(Bear in mind this entry is as much about adult training and education as any other type:)
When I was in high school, I was a pretty good student in most subjects. This was partly because I am a good “test taker.” I could actually look at a test and have a sense of the psychological profile of the person who designed the test.
There were some subjects, however, that I was just awful at. One of them was algebra.
I have no issue with algebra per se but I was always asking a question back then to which I never received much of a response. My question was, “Why do I have to learn this?”
My question finally made it up to a senior level manager (aka the assistant principal), and with a perfectly straight face he said, “because the state requires that every student have 2 years of algebra in order to graduate.”
That answer was good enough for him, but not for me. Ok, so the state requires it. Well then, WHY does the state require it? What good does this do ME?
Fact is, if someone had given me a good reason for learning that stuff I might have had an entirely different approach, i.e., I might have actually sat down and figured it out instead of deeming it as useless and focusing all effort on avoiding it and passing it with as little work as possible.
There is a common belief out there that people are just always automatically eager to learn anything and everything. (I know a lot of people in the classical music industry who can’t comprehend why people don’t flock to their concerts nightly. Marketing, to them, seems redundant and unnecessary. A request for justifying the expense of their services is deemed an affront.) I can’t tell you how often I have seen conductors give a talk on some arcane point of musicology to a group of 7th graders. They just assumed the audience would be interested. Disaster always followed. In such instances, the audience’s lack of interest, not the presentation, is always blamed.
It is a very common presumption to think that just because you think your product, book, service, or hobby is interesting to you, it is going to be interesting to other people. This isn’t necessarily the case.
Sorry to tell you this, but my brain is full, and I have learned to be selective about the information I allow in that limited space in my cranium. If you want me to learn something, if you have tips to share, please don’t assume that I will passively sit back and study or focus on anything just because you think I ought to know it or it interests you or “the state requires it.” If you don’t do an effective “pitch” for WHY that information is useful to me, you should not be surprised if you get an apathetic pushback. It’s not the audience’s fault for not understanding you. It was your fault for not respecting their perspective. There is a big difference between an audience not being able to understand you and an audience just not interested in your topic, but most people always assume it’s the former when it’s almost always the latter.
When I get up to give a talk, well, it is true, the typical audience will give me a lot of leeway for 5 minutes or so. But if I really want them to pay attention and learn anything, it isn’t enough to just put the info out on a table. I have to justify the expense– i.e., the mental energy expense– of learning it. I need to give a definite prediction of ROI. “Here is why you need to learn this, this is why this will help you.” And the best reason is that it's fun.
One must also overcome the fear of new information, but that’s for another blog.
Many people assume that the job of teaching is to make the information easily digestible, and making it all nice and orderly and organized– hence, dull PowerPoint slides ad nauseum abound. Actually, most of the time, all you need to do is explain to people the benefit of learning something, and if the benefit is tangible, they will immediately go out and learn it themselves, and will only ask you for bits and pieces of coaching as needed.
It’s harder to monetize this system, I admit. If you say 18 words and everyone bolts out of the room to go figure the thing out on their own, how can you charge for that? But I still say this approach is always better, and every superior teacher I ever had used this approach. If you ignite curiosity, permit use of innate problem solving skills, and add a dash of resources, whoosh. Stand back.
One could almost make an argument that the reason this approach is not used generally is because we don’t want certain populations to excel.
Believing in your students’ ability to figure things out for themselves is a big leap. Putting the onus on yourself to not just have command of the material but also demanding of yourself that you be able to convince your customer/students of the value and usefulness of the material is something not required of most teachers or presenters–but the best ones do it all the time. Education, or information, is a product that has to be marketed like any other. Teaching is a sales job.
© Justin Locke
