Failure is a Valuable Learning Tool

Toddle –To walk with short, unsteady steps

By Amy Barr with The Lukeion Project 

    All three of my clever competent children have successfully made it to adulthood in one piece. When they were toddlers, I was not so sure they would cross that finish line. When children learn to walk and then go careening into their new world to explore, their development is nothing short of death-defying. There will be endless head-bonks. Gravity will be challenged. Cats, houseplants, fragile items, and parental patience will be fully tested. Learning to toddle out into the world requires trial and error. Success is almost certain unless a toddler is kept too safe. Trial and error are necessary.

Fast forward to a person’s school years when new challenges line up. Failures are not measured by toppled chairs or head bonks (at least not too often), but challenges remain necessary for those who want success.

Children who will learn to cook must be able to chop food (with a knife!) and use a stove. Those who take up a new instrument will experience plenty of sour notes. Everyone who wants to learn dance or to excel in gymnastics, will endure more than a few sore ankles and stubbed toes. Want to learn to ride a bike, use roller skates, master a skateboard, or play football? Get ready for bonks, bruises, and broken bits. It is normal. It is required! Nobody expects to be the top gymnast, execute a 180 heelflip, or score a winning touchdown before loads of challenging work and a stack of failures.

We humans expect consistent setbacks when learning new physical skills, but do not offer ourselves the same grace when mastering new academic skills.

As we progress through our education, we decide about our skillsets too quickly. We learn to self-identify as math or science kids, “bookworms,” “creatives,” or “jocks” even though we must all master math, physical activities, literature, writing or expression. We must all get in touch with our own creativity plus a bit of biology and botany.

Few of us become a polymath, one whose knowledge spans a substantial number of subjects and draw on complex bodies of knowledge. Why? We interpret academic bonks and bruises differently; we think they are proof that we will never be good at something academic.

“Ugh! I get mediocre grades in algebra, I’m just not a math person.”

“Yuck, I never do well on written projects. These are too difficult.”

“My creative project wasn’t half as good as everyone else’s. I guess I’m not creative.”

What if we let our academic bonks and bruises serve us the same way they do when learning physical skills? Do you regularly miss deadlines? Let that bonk teach you new ways to manage time. Do you often miss details on tested subjects? Produce new mastery technics that suit your brain best. Do you lose interest and focus during reading assignments? That bruise is not there to get you to stop reading but tell you it is time to find coping mechanisms that help you retain focus throughout a whole assignment.

Finally, do not fall for the poor advice that you are perfect just the way you are, no more effort needed. You and I both know that you would prefer to feel confident about things that interest you and you would rather feel at least competent in things that interest you less. Humans are happiest when we are toddling forward, learning new things, and acquiring new skills. Bruises and bonks let us know when to strengthen ourselves in some way so we can become proficient, then competent, and then finally confident. Failure is a valuable learning tool.

Melancholy is a Classical Mood

Gear up for New Beginnings

Amy Barr of The Lukeion Project

The world is currently suffering from some very Classical maladies such as melancholy, a term that comes from Greek: µέλαινα χολή melaina chole meaning “black bile.” In the 5th and 4th centuries BC. Hippocrates, in his work Aphorisms (from Greek ἀφορισμός: aphorismos, meaning concise or memorable expressions of a general truth), characterized the condition of having long-lasting fears and despondence as melancholia, a physical problem characterized by mental symptoms.

If you prefer some Latin roots, try lugubriousness (Latin lugere, "to mourn") or moroseness, (Latin morosus, "self-will or fastidious habit"); and saturnineness, (Sāturnīnus, "under the influence of the planet Saturn") which brings us back full circle since both Greeks and Romans thought dark moods meant one was under the influence of the planet Saturn.

Both the Greeks and Romans viewed the god Saturn (Cronos to the Greeks) as being the guy in charge of agriculture (specifically the harvest), periodic renewal, and liberation. He’s the one we see as an old man carrying a sickle due to his primary job in agriculture. His iconography is often confused with the “grim reaper” in modern times. Even a few decades ago, Saturn was the illustration commonly used along side best wishes as we would ring in a happy new year. His overall vibe was “out with the old, in with the new.” The Romans named January after the two-faced god Janus, a fellow that was in charge of endings and, simultaneous new beginnings.

Melancholy, a mournful wistfulness, often precedes great changes. The “best of all holidays,” according to the Roman poet Catullus, was the festival for Saturn in late December. About the time they couldn't stand one more long dark dreary cold day, the Romans threw huge parties, decorated everything lavishly, exchanged jobs between the powerless and powerful while they also exchanged gifts to celebrate Saturnalia.

