Living the Curious Life - An Article about Truth

America’s relationship with public schooling is exceedingly poor at the time of this writing. Coming off the heels of a not-quite-and-probably-never-finished pandemic that exposed much of the corroded underpinnings of American public schooling, it is clearer now more than ever that our systems are crumbling. Much like the orchestra continuing to play as the ship sinks, teachers, students, and families continue to maintain the illusion that things are okay when they very much are not. Why maintain a clearly faulty illusion? If you ask any student or any teacher, they will tell you baldly that things are not as good as they could be and that some aspects of public schools actively harm them. Teachers put on a strong face for students. Students put on a strong face for parents. Parents continue to send their kids to schools because there is no alternative for working families.??

This book is a discussion on practical solutions to real problems teachers and students face every day as well as a manual for “Living a Curious Life”.?

Live the Curious Life is a motto that I adopted after my fifth year of teaching. Living curiously is about seeking answers to questions that we have. It is a foundational principle of scientific exploration and discovery. It is a motto that communicates a desire to live a life full of wonder and excitement and is a core structure that supports the work I do as a teacher and a lifelong learner.?

Students of public schooling in America bear the brunt of a tremendous amount of abuse in their pursuit of an education, for which it is not super clear why one would want that. The act of becoming educated is not well-defined for children when they enter the education system. Furthermore, it is my point of view that young adults graduating high school have an even less clear understanding of learning, intellect, citizenship, curiosity, compassion, character, love, belief, joy, knowledge, truth, action, and many other abstract nouns that we have all subconsciously agreed make for a well-rounded world citizen. It is as well my point of view that these young adults grow into not-so-young adults who likewise have a weak understanding of what it means to be a content, happy and whole person.??

Undoubtedly, America has many problems and it is perhaps beyond the scope of this work to address all of them. However, I believe that many of America’s issues can be addressed if we simply acknowledge the philosophical underpinnings of these issues. Most, if not all of our problems begin where our citizens begin, in schools.??

In this work, I will present necessary topics in child development. These topics will be instrumental in the further sections of this writing, where I will make proposals for actionable solutions to real issues that face teachers and learners. Additionally, I will describe and clarify aspects of my personal pedagogy (Living the Curious Life), and reveal tips for building a classroom, a school, and a school district that prioritizes learning, curiosity, and wonder. I will elucidate methods for facilitating real learning in the classroom as well as outside. I will resolve debates among education professionals concerning methodologies for classroom management and behavior. Finally, I will conclude this book by describing an actionable endgame for public education; a retreat, paid for by taxation, free at the point of delivery, for people to go to where they are truly and radically free to pursue their own interests.??

It is my belief that after reading this work, the reader will have tools in their toolbox to make sweeping, radical changes to their own pedagogies and the lives of learners and peers in their own lives.??

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Fred Rogers cared about kids. Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood is a decades-long demonstration of that care. Between 1968 and 2001, Mister Rogers and his team produced 912 episodes of gentle, thoughtful television for kids. In 1969, he testified before the United States Senate in order to secure twenty million dollars in federal funding for public television. Fred Rogers continuously espoused the virtues of kindness and wonder. He spoke to kids watching his program with real language. He never talked down to them or spoke in an infantilizing or baby-ing tone.? Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood focused on the social and emotional needs of children, teaching preschool age children about tolerance and self-worth, how to process grief and sadness. It is evident, for anyone who has spent time in the neighborhood that Fred Rogers cared about kids. It is evident because he demonstrated it with his words, but more importantly with his actions. The things he did belied an incredible capacity for love and kindness for millions of children that he had never met. Why would someone do this??

The world seems to be in a constant turmoil, the central tension of which is the same as that rhetorical question. People in America have an immediate skepticism of altruism, and they’re right to, these days. Good deeds are often done for cynical reasons. Whether it’s views on social media, cross-posts to Instagram, or tax incentives, our American bootstrap money-centric mentality has led us to a moral dead-end. Americans tend to do things when there is an obvious value to them associated with a course of action. Because of the way the United States operates, this is mostly tied to some sort of monetary reward. We tend to conflate money and value. That misguided equation means that most Americans have a hard time understanding why a person would do something in service to other people, solely. This is one of the main things that contributes to America’s modern distrust of teachers. We are often suspicious of good people. We are suspicious that they have ulterior motives. We are neurotically concerned about con-men and getting taken advantage of. Part of America’s culture is built on the idea that if a person gives something over, then they are diminished in some way by that. We are distrustful of being shown kindness, because that must mean we are unwittingly losing something in the process. They would not be helping us, if they weren’t coming out ahead.??

Mister Rogers understood that kindness is not a resource that runs out. Compassion and understanding are not prizes to be won. Kindness is a way of being. It should be the default state of every rational, thinking human being. That is how he lived and that is why he did the things he did in his life.??

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On January 20th, 2020, I sat on a bank next to a side road in the neighborhood I lived in. I took out my phone and I made a video. I never really intended for anybody to see it, and at the time of this writing, only about 30 people have. It is a video that I made with the intention of watching it back later to see how my philosophies have changed, how my pedagogy has changed, and how my mission for what I want to see in the world has changed. The following is a (mercifully edited) transcript of that video:?

In the grand scheme of things, why now, why here, why this, why? It’s important when we begin something, when we begin any sort of intellectual exercise, to generate our thesis statement. Consider why anything. It has become clear to me, over the past few months, maybe years (it may have always been there), it’s become clear to me that education, the system, whatever you want to call it, is actively crumbling around us. I think generally, I think people want to do something about it. We want to help. We want to do things to help kids and our students, our future. I’m sure most people agree that education needs to be “better”. But I don’t know if we agree or know what that entails or what that means, or anything like that. I think if you were to go to any school and ask around, I think you’d find that most educators believe something should be done differently. I just don’t think that we have the energy, or the time, or the wherewithal, or the resources or the desire, or the drive to do anything about it right now.??

More or less, that’s why now, that’s why here, that’s why this. Strictly speaking, I don’t really know how. I know why. Something has to be done. And I think. I feel like I, in the position I’m in, in the place in the universe that I exist in, right now, I feel like I have to do something about it. This (motions to the camera) is that story, log, journal, vomit out into the ether, but the more people talk about this and seek change and come together, form a community of people who care about learning and education, that’s how things start. What the world needs now (the world is not a particularly happy place at the moment) is people to be champions for learning and education, thought, truth, things like that. I don’t know if we have anybody like that right now, whose main goal is to help facilitate learning. I don’t really know why I think this, but... I think I can be that. That’s why this. That’s why here. That’s why now. That’s why all this.??

Yeah...?

There’s a lot of powerful language in that video. There’s also a lot of heartbreak. I can tell from watching that video back for this writing, that I have learned more in the past two-and-a-half years than I’ve learned in the rest of my life put together.??

This book comes from a place of service. I want to make the world a better place, and I have chosen what I think is the most important band of society to focus on: our young people. We need people to be champions for learning in this world. We need people to be champions for education, thought, intellectualism, Truth, virtue, community, kindness, altruism, service, knowledge, wonder and all the other things that make the world an amazing and wondrous place.??

This set of endeavors is not about money, or power, or fame. It’s about trying to make the world a better place, a nicer place, a place that values its inhabitants, a place that sees the light inside all of us, a place that encourages every person’s passion and helps us reach our full potential. These characteristics are what makes the place you’re in good. I want to make the world a happy and kind place, and I believe we do that through reforming public education.?

Someone has to try.?

- Mr. Warden?

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“Luminous beings are we, not this crude matter.” - Master Yoda, The Empire Strikes Back, 1980?