Participants: James Tucker, Kathy Matthews
Series Code: TAH
Program Code: TAH000102
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00:30 Hi, I am Kathy Matthews, and I want to welcome you
00:33 to Thinking About Home, we've been discussing family 00:36 life naturally and we're gonna be talking about the 00:40 role of the home in learning and motivation and 00:43 Dr. Jim Tucker from Andrews University, 00:45 professor of education psychology at Andrews 00:47 University is with us again today. Welcome Jim, I am 00:51 sorry. It's my pleasure. We want to go over some of the 00:56 things that we talked about I would like to anyway and 01:00 some of those things were context, challenge and style 01:05 and preference, that we've talked about last time and 01:07 learning naturally and I will have another question, 01:12 because we didn't get all of our material finished and we 01:16 would like to catch up on that or not leave that out. 01:19 What are some of the effective ways that parents 01:22 can assist their children in learning naturally? Well 01:25 first of all and I've often say that, if I were able 01:30 to give parents or teachers for that matter. One gift, I 01:34 could just give them one gift, it would not be money, 01:37 it would not be longer life or whatever. It would be 01:41 the honest belief that everyone of their children 01:46 is gifted. Gifted in every sense of that word, 01:53 typically we think of gifted as being a relative term. 01:58 Smarter then somebody else, my child is gifted or 02:02 somebody else's child is gifted and this other child 02:05 is not. Umm! But the way I view children, the way I 02:09 view a family is that. The family is a unit and every 02:14 member of that family, every member of that unit is a 02:17 gift. Umm! And they have gifts that are unique, that 02:22 can be developed to the fullest. So, a family needs 02:26 to start there and then surround itself. The family, 02:33 mother, father, parents, surround themselves with an 02:38 environment that allows that gift to blossom, to bloom. 02:40 Umm! To develop naturally and I feel and I think there 02:46 is abounded evidence to support, the best way to do 02:50 that is to provide a natural environment from the out of 02:54 doors, bringing the out of doors in, taking the family 02:58 out of doors, a natural learning setting. Umm! And 03:03 what about the expectation of the parents toward the 03:06 child, you said to it, just to see them as a gift. Well, 03:10 if you believe, your children are gifted. Yes, 03:13 what about view for the parents. Then you will 03:16 automatically have high expectations. Yes. We know 03:18 for example from some research that's been done, 03:21 for quite a numbers of years now. That the single most 03:29 powerful force in motivation is high expectations. If 03:34 parents honestly believe, that their students are 03:38 smart and will do well, that belief somehow transmits to 03:45 the child in a very powerful way and the child will do 03:49 better. Not just by verbal, not just by saying. No it's 03:52 the belief, that does it. Something about you 03:55 happens, something happens to you, yes, because you 03:57 believe it. If parents, you know God forbid, that 04:00 parents would say, Oh, this is a verbal behavior. I must 04:04 tell my child, you're gifted, you're gifted. Aha. 04:07 That won't do it. Umm! It has to be a belief, now how 04:10 do you get that belief. You know, Kathy I really don't 04:14 know how you get it, except from God. I think this is 04:17 probably something we only obtain from the Holy Spirit 04:21 from God by praying for it. Umm! Saying God, you 04:25 know, no matter how I feel, no matter what I think on a 04:28 day to day basis, please sanctify my attitude toward 04:32 my child. Toward my child. Yes. You know I can relate 04:34 to that, I have someone that I was just, motherly talking 04:39 to recently. One of her heart breaks over that, she 04:44 came in one day and she was in a group where there were 04:47 children and her family and children and she came, later 04:51 on she was crying and we were talking and she said, 04:53 I just don't, I just don't have the good feelings 04:58 toward my children. Umm! And, what is that conveying. 05:02 Yeah. Yeah and she was hurting because of that and 05:07 she wanted to know how to love her children and not 05:12 just see their faults. Well the source of love, those 05:15 true feelings. Umm! Is only God. Umm! That's not 05:18 something we can get from therapy. Umm! It's not 05:21 something we can get from wanting or wishing, it can 05:24 only come from the source of love. Umm! What are 05:27 some of the qualities now that the learning and 05:29 motivation that should be considered by the parents 05:31 and teachers. I don't understand, I don't 05:35 understand it. Well, we, what are some of the 05:38 qualities of learning and motivation that should be 05:41 considered by parents and teachers learning naturally, 05:45 only it happens doesn't end in the affective nature God 05:50 given environment. Well, I believe that's true. Yeah. 05:53 If you place a child, if you surround a child with lots 06:01 of things. Umm! The child begins to believe in things. 