Powerful Invitation to Learning

I heard the dearest thing today. A young mom, a teacher, who had been struggling with the concept of expanding her approach, began to notice her child’s play. A scientist herself, she noticed that the process in which the baby explored his world was the same process replicated by scientists. A profound discovery, this knowledge of how we learn by exploration, observation, trial and error, changed the teacher deeply. She decided to apply what she learned about scientific inquiry to her approach with her students.

Christine Chaille and Lory Britain are working on the third edition of The Young Child as Scientist. The first edition was published in 2002, and while an easy read, is a highly regarded textbook in early childhood education.

The book clearly illustrated the concept of “constructivism,” and provided activities and materials to encourage the innate curiosity of children. It demonstrated the process of developing a theory by repeated testing. The tenets of the book are applicable to children of all ages; indeed, teachers use the same process as they collect data from student learning to design instruction. Constructivism is a theory, but also a fundamental strategy in all learning. Thoughtful teachers provide materials for exploration, encourage theory building and testing, and see the process evident in their own learning.

I wonder: how can we better support students and teachers to expand the constructivist approach in all classrooms and professional development to ensure that students are learning from the inside out?

The View from Below: The Witness as Guide to Being with Children.

Ram Dass offers wisdom for those who interact with young children, although that is not his purpose:  ” The witness place inside you is simple awareness, the part of you that is aware of everything — just noticing, watching, not judging, just being present, being here now.”

In my role of “grammy,”  I am very aware of how easy it is for me to find that witness place in myself as I play with my little one.  Teachers and and parents are, by role, responsible for more than simply “being with” the child;  they make and enforce rules and agendas by nature of their jobs.  And yet, there is nothing more important in being with a child than finding that space to be a witness.  It is the place from which they show us how best to help them grow.

A memory of my first child is indelibly etched in my mind, as a moment of witness.  We were piling into the car, and I had just strapped her little brother into his car seat.  Jenny stopped, seemingly frozen, as she prepared to climb in.  I’m not sure where I found the presence to ask her why she had stopped instead of rushing her in.  She replied, unabashedly:  “Mommy, the elephant has to get in first.”  Of course!  Why would I not know that?

If we stop and wait and listen enough as we abide by young children, we contact that wise witness in ourselves.  We see another layer of reality as life.  Childhood and the mystical have much in common.

Too much quiet: When child care and child management go awry…

Quiet.  That is what many adults think of as the outcome of excellent child management.  Echoes of “Children should be seen but not heard” remain, despite reams of research establishing the importance of conversation in learning.  Teachers are evaluated on the noise levels of their classrooms.  Administrators take a quick peak to see if students are “on task”  sometimes neglecting to see what the value of the task might actually be.

My thoughts today are not on classrooms, although the hustle and conversation found in classroom in which children are actively engaged is the goal of my work.

My thoughts today are with parents of young children, upon whose shoulders mighty tasks have been foisted.  Read my blog from yesterday to get a glimpse of the conflicts involved in being a full time, working outside-of-the house mother.  Having spent four years at home with two “under 5’s”  I sympathize with full time, working inside-of-the-house parents as well.  As I watch parents today, their children sitting in traffic, watching TV from the back seat or sitting in restaurants mesmerized by ipads, I wonder, “Would I have bartered an electronic device for a little peace and quiet?”  My conclusion is that quiet is a slippery slope.

In a classroom, quiet as a goal can stifle learning through conversation, cutting off one of the brain’s most effective strategies for learning.  Excellent schools cultivate cultures that foster conversation and collaboration, and skilled teachers recognize the difference between chatting and learning.

Parents face a different situation.  At the end of a long day, or in the race to get out the door, parents are often forced to be focused on cooperation of a large number of variables:  pets, kids, groceries, meals, errands, getting to school/work on time.  Quiet children are an asset to facilitate the tasks of day to day living, no argument.  But at what cost?

Sometimes what is expedient is harmful;  sometimes not.  Children’s brains are programmed to explore and interact with their world.  Every situation, every interaction, provides a child with an opportunity to learn.  Mealtime is socialization time as well as learning time.  I’m sure everyone has heard of the studies of the importance of family mealtime in the cultivation of Rhodes scholars;  I doubt it included ipads or iPhones at the table!

Cognitive and social growth, problem-solving, delayed gratification, boredom, frustration, disappointment…are all connected.  How we foster problem-solving in our children to deal with boredom, frustration, and disappointment teaches our children more than how to sit through a meal.  The tools of learning involved lay the groundwork for the skills they will need for a lifetime.

Some of us have decided to make our homes a “media-free” zone for our grandchildren, succumbing to the overwhelming reality that current parents cannot establish old-fashioned boundaries with media.

But my real hope is that despite our busy lives and the temptations provided by increasingly accessible media, our newest parents can hold the line.  Our media-rich world holds the promise of connecting our globe and each other in ways we cannot even yet imagine; that is a good thing.

But in our interactions with each other we must never lose sight of the importance of humanness, person to person.  Organizations such as “Echo Parenting” and “Common Sense Media” are resources for parents who seek to parent with quality.  We won’t be able to be media free, nor would we want to be; but a least let us be conscious in our decisions to bring media into the daily lives of children.

Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/60034894@N06/5526380950/.

Empathy: A timely topic.

I find it impossible to maintain both a sour disposition and the full presence of the ocean.  In the same way that our own, small, human experiences disappear in the presence of nature, empathy for another human being is transformative.

Empathy can be painful for us as we view the tragedies that play out in the world. At any given moment, our hearts can be filled with grief, causing us to feel vulnerable and impotent.  However, when armed with full understanding of the power of empathy, we can move out into the world with a commitment to shine our mirror neurons into the light.  Empathy implies “shape-shifting” or finding a way to view the world in a new way.

