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You
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Recommended Reading
The Power of Mindful Learning
by: Ellen J. Langer
Perseus Publishing, 1998
ISBN: 0201339919Take everything you have ever been taught about education, and throw it out. Look at everything in a new light, a mindful state. That seems to be Ellen Langer's plan in her new book, The Power of Mindful Learning. With the movement of returning to the basics at hand, Langer debunks the seven popular education myths:
1. The basics must be learned so well that they become second nature.
2. Paying attention means staying focused on one thing at a time.
3. Delaying gratification is important.
4. Rote memorization is necessary in education.
5. Forgetting is a problem.
6. Intelligence is knowing "what's out there."
7. There are right and wrong answers.
If the basics become second nature, then true learning stops taking place. Learners become so conditioned to seeing things a certain way, the "right" way, that they don't learn, don't challenge, don't question. Real learning takes place in a "mindful" environment, one that provides a context for the subject we are studying and allows us to bring something of ourselves into the process.
When speaking about her book to teachers in the Edmonds School District this fall, Langer told the story of watching someone set the table and put the fork on the right. The RIGHT? What was that person thinking? Everyone knows that the fork belongs on the left; then, she stopped herself. She had overlearned this fact and no longer doubted that sacred place of the fork on the table. Why did it belong on the left? There could be benefits to placing the fork on either side of the plate. Langer argues that teachers must teach facts conditionally to allow for doubt and more learning to take place.
She further illustrates this point with a study of two groups of piano students, one taught through repetition and memorization of scales, while the other encouraged to respond to their own thoughts and emotions. The second group ended up being more competent and more creative. Langer challenges educators to use this knowledge to rethink teaching.
This book is a great one for educators and learners alike. It teaches the reader to look at learning in a whole new way. Ellen Langer, Ph.D., is a Professor of Psychology at Harvard University.
Copyright © January 2000 New Horizons for Learning, all rights reserved.
http://www.newhorizons.org
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