As an educator, I have seen a lot of students suffering from melancholy over the past 18 months. Who can blame them? It can be difficult to focus on mundane classwork if one isn’t certain what life will look like in an uncertain future. Everyone is wistful about the past and uneasy in their new terrain. Uncharted territory isn’t all that fun.

Students: even if gloom is in the room and typical enticements are few, what can offer sufficient inspiration to engage in one’s studies with excellence even during times of great uncertainty?

Prior to roughly 100 years ago, no significant percentage of the population enjoyed a college education. People were not, contrary to modern spin, poorly educated. On the contrary! Flip through an original edition of McGuffey Readers to see that most students mastered material by 6^th grade that colleges won’t touch until students enter upper-level seminars, if ever. While the decline (collapse) of education is worthy of multiple blogs, suffice it to say that history’s best thinkers, inventors, writers, speakers, artists, musicians, and entrepreneurs achieved greatness without pomp and circumstance.

A good education—one that is rich with literature and well-stocked with essentials like language mastery, logic, rhetoric, sciences, maths, and then adorned with music, arts, and a broad exposure to practical skills—is the key to unlocking the future in any form it might take.

The future should not be framed in terms of diplomas and acceptance letters even under the best conditions. In times of great uncertainty and certain change, think of education as an epic RPG (roll playing game, for you old folks) in which YOU prepare yourself for the ultimate boss by accumulating skills and strengths in your path. There’s no older sibling or neighbor to spoil the end of this game for you and there are few cheat codes available. You will have no idea what the final boss will throw at you so get ready now. Accumulate strengths, skills, experience, energy, equipment, and even teammates to help you along the way. Train well and you’ll succeed, even if all your battles will be fought in new territory.

Make or Break College Preparedness Skills: Subject Mastery

By Amy Barr, Sage Thinkiac at The Lukeion Project

Subject mastery isn’t usually something people think about during middle and high school years. At least for many, a modern high school education is nothing more than a mad dash to complete a list of class hours served before we hurry off to complete the next list of hours to serve. Does everyone need the same semester of time to learn algebra or biology or French? There’s nothing magical about a semester on one subject, or a week of classes, or an hour of lecture. Some students can master the material in a fraction of the time, others need triple with a dollop of review mixed in daily. If a certain subject is poorly presented—for any variety of reasons—all the time in the world won’t help bored students. 

Instead of the time-served approach (exactly like a prison sentence ) what if we return to a subject mastery approach. To do so, students need a few basic learn-how-to-learn skills that have fallen out of favor. Memorization, for example, has been tossed out in favor of “subject tools.” Mainstream educators argue that students simply need to know how and where to access the information they need to complete their work. In the modern world, they argue, it isn’t necessary to memorize the periodic table, the anatomy of a cell, or Latin verb forms when one can just look online. Imagine giving a baby a dictionary rather than expecting him to form new words for himself. Requiring a child to swim laps before she can kick-and-paddle is a cruel recipe for disaster. Telling a student to rely on “subject tools” year after year is equally cruel. 

But, one might argue, if a child isn’t going to become a biologist, Latin teacher, or physicist, does she really need a storehouse of memorized data to make progress in science, language, and math? Children will never one day become any of these things without memorization, and we wouldn’t want them to. Consider the difference between a memorized speech and one read from a teleprompter. An actor reading lines from cue cards can’t compare with one who memorized his lines. Your heart surgeon shouldn’t be searching subject tools while you are under her knife. A concert pianist never performs with sheet music. Your physical therapist should already know how to improve your poor swollen knee without a fast web search. 

Memorization is essential, normal, and not all that difficult once you get the hang of it. There are dozens of techniques for subject mastery that will help anyone do it well at any age. Here are just five methods that will work for anyone mastering anything.      

Write it out 

Qui scribit bis legit, “He who writes learns twice.”

The act of writing helps us remember. You can master a lot of information very quickly just by writing it out a couple of times. Take notes while listening or reading to cut study time down considerably. A student activates all mental muscles when pen is put to paper. Sight, sound, higher reasoning, analysis, and coordination all work together to help the student remember the material. Transcription is still an excellent way to teach spelling to younger students for this reason. Some teens lament they hate taking notes, but I know firsthand how information retention improves just by helping them build this skill.  

When it comes to note-taking, the magic only happens when pen or pencil hits paper. I don’t care if your handwriting is messy. Taking notes is the real secret. No one cares how they look.