06:06 Okay. If you surround a child with opportunities, 06:11 the child begins to believe in opportunities and you 06:15 can get confused. Umm! About things being 06:19 opportunities, but when you take the child out into the 06:24 woods. It is surrounded with an abundance of 06:27 opportunities to think, to do, to act, to run and to 06:32 play or to lay down and stare at the sky. Umm! 06:35 That's different and it does different things to the 06:40 mind, to the brain, to the nerves, to the physical 06:43 body, then surrounding the child with stimulating 06:48 artificial learning tools. Umm! Well, you have a list 06:58 of things that we can talk about on what are some of 07:01 the natural learning characteristics, would you 07:04 start helping us with that. Sure. Right. Probably one 07:10 of the most, no it may well be the most abused natural 07:19 characteristic of learning. Everyone learns at a 07:23 different rate. Okay, you're talking about rate 07:26 of time. Yeah. Their time of learning. The amount of 07:29 time it takes for a student to learn a given thing. Umm! 07:33 Like the multiplication facts or like the books of 07:36 the Bible or whatever. Right. It takes different 07:39 people, different amounts of time. Umm! Even if you 07:42 allow for breaking it down into chunks and teaching 07:46 just a little bit at a time, it's still everybody is 07:49 different. Umm! Even if you allow for the fact, as we 07:52 talked about last time that some students are, or some 07:57 children are auditory, some are verbal, some are visual 08:01 and some are tactile, it's, they're still, there is 08:05 difference in rates. Umm! And kids can't be rushed, 08:08 learning cannot be rushed. It has to, it has to emerge 08:13 with an inner motivational force that is gonna vary by 08:17 the individuals. So, you can't have a classroom where 08:21 everybody is on the same page marching systematically 08:24 through a text book and all getting to the same place at 08:27 the end. At the same time. That probably won't work 08:30 for any member of that class. Umm! And the idea 08:34 that we think it might is a shame. Umm! Well that's 08:38 pretty strong language, you must have something to back 08:41 it up. Absolutely. Yeah, you've been gone through a 08:44 lot. I know and studied this subject, I suppose. 08:49 Thoroughly. Thoroughly, and what about priority? We only 08:57 learn those things which are important and different 09:02 things emerge at different times. This is a 09:06 developmental issue as well, as a value issue. Umm! Some 09:11 children for example develop earlier than others and 09:17 they're able to perform certain skills sooner than 09:20 others, it has nothing to do with intelligence, it has to 09:23 do with development and when they're able to do 09:26 things. They value them. Umm! They have a higher 09:28 priority. Umm! But typically an assignment is made to 09:34 everyone, everybody is gonna do the same thing. Right. 09:37 One student or one child may say, oh I will, this is fun, 09:41 we're going to have a good time. The rest of them or 09:44 the next one might say this is boring or I already did 09:47 this. Umm! Or this is too hard. Yes. And it might in 09:51 fact be too high. Umm! Or too hard. Right. This is 09:55 different from rate, even if you're doing the things at 09:59 the proper rate and giving enough time, it has to be 10:02 something the student values. It's important, I 10:05 remember one of my sons wanted to learn to read and 10:10 he was only three. And he learned a few words and then 10:14 he strung a few words together in sentences and we 10:18 were very excited about them, you know wow this is 10:20 great and naturally any parent is excited. As soon 10:23 as he learned how to do that however, still being three, 10:27 he wasn't interested anymore. He didn't want to 10:30 read anything else, he didn't wanna do anymore 10:33 reading. Umm! For another year or so. Right. And then 10:37 he came back to it, picked it up and it was valuable to 10:40 him and he went and today he just reads voraciously, 10:44 now he is a college student. Supposing, we had said as a 10:49 three year-old aha. He is a precocial genius. Yes. He 10:55 can do this wonderful thing. We need to exploit it, so we 10:59 want all the neighbors to know and Michael read, read 11:03 for this, read for this, read for that, show them how 11:06 you can read and pushing, pushing, pushing. Umm! 11:10 We know from again abundant research that that 11:13 often turns students, children totally against 11:17 reading for sure. Umm! And learning, you're forcing 11:21 them to do something they're either not ready for or they 11:23 don't value. Umm! On the other hand, the next child 11:27 after Michael, he never was interested in reading until 11:32 he got to school and then suddenly, well, dad, mom, 11:37 look at this reading thing, I am really interested in 11:40 that. There is a whole world of words out there. That's 11:41 right and it couldn't stop him, there was no break. 