Harry Pollard wrote:
Karen,
You know the old saw about either giving a hungry man a fish, or
teaching him how to fish.
'Tis the same with kids. You can either "larn" them - or you can teach
them how to learn.
My experience in observing hundreds of high school is that there is not
much learning how to learn involved in education. For example they don't
learn how to use the library, they "do" library.
An important part of learning how to learn is the urge to learn. This is
dampened rather than enthused in the modern high school.
[snip]
This sounds good to me. But how far are you willing to go?
As a child, every assignment that was imposed on me just
stifled me and ultimately made me resentful.
Every grade taught me that
people could hurt me, which my parents had already
amply demonstrated. I'm not sure what would have been
best for me, but one option would have been to make
me a member of the faculty
(at age, e.g., 12 if not earlier...)
so I could teach instead
of stew.
It probably doesn't prove anything that
finally at age about 45 I got an opportunity to do a
major project 100% my way (my dissertation), and I
*loved* it. Maybe I needed to be tortured for
45 years in order to be able to learn at age 45? (I
doubt this, but it is possible, just like the big
spot on Jupiter may have been the thing that enabled
me to do my dissertation....)
My point is that there are *exceptions* out there,
and, unless one wants to repeat the lesson of
Bertolt Brecht's play _The Exception and the Rule_
(which I will be glad to explain if anyone needs to
learn it because it is a very important lesson),
then one may need to do very unusual things with
very unusual people.
**************** SEXY *******************
Are you into nurturing young persons' sexual
pleasure? If not, then please have the decency
to not use the word "sexy" in this context.
There are at least 2 kinds of sexual abuse. One
kind has been in the news a lot these days. But there
is another kind which gets off on repressing the
child's sexuality. In all sincerity, if I could
have been sure I would not get a venereal disease
from it, I would rather have been raped by my
teachers than repressed as I was by them. I mean
this entirely seriously. Never again.
\brad mccormick
--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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