Involve all your senses

"All our knowledge begins with the senses, proceeds then to the understanding, and ends with reason. There is nothing higher than reason." –Immanuel Kant

Good note taking habits make mastery easy because multiple senses are put to work. All effective study techniques involve more than one sense. When I ask a young student to “study” for an exam, he’ll likely flip open his book and stare at the words, hoping they will soak in. This is an exercise in futility. Teach  your young ones how to study actively. Tell them to try a variety of approaches including reading it aloud, writing it, drawing it, dancing it, singing it. Flash cards are still a powerful tool simply because they involve more than once sense. If done well, flash cards are portable, cheap, and used by subject masters worldwide. 

Teach it 

Homines, dum docent, discunt, “People learn while they teach.” (Seneca)

When I was in graduate school two of my fellow students had been teaching high school Latin for years. Though they were proficient in Latin when they started their teaching career, they had become excellent at it while teaching it at the high school level. The rest of us trailed behind by comparison. This principal applies to every subject and is one of the best perks of home education, especially at the high school level. We adults get to relearn all sorts of forgotten tidbits as we teach them to our children. When a big sibling instructs a little brother one of his favorite subjects, he has the chance to become exceptional at that subject. The practice of carefully explaining and illustrating anything makes one more proficient at it which is why assigning presentations is a good idea. Parent educators with large families shouldn’t feel bad about employing older siblings to educate younger ones within reason. They will gain as much as they give. If you have an only child, just ask her to teach the material to you or a friend.

Mix it up

"It may be that when we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go we have come to our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings." –Wendell Berry

Even the best study method can grow stale if used in isolation. Try a variety of study techniques so that mastery will come quickly and painlessly. Everyone has a slightly different learning style. Chanting something might work well for one person but utterly fail for others. Try out games, flash cards, study partners, diagrams, silly rhymes, funny songs, chalk drawings on the sidewalk, play acting on videos, and even audio recordings: Be creative. 

Do a little every day 

Assiduus usus uni rei deditus et ingenium et artem saepe vincit, “Constant practice devoted to one subject often outdoes both intelligence and skill.” (Cicero)

The battle for mastery over a subject is not won in a single night. How many of us can recount times when we pulled all-nighters in college? If only I could get back all that sleep I lost on geology and Hittites, about which (I should point out) I recall very little. To every cram-session success story you’ll hear a dozen sad tales of poorly written essays, flagging health, and plummeting grades. Help your student learn how to study a little every day. 30 or 40 minutes of clearheaded memorization over a week’s time is far better than 4 fog-brained hours the night before the quiz. Sleep is as essential to organizing and storing data as are short effective study sessions. Alternating periods of both are key.

Students will argue they are preparing for an exam while their brains fight for concentration between notifications from social media, the urge to change songs on a playlist, and a hilarious video complete with ads. They think this works because they haven’t ever tried it any other way. Study sessions should be conducted in a distraction-free zone. Phones, internet, television, social media, friends, and siblings will always win the competition for brain time. Even little distractions like music will conspire to rob a student of subject mastery. 20 minutes with no distractions will be far more effective than 2 hours with them. Short effective study sessions with small rewards for success and a nice break in-between sessions.

So, even if you are educated now (as most are) under the time-served style, you can turn time into mastery with just these few special skills that will give your brain super-powers. 

Above All, Don’t Quash the Squash

Sundry Garden Metaphors for Educating your Own

By Amy E. Barr, Latin guru at The Lukeion Project

Pardon all the garden talk lately. It is that time of year. I moved to the middle of nowhere so I could have a big garden, chickens, fruit trees, and fewer neighbors. Before I took up the responsibilities of owning a bit of land, I fancied myself as clever about growing things. I was wrong. My horticultural efforts are only impressive to the most amateur neophytes and those that see my carefully edited photographs on Insta. Painful comparison of my efforts to successful growers comes weekly when I visit the nearby Amish community. Their lovely produce is a nice supplement to my inability to grow enough potatoes and cucumbers in any given year. I confess I did manage to produce some fine cabbages and squash this year for once. I’ve been growing things and gardening since I was a kid, but I still have a lot to learn.

If I were to give up my day job teaching Latin, it would be fun to teach gardening lessons. My first bits of advice would be: prune often, coddle seldom, and thin regularly. Since my day job is teaching young people, my advice can be a bit similar so hang in there, we are about to talk veggies.

