Savvy Women

I found this brief CNN video that profiles Rosena Sammi. In the clip, Sammi, once a corporate lawyer but now a jewelry designer, discusses her career change and why she gave up such lucrative work to start her own business. According to the now-ex-attorney, making jewelry, which she considers “wearable” artwork, provides her with a “creative outlet” that was lacking in her former job. Though she’s made a dramatic change in her work life, she believes that the skills she gained as a lawyer are helping her succeed as an artist and designer.

The whole subject of changing careers is one that I’m interested in because I sometimes think (more like fantasize) about what it would be like if I could get out of teaching and do something entirely different. (Actually, a few years ago, I did just that and worked, for a time, as the director of a nonprofit museum.) Anyway, all this writing about leaving one type of life behind for another prompted me to go online to see if I could find out how many people are truly happy with their occupations. My feeling, before even looking at what the stats showed, was that many feel that the work they do is not the sort that is conducive to self-actualization.

That’s my two cents.

Troy Headrick
The American University in Cairo
Maadi, Cairo, Egypt
contact@savvy-women-magazine.com

I want to begin this blog by asking women with school-aged children a direct question:  Do you think your kids are receiving a good education?

I want to follow that up by asking educators:  Are your students getting the sort of schooling they need to succeed in work and life?

Linda Elder, president of a nonprofit organization called Foundation for Critical Thinking and author of “Are You a Critical Thinker?” (which appeared in a recent issue of The Christian Science Monitor), believes that the teaching of critical thinking skills is vitally important today because we live in a world that is plagued by many problems that require fresh problem-solving approaches. On the current state of the teaching of critical thinking, Elder writes:

Everyone thinks; but we don’t always think well. In fact, much of our thinking, left to itself, is sloppy, distorted, partial, uninformed, or prejudiced. Yet the quality of our life and all of the decisions we make depend precisely on the quality of our thought. At present, the act of thinking is virtually ignored (emphasis added).

Elder then defines “critical thinking” as

…self-guided, self-disciplined thinking that aims to take the reasoning we all do naturally to a higher level. It is the art of analyzing and evaluating with the goal of improving thought. When making a decision, it is the difference between weighing information to come to a logical conclusion and making snap judgments without understanding the information.

As someone who’s been in the teaching business for a heck of a long time, I can say I agree that we need to teach critical thinking, but I don’t think the “establishment” will ever get fully behind the idea of teaching it until it is ready to accept the large societal changes that will come when more of us think this way.

What, exactly, do I mean by this?  Well, let me begin by saying that Elder’s definition of “critical thinking” is very vague and superficial.

Critical thinking is actually this:  It is the questioning of all firmly held beliefs.  (In fact, critical thinking means accepting nothing at face value.)  Critical thinking is the development of rigorous methods of inquiry that begin with the following argument:  “All things are to be rejected (or viewed skeptically) until proven true.”

In practice, critical thinking
•    Is antiauthority (and thus “threatening”)
•    Is fundamentally “radical”
•    Scares the political establishment (and all sorts of “establishments”)
•    Promotes analysis over immediate compliance

Critical thinkers, in other words, are not mindless automatons who accept all rules without question.

I want to conclude by calling for ideas about how our educational system can be improved.  Is critical thinking the answer?  Or would you fix the system some other way?  (Maybe you would like to take issue with me saying the system is broken and needs fixing?)

Please post your suggestions or send them to me via email (contact@savvy-women-magazine.com).

Take care and happy thinking!

Troy Headrick
The American University in Cairo
Maadi, Cairo, Egypt
contact@savvy-women-magazine.com

Village Home Education Resource Center from Village Home on Vimeo.

It’s confession time. Before watching this video, I’d always had kind of a negative feeling about homeschooling. I’d wondered if homeschooled children were getting the sort of educational experience that would allow them to become happy, well-adjusted people and productive members of society. But I now realize that those notions were based on what? Ignorance, I suppose, would have to be the answer to that question. After all, what experience did I have with homeschooling? What did I really know about it? Not much before viewing the Village Home Education Resource Center video.

Now, after watching, I’d have to say that if I had a child, I’d want her to attend Village Home or an “unschool” just like it.

I am a product of the public education system in Texas. (Writing that sentence made me realize that “system” is the perfect word to describe how I was educated during my formative years.) My schooling was indeed heavily systematic, meaning regimented, boring, teacher-centered, and designed with the idea in mind that “one size fits all.” The system did everything it could to turn me into a human widget. About the time I started eighth grade, I became something of a rebel. Looking back at that period of my life, I’d have to admit that frustration, in large part, fueled my rebelliousness. It frustrated me to have to spend so many hours of my day cooped up in an institution that didn’t know me or didn’t know how to give me what I needed and/or wanted to become my best self. Rather than setting me free, the system held me back.

I bet many of you have similar stories to tell.

Now, all these decades later, I am on the other end. I am part of a system. I am a teacher, and I have students. I work for a well-known university in the Middle East. On a daily basis I have to find a way to balance the needs of my students with the mores of the institution that pays my salary. In finding that balance, I almost always end up tilting the scale toward the needs of my students.

One thing I have learned over the years–and is shown so vividly in the Village Home video–is that learning and teaching (when they are done well) are “messy,” meaning that too much control can stifle them. I’m afraid that such an idea would scare many school administrators. (Administration, after all, is about exerting control, right?) While listening to Lori Walker, Executive Director of Village Home, I get the feeling that she understands this and that the resource center she represents does a lot to encourage the sort of learning environment where children can be themselves and thus flourish.

One of my favorite parts of the video comes at the very end when Alice Cotton, one of the Village Home instructors, says, “The children are already geniuses. Human beings are natural learners. We don’t have to force it. What we have to do is allow it.”

Well said, Alice. I couldn’t agree more.