Wild, Courageous Learning

I love being an educator. I love being a teacher, and I love being a head of the Junior School. I am quick to proudly tell people who ask that teaching, as a career, has given me far more than I have given it. The opportunity to transform the lives of others, and to help create a future of possibility, is one that makes even the hard things that teachers do worth it.

I recently read the following by Issy Butson, author of the Stark Raving Dad blog that I love to regularly check, as it captures a bold and courageous expression of taking the art of teaching to the edge, to allow for the learners we engage with to find new ground, to create something unseen and to sense the world the way it might be.

Here’s to the wild ones.

The restless, loud ones. The rule bending, breaking ones. The ones we tell to sit down, slow down, quiet down, calm down, back down.

Here’s to letting them run, jump, shout, scream, laugh and sing. To letting them drift, imagine and daydream.

Here’s to giving them the space and grace to learn when they’re ready. To taking the weight of tests, benchmarks and grades off their shoulders.

Here’s to giving them a say in what they spend their time on and who they spend their time with.

Here’s to celebrating their questions more than their answers.

Here’s to throwing open the doors.

Here’s to setting them free.

https://starkravingdadblog.com/

While it resembles some ‘Steve Jobs-esque’ language at Apple, it is relevant and provocative, as independent school education in 2021 wrestles to hold in tension the preconceptions of parents, and the requirements of university entrance, with everything that neuroscience and psychology tells us makes powerful, engaging and transformational learning.

Alfie Kohn writes in The Schools Our Children Deserve (2000): 'I don't think I've ever met a child who wasn't motivated to figure things out, to find the answers to personally relevant questions. However, I've met (and taught) plenty of kids who aren't motivated to sit quietly and listen to someone else talk or to memorize the definitions of a list of words. That lack of interest doesn't suggest an absence of motivation (to be remedied with carrots and sticks) but a problem with the model of instruction or with the curriculum.'

What sparks motivation to figure things out and to find answers? Insight, thought, ideas and engagement lead to care, compassion, creativity, collaboration and commitment. Over the course of this weekend, there are two powerful events happening within the ACT that celebrate and support the power of education and are available to our learners.

Firstly, Radford College is proud to present, host and make possible the Dirrum Festival on Friday and Saturday evenings. See www.dirrumfestival.org. Dirrum is embodied in purpose and intent to inspire and lead ourselves and others to engage on common ground. There are handpicked and curated speakers that will embrace the theme, Stepping Stones For A Better Tomorrow. The Dirrum Festival will include market and food stalls and and will be packed with entertainment.

Secondly, TEDx Canberra is on this weekend. A part of my personal and professional contribution to education and ideas cultivation has been to volunteer and help with not-for-profit TEDx events, in Qld and now in the ACT. It is a great opportunity for our older students to experience courageous and committed Canberrans making an impact in their fields of study and interests.

We live in a world at a time when opportunities to create a better future for those to follow rely on education and purpose. The more we can support our young people to move from insight to co-regulation to self-regulation, gaining fulfillment from meaningful learning and work, the stronger our community, country and planet can be.

It is exciting to be at Radford College where we are committed to giving our students the best possible post-school opportunities through relevant, contextual and powerful learning.

Andy Gordon

Deputy Principal Head of Junior School

References:

Retrieved from https://starkravingdadblog.com/

Retrieved from www.dirrumfestival.org

Kohn, Alfie. (2000). The Schools Our Children Deserve. Mariner Books, Boston.