Prune Often

Tomatoes, roses, peach trees, and most people, do best with regular pruning. When it comes to people, think of pruning in terms of well-calculated challenges. Twelve long years of bland or overly simplified education results in adults who seldom bloom. If a tomato just sprawls on the ground, it will continue to leaf, but it will not produce much fruit. Challenging a plant with a good pruning along with a bit of support and feeding, followed by several more pruning sessions is a good tactic in education. Support and nourish? Yes. Challenge and rectify? Also, a big yes. Growth, blooms, and fruit are stimulated when students encounter challenging subjects, endure a set back or two, and then learn to grow past failures and challenges while they meet new ones.

I once met a gifted student who was terrified by the thought of even the smallest academic failure. His terror was so severe that he had to be cajoled into completing every single assignment given to him. Hoping to mitigate his academic anxiety, his mother made it far worse by constantly trying to “help” him avoid those very academic challenges. She begged for extensions, she pled for special grading, she demanded a unique schedule, even though this student performed quite well whenever he decided to do so. This student had been fed and supported, but never pruned much.      

Coddle Seldom

This year I grew a bed of giant sunflowers. I love their cheerful yellow but admire their ambitions to grow to 10 or 12 feet before sustaining the weight of massive seed-filled blooms. Winds, thunderstorms, squirrels, and a few chomps from our old goat Otis (living next door) did not knock them down. They went from sprouts to towering giants in a few months. They grew strong because they were not shielded from sun, wind, and rain. They were given appropriate challenges along maturation so that I never had to prop them up artificially.

Students can grow the same way. Education shouldn’t be something done TO or FOR a child, with minimal expectations of the child’s engagement in his or her own education…yet it often is.  There’s no magic grade level in which a student can start working on challenging or exciting subjects after clocking enough hours in boring worksheets, primers, and prerequisites…yet we often think there is.  Likewise, too powerful a challenge at too young an age can stunt grown.

Learners are like young plants. The wind must blow, and the rain must fall from the start so that a student responds appropriately and grows strong enough to sustain harder challenges. Greenhouse veggies are tender, but they need hardening-off before you can plop them in the garden. Don’t keep your learner in the greenhouse for twelve years. Let them enjoy some sun and rain now.    

I once spoke with a person who bought an exotic specimen tree for her front yard. Since the tree was still small but represented a sizable investment for her landscape, she strapped a strong pole to the little trunk to make sure it grew straight and tall. After the tree had grown for two years, she decided it was mature enough to remove the support pole. She was horrified to find her little tree snapped in half after a rainstorm a week later. Strapped to external support, the coddled tree had not encountered any real challenges as it grew. It appeared to have been maturing, but appearances were deceptive.

Thin Regularly

Carrots are difficult vegetables. They don’t like to germinate and, when they do, they take their sweet time about it. Carrot experts always plant way more seeds than necessary if they plan to get a normal harvest. If one is patient enough to grow carrots, one is also aware of the need to thin those hard-won sprouts before they crowd each other and fail to grow. Thinning carrots is a tedious, but necessary task for everyone planning on a good harvest. What can carrots tell us about education?

Thin your child’s schedule regularly so he or she won’t get crowded out. Thin intelligently and in the best interest of your learner rather in the best interest of somebody else. Lots of upper level high school students forgo classes that interest them so they can pile on prestigious classes that might look good on a transcript. Sure, an ambitious student should add an AP class or two, but only if the subject is engaging to the student. I teach an AP Latin class. About three-quarters of my students love the subject. It gives them great satisfaction to succeed at that level of Latin so the AP credit is a nice bonus. About one-quarter of my AP students are there because they hope it will look good on a transcript. They are not terribly excited about the material, but they will spend a lot of energy on it anyway. They are likely taking a variety of other AP classes and they are stressed to the max. Instead of easing into their best transitional year, they are tired and a little bitter. Crowded schedules keep people from healthy growth, regardless of their age. Thin the timetable a bit if you want to see improved development.  

Don’t quash the squash

This time of the year my garden is consumed by a few sprawling winter squash plants. As the main growing season comes to an end, I don’t mind if my pumpkin vines start to crawl over the asparagus or shoot up the tomato trellis. There’s an especially sturdy offshoot headed into my cowpea patch right now. I try to keep the roots watered, fed, and relatively bug-free while vines head in all directions. If a vine is relatively healthy, I let it head off on its own unchecked. In a few weeks, I’ll look for the fruit (hopefully some butternut squash, some pumpkins, and maybe a large summer squash that went unnoticed too long under the vines). Some of the biggest and best fruit comes from healthy vines that were allowed to grow in a direction of their own choosing.