is, how can we encourage our children, our nieces, nephews, the community at large to value education in our fame, fashion, sports, money, etc. obsessed society. I am pretty sure that everyone who visits here values education, or you wouldn't be bettering yourselves by reading and discussion, but how do we encourage the next generation to value these same things?? How do we make learning fun? Interesting? Any ideas? (I know there are a lot of educators out there...)
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This quote also reminded me of the book True Believer, by Virginia Woolf (I don't recommend the book, necessarily, but the writing was well done) which is about an African-American Girl who decides that she is going to go to college although no one in her family or in her building where she lives has ever done so, and her determination to pull herself out of the slums. If we don't have these obstacles in our life, can we still have a "fierceness in [our] desire to learn?" How? I feel like I have that, but I feel like I was born with it... can it be taught?
ReplyDeleteOne thing I have found... and I am certainly no expert... is that I have to go with the flow as far as WHAT my kids want to learn about. For a long time at trips to the library etc. I wanted my oldest son Jack to learn what I thought was important and good for him. I quickly learned that he was not interested. He only wanted to learn how to read after I taught him how to spell "Batman." Then it was "Superman." etc. I think at least at young ages it's just important to get them excited about learning in whatever interests them. If he has a question about something (which he ALWAYS seems to have) I try to stop what I'm doing it and answer it RIGHT THEN. Then if it's something we can learn more about later I try to teach him more. I know at some point he will need to learn things that aren't interesting to him, but at least for now I think I can just build on what he loves and hopefully it will help him be excited about learning. Am I off on this? Any thoughts?
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