Learning Matters: The importance of understanding relationships
I heard a TED talk last week, replayed from a 2013 presentation by the late educator Rita Pierson, entitled “Every Kid Needs a Champion.” Her stories of championing children begin with a statement attributed to George Washington Carver: “All learning is understanding relationships.”
I agree with the sentiment Pierson shared regarding the importance of the relationship between students and teachers and the critical need for caring adults in the life of a child. I think of all the relationships students stand to miss if their parents enroll them in the widely advertised online learning programs sprouting up across the country.
But I also wonder if perhaps Carver’s notion of relationships extended beyond the personal to encompass the relationships of all things, living and nonliving, one thing or subject to another. Carver was, after all, a botanist and inventor, a pioneer in agricultural research, the prime promoter of peanut farming. He also championed improvements to the economic lives of African Americans in the South in the first half of the 20th Century.
Carver researched the relationships of crops to nutrients in the soil before he started urging cotton farmers to rotate their crops. He discovered new purposes for soybeans and developed new products from cotton waste. Relating one set of scientific facts to another was integral to his scientific and economic contributions.
I think it’s useful to consider a comprehensive interpretation of Carver’s words. As teachers and students adjust to the developments in curriculum and instruction aimed at connecting classroom instruction to the world we all inhabit, education can benefit from clearer messages that learning is about understanding relationships among people, places, and systems.
Students need to understand the relationship of their history class to the problems the world faces today. They should have a better idea of how math and physics play out in the vast “Internet of things” and the ways in which arts and books can heighten their appreciation of life.
Part of the promise of the Common Core curriculum is to shift students’ experience of education from “meeting requirements” or “getting credits” toward a broader, deeper comprehension of the subjects they study and their relevance to their lives and careers.
As I look toward starting another year as a musicianship teacher with the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus, helping my students master the basics of rhythm and melody, I am mindful not just of the musical concepts I must impart — like why a whole note usually has four counts and a quarter note usually one, unless the time signature indicates otherwise; I also want to help them see the importance of paying attention to the “time signatures” in every class and job they undertake.
Yes, I want them to learn the names of the notes on the staff and the keyboard, pitches that don’t change, as compared to the do-re-mi pattern of syllables that can move up and down the scale. But I also want them to appreciate how learning the musical intervals hones their listening skills and their sensitivity to other voices.
I hope the homework and classwork my students do will increase their appreciation of the composers who match meaningful poetry to music and to the conductors who help them feel the spirit of melody and text. I hope they’ll take pleasure in knowing the other young singers who come to rehearsal and class every week.
I agree that every child needs a champion. If it were up to me, I’d want every child to have a champion like the principal of the elementary school in San Gabriel, where every child gets music instruction every day. As my music teacher friend Lissie Quishenberry said, “That principal did his homework!”
I admit my bias toward choral music. Another colleague would give more weight to teaching every child coding, and I understand the importance of that, too. My point here is to draw attention to all the relationships to be found in all the subjects students encounter.
To quote a children’s choir song, “…The world is a place for a seeing eye, and a place for a listening ear.”
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JOYLENE WAGNER is a past trustee of the Glendale Unified School District. Email her at jkate4400@aol.com.