11:46 They might be, you might be thinking or some of the 11:49 people watching might be thinking. Well, do you just 11:54 let students emerge, learn whatever they wanna learn, 11:57 when they wanna learn it, isn't it important to 12:00 sometimes teach him stuff, whether they want to or not. 12:02 Yes. Yeah, it is, in reality. Well, that's part 12:07 of my thoughts. That's well, that's right, there in life, 12:10 there are things we're not perfect. If I were a perfect 12:14 parent then this really natural idea, which is based 12:19 on creation, based on my understanding of God's true 12:25 way of learning and based on what I know about research 12:28 and learning. If I were a perfect parent then all 12:31 these things would emerge, emerge naturally and also if 12:35 there wasn't a negative power out there, trying to 12:37 thwart everything I was trying to do. Coming along 12:40 behind me sometimes when I didn't even realize it and 12:43 undoing the things I had done. Umm! If we were in a 12:46 perfect environment, which the Garden of Eden probably 12:49 was and in which heaven will be, that would work, we need 12:53 to get as close to that as we can. But there are gonna 12:56 be times, when we don't do it right. Yes. And when the, 13:00 something needs to be taught simply because it's 13:04 time to learn it and you got to get it and that's the way 13:06 it is. Right. So I am not opposed to that and I don't 13:09 wanna be assuming that everything is roses and you 13:11 should be feeling guilty if you're kids don't just 13:13 naturally blossom into learners. Right, because I 13:16 was thinking how, you have to apply yourself on math or 13:20 those kinds of the areas where you must learn 13:23 multiplication, of course we talked about there is the 13:25 time where that might come much more easily and more 13:29 with much more interest than other time. But supposed we 13:32 missed that time. Yes. Then you still gonna learn it. 13:35 Yes. And it becomes, then there are some easier ways 13:37 to do it, but and you still use the motivation, you know 13:41 Kathy why does everybody always use this math, that's 13:43 the example. I don't know probably because it's the 13:46 thing that we have most difficulty with and I don't 13:49 know. And I think there is a reason for that, well 13:51 because we don't teach math well. We teach it only as 13:55 wrote memory thing and we wait too long to do that. If 14:00 we let math concepts emerge. Umm! In the kind of 14:04 Montessori way. Umm! You know if we just let it 14:06 emerge, there are kids who absolutely adore and love 14:11 learning all the details of math. Umm! Well what 14:15 makes them different, partly because they are simply 14:18 different, but also partly because the methods that we 14:21 use to teach. Are different. Are different and they work 14:25 for this group but they don't work for this group, 14:27 so we need to vary the way we teach in the way, in 14:31 terms of the way kids learn math. Math can be fun at all 14:34 stages. You know, I remember a learning several 14:37 years ago of a method that was used with dominoes. 14:40 Umm! And just teaching them into immediately 14:44 identify the dots, numbers by the dots and that child 14:48 could much more easily grasp math if they would just 14:53 play dominoes. Yes. Is that something that you 14:56 would agree with. Some children that works very 14:59 well for. What about getting in the kitchen and learning 15:01 your fractions. That's one of the best ways to learn 15:04 fractions is cutting up an apple and eating a quarter 15:07 half of of it or an eight of it or an half of it, yes. 15:09 Some of those things. That makes it experience. And 15:11 then you talked about music, because of the keyboard, and 15:14 what they had to learn. The number lying on the 15:16 keyboard and also the fractions of notes and how 15:19 you actually bring that in through the auditory as well 15:22 as the tactual, as well of the visual, that's 15:25 you're using. A Multi Avenue. That's right Multi 15:28 Sensory is always more powerful. Umm! And it 15:30 makes it more fun. Umm! Well, what about then skills 15:34 or lets backup when learning is natural it builds on 15:38 prior experience, right. Everything we learn, we 15:42 learn on the basis of what we already know. 15:44 Knowledge. Yes, prior knowledge. Prior knowledge. 15:47 And the first question that a teacher or a parent should 15:51 always ask, when they wanna teach something else, when 15:55 they wanna to teach something, is what is 15:57 already known, what does the student already know and 16:00 then take that basic fundamental, that foundation 16:04 and build on it, little bit at a time. Prior knowledge 16:08 is absolutely fundamental. That reminds me of another 16:13 course that I was looking at, because we've home 16:14 schooled and it had do with phonetics and I remember the 16:20 teacher saying, who taught the course, don't expect 16:23 anything out of the child you haven't already taught 16:27 them, why would you do that? Absolutely. To them. 16:30 Yes, yes. You know, you know So, what about skills? 