My Opinion on 5 Works about Education, Teaching, and Learning - Volume 2

If you were to decide to learn about education, teaching, and learning you would search and find books pertaining specifically to those subjects. If you were to read thousands of books on many subjects, you would find unique insights that a normal person wouldn't find in their normal search. That's why my list is a unique mix.

'Some short Notes Concerning the Education of a Prince' by King George III

It makes sense to take a look at how the rich and powerful choose to educate their children. This is from the king that the American Founding Fathers fought in the American Revolutionary War. He was highly intelligent. He also went crazy. He lost the United States, but conquered Australia. I was amazed to find that the British put letters from past monarchs online. I read it years ago, and of course it is important if you want to rule to have a liberal education that includes languages and history. King George III also liked science, when in its modern form it was just becoming a thing. I remember the detail I was most surprised about was that his sons should go overseas to know other royals and nobles, and to work on their language skills, but that they shouldn't spend too much time. He complained that many royals spent so much time in other countries that they ended up with an accent in their own language and didn't know their own culture. This letter helped me to see that the rich and powerful don't know the answer to education.

'To Educate the Human Potential' by Maria Montessori

Montessori is amazing. She started a whole education movement, and her name is on many schools around the world. She wrote quite a few books on it too. She was a medical doctor in the late 1800s in Italy, rare for a woman. She is most known for her emphasis on early childhood education and utilizing specifically engineered physical objects for learning. However, she also talked about education for later ages, and also had excellent ideas there. She's known for science and the young, but also spoke of religion and young adults. The 'Conclusion' of this book is like a wonderful sermon on self-directed education.

Here is one paragraph: "In the advanced as in the primary stage, the first step to take in order to become a Montessori teacher is to shed omnipotence and to become a joyous observer. If the teacher can really enter into the joy of seeing things being born and growing under his own eyes, and can clothe himself in the garment of humility, many delights are reserved for him that are denied to those who assume infallibility and authority in front of a class. Such teachers suffer from illusions, being far from the truth. They agree that it is necessary to cultivate the will in children, for spontaneous interest, but contend that it must be strictly controlled and restrained." This helped reinforce my ideas about student-led learning, which I had come to in my own teaching experience.

'The Doctor and the Soul' by Viktor Frankl

Frankl was an Austrian psychiatrist who ran a hospital before WW2. He was Jewish and decided not to escape, so he ended up in a few concentration camps. His wife was forced to have an abortion by the Nazis, then she died in a prison camp. His parents and brother died in camps as well. He survived. The camps proved his theories about having meaning in life in all circumstances, which he calls Logotherapy.

At first it doesn't seem like this connects with education, but his emphasis on meaning, freedom, and responsibility is sorely lacking in education, which is a failure of education. Look at how important these two quotes from Frankl's 'Introduction' are:

"Thus, man is by no means merely a product of heredity and environment. There is a third element: decision. Man ultimately decides for himself! And, in the end, education must be education toward the ability to decide."

"The gas chambers of Auschwitz were the ultimate consequence of the theory that man is nothing but the product of heredity and environment—or, as the Nazi liked to say, of “Blood and Soil.” I am absolutely convinced that the gas chambers of Auschwitz, Treblinka, and Maidanek were ultimately prepared not in some Ministry or other in Berlin, but rather at the desks and in the lecture halls of nihilistic scientists and philosophers." I've studied Frankl's work for a couple of decades, and it's helped me with many things, including seeing the important effects of the assumptions made in education.

'Bobby Fischer Teaches Chess' by Bobby Fischer, Stuart Margulies, and Don Mosenfelder

Fischer is one of the greatest chess champions of all time. He's the American that beat the Soviets. He invented a new type of chess clock, which has become common, and a new type of chess to make it more difficult. He knew and helped the Polgar sisters as well.

With this book you can learn chess starting from nothing. It has a unique structure and method. At the beginning it tells you how the pieces move and the rules. Then it presents problems. It starts with easy problems and then they get more difficult. The focus is on learning how to checkmate someone, which is how you win at the end of the game, rather than on opening moves.

The book uses a type of programmed learning so you can teach yourself. You have a problem on one page with a picture of a board and a question. You figure out your answer, how to move a piece to checkmate, or if checkmate is possible, then you turn the page. At the top of the next page it gives you the correct answer. Then the rest of the page offers the next problem. Once you get to the end of the book you actually turn the book upside down and go through the second set of problems. It's very creative.

After I was sick and left for dead in Kenya in late 2015 I found out I have spinal deformities which damaged my brainstem, and I ended up with short and long term memory loss. Looking through books I had underlined and old pictures helped with restoring memories, alternative health solutions helped when the hospitals and doctors were ineffective at best, and then I set this crazy goal of joining Mensa, the high IQ society. I would have been able to do it before my health issues, but with the shape I was in it seemed like there was no way. I would get lost trying to drives roads I had been driving since I was a kid. I had issues with my heart and lungs. It was pretty bad. The way I studied for the test was to get practice tests, do them, and then go over the ones I got wrong. Then do another test. It's the same idea of programmed learning as in Fischer's book, and you can teach yourself. I did end up passing the test and joining Mensa for awhile. Fischer's book helped me to realize that with well-structured lessons you can teach yourself, that programmed learning works outside of just tests, and to think about the end goal you're trying to achieve.

'Gifted Hands' by Ben Carson

Carson is one of the greatest neurosurgeons in history. He was the youngest chief pediatric neurosurgeon in the US, did the first separation of conjoined twins joined at the back of the head, did the first neurosurgical operation on a fetus in the womb, and developed other new methods and techniques. When he was young though he had anger issues, and didn't do well at school. His father had a separate family and left, his mother went to mental institutions. It wasn't great.

To make the kids do better in school his mother restricted their television time, and required them to read two books per week and write reports on them. Carson obviously ended up doing well at school and in life. His reading of the Bible helped him overcome his anger. His brother Curtis also did well in life. Considering the circumstances it was unlikely that Ben Carson was able to become the person he became. It helped me realize that even a mentally unhealthy mother could significantly change the trajectory of kids by requiring reading and writing.

Conclusion

Look at the wide circumstances of these people. Insights about life and education abound. Many beginnings, many paths, many ends.

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