Thursday, April 2, 2009

Do You Learn? (or do you just Teach?)




Are you a lifelong learner?  What is the last thing that you learned?  Was it an "ouch that hurt - no more touching the pokey thing" kind of learning or was it something that you went out learned on purpose?  What was the last thing that you learned on purpose - not because you had to but because you were curious?

Be careful how you answer that question because you might not like the answer.  I didn't really.  Yes I am a lifelong learner.  Yes I learn on purpose.  (Yes I also learn from the painful, pokey things too.)  But what fires me up and keeps me up at night researching and learning?  My hobbies and my projects.  That would be awesome - if I were retired - but I am not.  Don't get me wrong.  I do a lot of work related research/reading as well.  I love new ideas (well new to me is good enough).  But I can put work research down.  I can put it off until a little later.  When I get off on a new project/hobby tangent - look out.  I pour through everything I can find about it.  Why am I not quite as obsessed about my work?

I just got back from a PD day.  I did not go for myself.  I went as tech support for some of my coworkers.  Boy is it ever fun to watch other people excited about learning something!  In the days leading up to it they were worried about it and not too excited about the ideas (involving computers).  As the day went on they forgot their fears and got really involved in what they were learing.  And then they got overloaded.  Even overloaded they were rushing to see how quickly they could use what they learned in the classroom.  I really enjoyed being there in that environment.

So go out there and learn something.  Do it on purpose.


Photo credit Bill Mosely

1 comment:

Ryan Nickell said...

I think it is our duty to learn of purpose. If we want our students to become life long learners...well, you know where I'm going with this. Sometimes I find myself thinking that my teaching job takes up all of my time and I have no time to learn. Hmmm, that would mean I am not doing my job...