16:34 Skills sometimes as parents, we want our students to have 16:42 certain skills and sometimes we want them to have the 16:48 skills we had or the ones we value. Right, we want them 16:54 to have. Yeah, and there are skills that students, that 16:59 all students should at least try for and probably 17:03 achieve. The basic skills and those skills. Would be. 17:09 Well the basic skills, reading, writing arithmetic, 17:12 those kinds of skills. But, we also want them to have 17:14 skills in thinking. We want them to have skills in 17:18 listening; we want them to have skills in speaking. Want 17:23 them to have skills in getting along with others. 17:26 Yes. We want them to have skills in accomplishing, in 17:31 a problem solving process and getting something done. 17:34 How do you approach, and study skills. Umm! We want 17:38 them to have those skills. Right. Which is a natural 17:43 part of learning, but you don't get the skills by 17:47 simply saying today we're gonna get this skill. Umm! 17:51 Furthermore, when you learn a skill by an inker and you 17:55 again prior knowledge, learn a little bit more then you 17:58 need to rest. Some Johns Hopkins Research reported 18:03 last year, said something really interesting. Kids 18:07 need to rest for six or more hours not less. After they 18:12 have mastered a certain skill and the brain then 18:15 needs to rest for six hours or more. Then you come back 18:18 to it and do it again and the learning is more 18:21 efficient then if you went ahead and continued to 18:25 practice it. Now, when you say rest, you don't 18:27 necessary mean lay down and rest, they could change 18:29 activity, right. That's what I mean, the brain needs to 18:31 rest from that skill. That activity. Needs to change to 18:34 a very different thing. Umm! And you know like that's 18:37 why we have, that's why we used to have what we called 18:40 recess or physical education or gardening or anything, 18:44 change the activity from mental to physical to social 18:49 to mental so that there is a balance and the balance 18:53 is what we're looking for, for natural learning. Umm! 18:56 I was thinking of journalism or riding or expressing 18:59 yourself even as younger child, when they have paper 19:01 to write. If they can't think of everything they 19:04 need, to stop and then go and comeback again. If 19:06 you're painting. Yes. And you, if you're wanting to do 19:09 something and you just can't get it right, to stop and go 19:12 and then come back again. Yes, how many times have 19:15 you have been grappling with a problem and you didn't 19:17 know how to solve it. Your mind is at fever level. 19:20 That's right and you either slept over night or you went 19:23 off and did something totally different and you 19:25 came back to it and bingo. And there was the answer. 19:27 Yeah. Yes, the mind continues to process even 19:32 when we're not thinking. Okay, what about fun, we 19:36 are learning at a natural way, it involves emotions. 19:38 What about fun. Fun we're only now beginning to learn 19:43 what that means. Umm! Up until recently maybe the 19:48 protestant ethic said fun is negative. Umm! But now 19:53 we're beginning to find out that you only learn those 19:56 things which you enjoy or which have some emotional 20:01 impact, there are three levels to the brain. There 20:04 is the brainstem which keeps your automatic system 20:08 going, there is the midbrain where most of the emotions 20:11 and or other kinds of nonconscious things happen. 20:17 Umm! Then there is the cortex, where all of the 20:20 synapses occur and the hundred billion neurons do 20:25 their things. Yes. We know as I, I think said last time 20:31 that or the time before that I can't remember what, 20:34 that we need a certain number of repetitions to 20:37 learn a new factor and the number was 35 on the 20:40 average. Umm! And by the way that number goes up, as 20:43 the mental ability comes down and the number comes 20:47 down, as the mental ability goes up. But it doesn't come 20:49 down by much, even gifted students need 25-30 20:54 repetitions, but people will then say and somebody 20:58 listening is probably going to say well, I, something 21:00 happened to me one time and I never forgot it. Right. 21:02 Well that's because there was an emotion attached. 21:05 Emotion involved. That's right. Like music that 21:07 effected us or some sort of thing that was going on in 21:10 our life. When you engage the mid brain, you can 21:13 reduce the amount of practice. Umm! In cortex 21:16 you can get. So that I can get it to engage on a 21:19 regular basis. Well the engaging the mid brain is 21:22 when it's fun. If you can make the learning fun then 21:25 you can reduce the amount of practice necessary for 21:28 cortical activity, that the information learning. You 21:34 can't reduce the number of practices for a physical 21:38 skill, learning to play the piano is not gonna be. 21:41 It's not always fun. No, sometimes you just have to 21:44 teach those muscles. Determination. And the goal 21:48 is the motivation. Right. That's pulling you there, 21:50 but if you have an experience in learning 21:55 information and the experience is enjoyable 21:59 because of who you're doing it with. Right. Or because 22:03 of the method that you're using to do it, such as 22:06 singing the Bible texts, for example, you know that's 22:09 a good example. Umm! Learning Bible texts, until 22:12 we discovered the singing, when I was a kid we 22:14 memorized them without songs. Right. And it was 22:16 tough. Then along came songs and my kids learned 22:19 them like that and I learned them in the process. 