“We worry about our traditional literacy rates, but we should be more worried, I think, about our emotional literacy, our ability to connect to ourselves and one another. In schools, we teach children to read, but if we don’t teach them to relate to others, they will be lost in life—lost in their relationships, they will not have success in their jobs, and we will not have peace in the world.”  — Mary Gordon, founder of Roots of Empathy, a program that brings babies into the classroom to cultivate empathy in children, http://www.rootsofempathy.org/.

What is empathy?  Research is still filling in the blanks about this mysterious and necessary human trait, but most agree that empathy reflects a person’s ability to feel the emotions or understand the perspective of another.  Some forms of empathy are innate, displaying as soon as we are born!  Newborns reflect the moods of their caregivers or cry in response to the cries of other babies. Newly discovered “mirror neurons” allow us to internalize emotional states of others. Our own  personal growth capacities allow us to be compassionate rather than responding to another person’s emotional state with criticism or our own upset. Our wiring for empathy may be in our DNA. Fraser and Bugnyar found that ravens observing a conflict offered consolation to the victim.

Children raised with empathic parents seem to grow up to be empathic adults. My good friend and professional colleague, Kelly Priest, reminds us that autistic children can benefit from therapies such as Social Thinking, by Michelle Garcia Winner, that cultivate skills in shared perspective taking (http://not-that-special.com/2012/12/25/they-lack-empathy/).  Autistic children, says Priest, possess empathy but may have difficulty expressing it.

Mirror neurons explain the phenomenon of shared moods, paving the way for either raising or lowering the emotions of a work or social situation.  As we become more sensitive to our own moods, more self-reflective of our own inner worlds, often referred to as “resilience,” we acquire skills in shaping the world around us.

Perhaps counter to our own expectations, Lisa Sideris tells us that the most resilient, adaptive individuals are those who have experienced challenges in their lives and identify as “survivors.”  People who acquire the traits of “flexibility, sociability, confidence, and curiosity” as a result of physical and mental trauma, according to Sideris, have the inside track on developing empathy.  Education and exposure to those outside our own cultural identities also expand empathy.

Empathy, when carried into action, allows us to contribute to our families, our work, and our society.  Empathy in action brings us closer to people in our daily lives and allows us to contribute in socially meaningful ways.  As a young dancer, my teacher cautioned:  “Bring in foul energy and you pollute us all;  bring in bright energy and you contribute to everyone’s experience.”  She described the power of empathy in action.  Walk into the business meeting with confidence and “good vibes” and you bring the possibility of a positive outcome.  Find the right word to change a trying family moment; transform tension to humor.

We can even embody empathy for our planet, thus cultivating habits that benefit everyone.  Keep bags in your car to bring to the market;  walk when you can;  turn off the water while brushing your teeth.

Empathy.  I see you, I feel you, I empower your life and mine.  Doesn’t that sound like a good start for a new year?

Life is Grand!

If you don’t recognize the photo, it’s a sunrise on Lake Michigan taken from a hotel in Chicago.  Chicago, it seems, is a part of my heart, as someone dear to me lives there.  I’m not in Chicago and did not take the photo; my husband did, and emailed it to me in DC.  He went there when I left for a long-needed vacation with a dear friend.  It seems a part of my heart lives in DC as well.  And in Oregon, and in Las Vegas.  In fact, if I tally it all  up, parts of my heart are in Alaska, Texas, Canada, San Francisco, St. Louis, San Luis Obispo, Ukraine, Minnesota, North County San Diego, Mexico, and all over nooks and crannies of the Los Angeles area.

Our hearts are amazingly expandable.  I can sit here looking out into the forest and feel my heart in all those places, seeing the faces of loved ones and friends and flashes of memories.  When I choose to spend time and money to see them, I’m recharged; but when I’m focused on other things, I can tune into my love-line, visualizing the beautiful faces and locales. Like pearls on a necklace, they shine brightly.

Vacations give us a change of perspective if we are willing to move with the energy of newness. The energy of newness is slow energy. Being here in DC, along with the reddening trees, my pace is slow, even slower  than my newly crafted, self-employed life has offered me the chance to be.  Slow energy is something I experienced as a dancer. Slow energy is not lazy energy;  as a dancer I moved all day, first in modern, then in folk, then swimming for a change of pace, and lastly in the studio for choreography or a master class.  Slow energy is being fully alive and at the same time present to mind, body, and spirit. Slow energy crawls up our bodies from the center of the earth, grounding us with intention.   Slow energy is different from LA, fast-paced energy, the kind that makes us believe that we must get so many things done in a day.  On vacation I set aside more of my “shoulds” and move more akin  with my dancing self, with more intention and less restriction.  Although my home provides me with the beach and beautiful weather,  I seem to allow daily life to  intrude on my real appreciation of the kind of presence provided by slow energy.

Today is day six of my vacation.  It’s been a long time since I have been away from home without a work agenda for an extended length of time, and three more days are to come!  I’m able to make this time available to myself firstly because I ask for it, secondly because I have a wonderfully understanding husband, and thirdly because I have a kind and generous friend who shares her home with me for as long as I like.  It’s easy to step into slow energy surrounded by the greenery, the freedom to plan my days minute by minute, and the patience and ease of a truly open hostess.

As I sit here, my fantasy becomes one in which all of my special people, all over the world, can know one another and see each other as I see them.  Next, the locus of the fantasy as me, becomes a many faceted matrix composed of each of them as the center of their own wonderful, heart-opening lives.  I imagine the world, criss-crossed by the fabric of human compassion, lit by one face and one snapshot at a time the movement of loving energy all over the planet.   I wonder if I can bring home awareness of the peace and love I feel as I sit here alone, filled with the slow, purposeful, and intentional energy that follows us everywhere we go!