Article Review
After reading the excerpt from Leo Buscaglia's book Living, Loving, Learning below please reflect on your thoughts and feelings.
The following questions were created to be thought provoking: (you do not have to answer them all but they may aid you in your responses/reflections)
1) What were some of the AHA's (ideas that stood out to you) that you encountered?
2) How can you utilize this information in your classroom to improve student learning?
3) Do you feel/think that this excerpt from the 1970's is still true today? Where have we improved in education since this article was written? Where have we slipped?
4) What do agree with? What points do you question?
5) Please comment on one other course members comments
**Click on comments to read and leave your personal ideas**
YOU MEAN A RABBIT CAN BE TAUGHT TO FLY?
As an individual you must not be satisfied with just becoming like everybody else.
By Leo Buscaglia, Ph.D.
Busscaglia: "I teach seminars in graduate school. It's amazing how people have learned to parrot by then."
A rabbit, bird, fish, squirrel, duck and so on, all decided to start a school. The rabbit insisted that running had to be in the curriculum. The bird insisted that flying be in the curriculum. The fish insisted that swimming be in the curriculum. The squirrel insisted that perpendicular trees climbing be in the curriculum.
All the other animals wanted their specialty to be in the curriculum, too, so they put everything in and then made the glorious mistake of insisting that all the animals take all of the courses. The rabbit was magnificent in running; nobody could run like the rabbit. But they insisted that it was good intellectual and emotional discipline to teach the rabbit flying. So they insisted that the rabbit learned to fly and they put her on this branch and said, "Fly, rabbit!" And the poor old thing jumped off, broke her leg and fractured her skull. She became brain-damaged and then she couldn't run very well, either.
The same way with the bird -- she could fly like a freak all over the place, do loops and loops, and she was making an A. But they insisted that this bird burrow holes in the ground like a gopher. Of course she broke her wings and everything else, and then she couldn't fly.
We know this is wrong, yet nobody does anything about it. You may be a genius. You may be one of the greatest writers in the world, but you can't get into a university unless you can pass trigonometry. For what? Look at the list of drop outs: William Faulkner, John F. Kennedy, Thomas Edison. They couldn't face school. "I don't want to learn perpendicular tree climbing. I'm never going to climb perpendicularly. I'm a bird. I can fly to the top of the tree without having to do that."
"Never mind, it's good discipline."
As an individual, you must not be satisfied with just becoming like everybody else. You must think for yourself. For example, art supervisors. I can remember when they used to come to my classroom in elementary school, and I'm sure you can remember it, too. You were given a paper, and the teacher would put up the drawing in front of you and you were really excited. It was going to be art time. You had all the crayolas in front of you, and you folded your hands and you waited. And soon the art teacher would come running in, because she had been to fourteen other classrooms that day teaching art. She ran in, and she'd huff and puff and she'd say, "Good morning girls and boys. Today we are going to draw a tree." And all the kids would say, "Goody, we're going to draw a tree!" And then she'd get up there with a green crayola and she'd draw this great big green thing. And then she put a brown base on it and a few blades of grass. And she'd say, "There is a tree." And all the kids would look at it and they'd say, "That isn't a tree. That's a lollipop." But she said that was a tree, and then she's pass out these papers and say, "Now, draw a tree." She didn't really say, "Draw a tree" -- she said, "Draw my tree." And the sooner you found out that's what she meant and could reproduce this lollipop and hand it to her, the sooner you would get an A.
But here was little Janie who knew that wasn't a tree, because she'd seen a tree such as this art teacher had never experienced! So she got magenta, and orange, and blue, and purple, and green, and she scribbled all over her page and happily brought it up and gave it to the teacher. She looked at it and said, "Oh my God...."
How long does it take somebody to realize that what they're really saying is, "To pass, I want you to reproduce my tree." And so it goes through the first grade, second, third and right on into seminars in graduate school. I teach seminars in graduate school. It's amazing how people have learned to parrot by then. Think? Don't be ridiculous. They can give you the facts, verbatim, just as you've given it to them. And you can't blame those students, because that's what they've been taught. You say to them, "Be creative," and they're fearful. And so what happens to our uniqueness; what happens to our tree? All this beautiful uniqueness has gone right down the drain. Everybody is like everybody else, and everybody is happy. R.D. Laing says, "we are satisfied when we've made people like ourselves out of our children.
Excerpted from the book, LIVING, LOVING & LEARNING by Leo Buscaglia
1) What were some of the AHA's (ideas that stood out to you) that you encountered?
ReplyDeleteSuccess is not always directly related to academic achievement. “You’ll never get anywhere in life if you don’t learn this” didn’t apply to Faulkner, Kennedy, Edison as the article lists as well as many, many others.
2) How can you utilize this information in your classroom to improve student learning?
This reminds me that the students are different animals. Not all of them are of the kind that is going to be utilizing Spanish on a regular basis throughout life. Therefore, I have to remember to teach them what they will need to use, mainly responsibility. This is why I often remind them that taking a foreign language makes you more articulate in your own language, so even if they don’t see themselves using Spanish in the future, they will not have studied it for nothing.