22:21 Yeah, I did too. Just by singing them and that was 22:24 wonderful, but that says it's fun, its multisensory 22:28 but it's also fun. Singing is fun. Memorize saying 22:32 the same thing over and over again is not fun 22:34 unless there is something fun about it. Or a goal 22:38 down there that makes you want to really go for it. 22:40 Yes, and that goal maybe, may make it more fun, at 22:45 least it will give it an emotional response. 22:47 Satisfaction. Yeah. But Jim not every class can be fun. 22:51 Well, I know that, let me come back to that point, 22:53 because that goes back to why is it always math. But 22:57 let me make the point that there are different things 23:01 that are fun at different developmental levels. A 23:06 working dog, a dog that is a sheepdog. Will not be a 23:12 good working dog, if it didn't get the chance to 23:15 play work, when it was a puppy. An eagle, who enjoy 23:22 soaring wouldn't enjoy wing flapping, but the eaglet in 23:27 the nest enjoys wing flapping. Oh! Yes. 23:30 So at certain stages, the learning of the simple 23:34 skills necessary to perform the more complex skills 23:38 is the fun, for preschoolers work, their 23:44 work is what we call play. Umm! And then we grow up, 23:49 we think well we're gonna go and have a, we're gonna 23:53 have a picnic okay and we say that's play. Well that 23:58 really isn't play. It's really part of our relaxing 24:03 and helping the brain to work. So having fun is an 24:09 absolutely essential part of learning. Fun meaning 24:14 the enjoyment of the experience, not fun and 24:18 games. Umm! Not amusement and giggles. 24:21 Okay, I am glad you clarified that, you know 24:23 because if a child hears this and they think the 24:27 mom's gonna make it fun all the time or the class 24:30 has to be the fun or its not worth learning. It's 24:33 not always just fun and games that you're talking 24:35 about. That's right and you said a phrase, it's not 24:38 worth learning, it's still worth learning. Umm! 24:41 But it's also still worth the parents trying to make 24:45 it fun or enjoyable or something that the brain 24:50 or the person has more enjoyment doing. Umm! 24:55 Well we have one another question. What's the 24:58 ultimate value of learning? There is really only one 25:03 and this will, this is no surprise to anyone. Umm! 25:07 We all need a savior. And if we gain the whole world 25:13 of knowledge and lose our own soul, what is that, 25:17 we've gained nothing. Nothing. That's Jesus' words. 25:20 Consequently as parents, as teachers, as educators in 25:25 my case. My goal, my objective, my mission is to 25:34 create an environment which is as close to Eden or the 25:41 environment that Jesus was provided with as possible. 25:45 To model as closely as I can. The behaviors that 25:53 were present in the garden and the behaviors that were 25:56 used in the teaching of Jesus and the behaviors 26:01 that we're advised to use in the Bible, to amulet by 26:06 principle and example, the grace of God, both if you'll 26:15 allow a theological analogy, both the justification and 26:19 the sanctification, the justification meaning its 26:23 yours, but the sanctification meaning 26:26 there's still work involved. Yes. But let the internal 26:31 motivation there that the, that the love of God gives 26:35 me be the motivating force in what I do to try to 26:40 develop my children. Umm! My goal as a parent and as 26:46 an educator then is the salvation of my children. 26:50 Amen! That has to be the case. Yeah, and I will come 26:55 back to the environment, we need good, solid, natural 27:00 environment to take advantage of the fact that 27:02 God created us to learn naturally. Umm! Then we 27:07 model the behaviors, we trust in God, by all means 27:14 pray that God gives us the Wisdom. Wisdom. Yeah and 27:19 then makes up the difference for where we fall short. 27:22 Right. Because the last thing in the world, we 27:24 should feel is any guilt or feeling of failure. Because 27:28 we can't be the perfect father or the perfect 27:31 mother or the perfect parent. Right. You know. 27:34 Dr Tucker, it's been a pleasure to have you on and 27:37 I'm very thankful that you made it and I just pray that 27:43 in your homes you're going to apply these principles 27:47 and I know that if you have interest in finding out 27:50 more about how to's and you can write 3ABN or call, 27:54 until then I want you to join us again on 27:57 Thinking About Home. |
Revised 2014-12-17