primalmommy@IVILLAGE.COM on sat 27 oct 01
Last sunday our Unitarian minister told the kids a story about a boy who, finding a chrysalis and wanting to help the butterfly emerge, carefully cut it open with a pair of dissecting scissors. The butterfly walked around, but never learned to fly; apparently it is the struggle to free itself from the cocoon that gives a monarch the strength of wing to fly.
It's tempting to hand kids easy successes instead of allowing them to struggle. Sometimes it is the compassion of the adult, sometimes the is ego that makes us wade in with quick answers and rescues. When my (homeschooled) kids ask me a question, even one I could "preach" a detailed answer for, (I love joyce's 'preachable moment' comment) I say, "I don't know. How could you find out?" They seek out their own books, librarians, doctors, websites, vets, professionals, experts, and ask their questions. Often they learn that there is more than one answer and they have to choose. A better lesson, I think, than "mommy (or teacher) knows everything and I don't know anything."
It isn't easy to watch a kid struggle and fail, when we could easily "fix it". Years ago my mom watched my baby try to climb up on the couch; she lifted him up, and he tried to get down. She lifted him down, and he wanted back up. I finally said, "mom, he doesn't want up or down; he wants to master climbing the couch." Helping is not always helping. Sometimes it's oversheltering, or underestimating.
I think one of the most freeing things a teacher (or parent) can hand a student is the freedom from being "goal focused". When a kid masters a skill, the victory -- and excitement -- is theirs. Then they raise the bar for themselves and want to do even BETTER. Unless we make it ours, by gushing, applauding, giving out gold stars; then it becomes another trick to do for the approving grown-up. When we croon and gasp over every crayon scribble or lumpy pot, we lovingly and with best intentions do three bad things:
1.) we emphasize the end product over the process that created it.
2.) we stall - or stop -- the process of growth and evolution, since kids think, "I did it right" and strive to repeat the scribble/pot that got the applause, and
3.) we set a precedent that the real world -- and we ourselves, in later years -- cannot sustain. Wil you make such a fuss over each of the 34,522 drawings presented for your fridge in the years to come? or the work of a six year old, ten, thirteen year old? All kids see is a shift from "OOOhhh! It's BYOO-tiful!" to a glance, and "uh-huh, that's nice." kid interpretation might be that whatever genius there once was either was lost... or was faked to begin with. They may discover the emptiness anyway when their weakest efforts get the same raves as their best.
Sometimes the best thing we can do is to back off, and give kids back their own struggles and victories. About touching: I do for my kid-wheel students what mel did for me: use their arm to center their pot, by pressing hard enough on the back of their elbow to show them what it takes. But if they want me to help with a pot, beyond the early hands-with-their-hands demos, I agree only if we can cut it in half afterward so I can show them what went on. Sometimes they say OK, sometimes they go ahead and work their pot into a collapse (one of the best learning experiences available.)
Disclaimer: these are not 30 kids with half an hour of art class and one shot ever at making a pot on the wheel. I still have my lumpy 4th grade wheel thrown wonder and was very proud of it. My students are back every other week month after month, and after the thrill of "I made something" is passed, they get much more process focused and want to learn to make something GOOD. I do whatever I can to encourage maximum use of the scrap bucket. If I praise at all, it's for persistence and hard work. I ask, don't tell, what is good and bad about their work.
We kid ourselves to think children need a bunch of external applause and grades/rewards to be proud when they do something well. And if a student has a bad day on the wheel, where nothing works and everything collapses, hey...they're that much closer to the life of a real potter. Hell, a real grown-up in any walk of life. Who rescues you when the kiln overfires? Who applauds when you wedge all that reclaim clay?
Another disclaimer: I mostly work with homeschooled kids, and there is less tension about touching/appropriateness than there might be in a traditional school setting. Very small children who spend a lot of hours away from family ARE vulnerable, and require a lot of (somewhat scary) training about stranger danger, abduction, molestation, etc... Parents are right to be worried when kids spend their days in the care of strangers, especially kids too little to fend for themselves.
Yours, Kelly in Ohio (who has personally requested -- and received -- a nice farewell bear hug from mel, though I never climbed in his lap...)
p.s. the philosophy of allowing kids their struggles is easier said than done when it's fear and sadness they struggle with... Tyler's 8, and in a few months time had a friend killed by a car, and saw the nation go to war with invisible enemies, and has temporarily lost his job of getting the mail from the mailbox because of anthrax danger... I explain what I can, admit when I can't, listen and hug, and allow him the time to greive and work up courage on his own... another one of those wing-building skills we'll all need in life.
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