3) Do you feel/think that this excerpt from the 1970's is still true today? Where have we improved in education since this article was written? Where have we slipped?
I never felt I had to parrot in order to succeed in a class. Perhaps I am just lucky. I can even remember many teachers telling us that they didn’t want parrots. I always felt assured I was allowed to disagree as long as I could back up my points with logical support. Since most of my schooling was in the 80’s, perhaps this is a sign that we have improved. In contrast, perhaps one area in which we haven’t improved is that we maintain this one-size-fits-all model that we’ve had for about two centuries. Are we still failing to see that we have a variety of animals with distinct skills and needs coming into our schools?
4) What do agree with? What points do you question?
I agree we need to assess what are the strengths and needs of each animal that comes to our school. The birds will not learn climbing well and the rabbits will not likely learn to fly. However, we are not teaching animals, rather humans. Maybe Faulkner didn’t need to know trigonometry in order to be a success, but a diploma would have been a help toward him getting a job so he could feed himself while he was writing his first book. We should not teach only math to the students who have math skills and only music to the students who have music skills.
I read this article in the past and thought it was great. We really need to start looking at the students as individuals and help them to learn in the style that is best for them. I teach 3 different levels of Algebra and must differentiate as the classes are leveled. Within each class I further look at each individual student as best I can and continue to change the lesson and work based on individual knowledge. I know teachers though that teach the same lesson day in and day out to every class. They say it is too hard to reach all of the students the way their class is set up (no leveling). To some extent this may be true – but you still have to do something to get the students interested in learning more than they already know. I have students tell me that they text throughout certain classes. I ask why and the response is that the class is boring. These students are above average in intelligence and are BORED?!? What a shame. Teachers say that they can’t make a student do additional work above and beyond what other students are doing. I say yes you can, it is all about motivation to learn and get better. We need to get better at bringing the unique talents of the individuals to the forefront. Let the students know that learning is a good thing and that wasting time is not going to get them to a better place. Teachers know the material now they need to know the students better and that means building relationships wherever possible. I for one do not want my students to just spit out the answer from the book without some thought on how to get there. There are many ways to solve a math problem and I want the students to know my way may not be their way – but they can both be right.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Donovan that although our students may not need to know the subject that we are teaching but that the idea of learning will help them in ways that are not directly related to the subject at hand. Perhaps they don’t see themselves using Algebra with x’s and y’s but the fact is they are going to use Math everyday in their lives one way or another.
I liked the article. I felt that yes, some teachers take away the creativity of their students. They should be able to create their own tree instead of copying the teachers. That shows so much about each of your students uniquenesses. We as teachers need to teach from the curriculum and standards, but we can add extra flair to it. We can also cheer our students on when they are growing with their strengths. But, we can motivate and encourage them with their weaknesses.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me that not all students that are well-rounded individuals will fit perfectly and enjoy a particular subject. They are unique in their own way and we need to accept and encourage that! We also need to expose each student to different cultures and backgrounds as well.
I feel we are still doing what we did years ago, however we have improved at meeting our student's individual needs. We have also improved with guided reading and provide the reading level that is appropriate for each child's needs. I feel that we still need to continue to meet all the individual needs of our students, sometimes we do slip in that area. We also need to keep updated on technology and teaching our students with the latest.
I feel we need to assess each and every student that comes into our classroom so we can meet their individual needs throughout the year. I don't agree with the fact that kids that are talented in music should only take music and the kids that do well in math should only be in math classes. I do feel that they should be exposed to it all and be well- rounded. They can excel in certain areas of interest.
I agree with Jen about how we need to look at each students individual learning style and teach to it the best way that we can to meet the needs of all of our students.
ReplyDelete1) What were some of the AHA's (ideas that stood out to you) that you encountered?
ReplyDeleteI agree that students can be very successful without mastery of every subject. It reminds me of when a student finally gets to high school and can develop a program that works best for them- individually.
2) How can you utilize this information in your classroom to improve student learning?
To remember to seek out what students can do. To also remember the importance of letting them figure out things for themselves or with partners, rather than always being told by their teachers what is the right way to do something.
3) Do you feel/think that this excerpt from the 1970's is still true today? Where have we improved in education since this article was written? Where have we slipped?
I think there is certainly some truth to this article. We have improved in education since this article by acknowledging that students have different ways of learning and different strengths. We have slipped in that there is so much more to teach children- including technology and there are so many ways we assess students. We are also responsible for exposure in all areas- so that students know what they are capable of.
4) What do agree with? What points do you question? I agree that some students are not capable of mastering some subjects...I don't know how we can know their strengths and weaknesses unless we try and expect that they can learn. I can't tell you how many times in kindergarten I hear the words "I can't"..it is my job as an educator to teach them and help them to try, because if you don't try... of course you can't do something.
5) Please comment on one other course members comments
I agree with Alice in that we need to try to develop well rounded children and understand that not all kids will master all subjects.