Learning is something that we do naturally. It is like a faithful friend who remains at our side until we cease to exist.
Sadly, when it comes to school, learning and studying are the least enjoyable activities we can think of. Why is that? It is because we wrongly believe that school is all about assignments, tests and exams.
The second reason is that we are being filled with information, but we are not taught how to digest and internalise that information. In other words, we are not taught how to think, learn and understand.
Have you ever seen a farmer who sows without cultivating the earth first? The seeds would fall on dry and hard ground. A teacher is like a farmer, the mind of the student can be likened to the earth and the lesson content is like the seeds. If a farmer must open the earth first before she can insert the seed in it, then a teacher must first open the student’s mind, so that it can receive the information properly.
The previous article taught us the real reason we go to school. We do not go to school to write and pass exams. Instead, we actually go to school to understand the world. Each subject is like a window into the world.
Take biology, for example. This subject reveals to us the miracle of life and how it manifests itself in plants, animals and the human being. Do this experiment: Next time you have a biology class, remind yourself that you are actually taking a closer look at how amazing the Almighty Creator is. If you do this, you will notice the speed of your understanding growing.
Let us now turn our attention to something that can and will accelerate our speed of learning, if done correctly. I just mentioned that if we approach for example a biology lesson with amazement, it will help us to understand much faster. Why is that? The answer is plain and simple: Interest.
Interest is one of the secrets to learning and understanding. If you are not interested in a subject, sitting in that class will feel like torture.
How do we develop interest in all our subjects? Is that even possible? Yes. It is not only possible, but it is necessary. Take a young man who desires a young lady. He will first ask her out and she will probably say ‘no’. Will he give up? No, he will perhaps bring her sweets during break time. She might say ‘yes’ to the sweets… but still ‘no’ to him.
Even if we advise him to give up, he will not. He will continue coming up with new moves and slowly she will begin to like him. Finally, she will say ‘yes’ to him and one day they will get married.
What made the young man continue pursuing the young lady? Why did he not give up?
He was interested in her and his interest would not let him rest. Interest is like a magnet which attracts the things we want closer to us. Can you imagine what will happen the moment you begin to be interested in your subjects?
The exercise for this week is to say the following: ‘This subject teaches me something about the world and interest in this subject will speed up my understanding.’
Do this at the beginning every new lesson and see what happens.
Shapumba ya Shapumba of Natural Learning Education Consultancy is a teacher by profession.
He gives lectures and workshops on how to understand any subject.
Email him at naturaLearningnamibia@gmail.com.
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