I was deeply moved by this recent piece on Tiger Woods and the assumptions embedded in the many public comments that we "know" him. We presume knowledge because he has been in the public eye and we somehow convert his public persona into a perception of his whole (and private) persona.
We make a mistake when we assume that what we see on the outside accounts for, describes or reveals the inside of a person. Many seemingly functional folks of all ages and stages have remarkable coping mechanisms and stories within that are hidden (sometimes from themselves even). And, because we only engage for the most part on the outside, we are often oblivious to the inside story of many people. And we miss their inner demons too.
This happens in schools where we assume we understand our students. We want them to be like us in some respects as that makes it easier to teach them. But, we often do not delve too deep and miss the "insider" piece of people and that creates for outbursts and misperceptions and misunderstandings and poor forms of communication.
In education, we need to teach the students that we have -- not the students we want to have or the students as they appear on the outside. If we do the latter, we will fail as teachers and institutions. It is like assuming we understand Tiger Woods.
Now the conclusion of the story on Woods is that we should leave him be and let him deal with his own problems. We need to give up our image and let the "real" Tiger be himself. But, and this is key, that cannot be the answer in education. Far from it.
We cannot just let the inside of kids eat them away. We cannot ignore their true stories, however well they cover them up. We are affected deeply by our homes , our communities, by those with whom we engage. When we witness abuse or addiction or violence or live in fear, that twerks our insides -- perhaps invisibly or perhaps visibly on occasion.
So, my recommendation: let's do a vastly better job of understanding the students across the educational landscape that we teach -- from early childhood through graduate school. Learn their inner stories and appreciate that what we see on the surface often masks what resides below. And how do we do this?
Start by changing the institutional culture to one that is ACE score sensitive, that recognizes our easy effort to assume knowledge (as in the cased of Tiger) is flawed. Start by looking at who ARE OUR students. Don't just ask either. Find out and then act -- create institutions that don't assume but instead learn and know and evolve.
Imagine how beneficial it would be to know our students better. Imagine how education could be improved. Imagine teachers and administrators who stretch to learn -- and then to engage our students.
Consider art as one vehicle for this and look at this program as a pathway for deeper and even angry expression: https://www.emkinstitute.org/e...vism-civicengagement. And look at the work of the Urban Institute that reinforces this very point.
http://www.urban.org/sites/def...Evaluation-Brief.pdf
We can do better -- we must do better. Let the Tiger example set us on a pathway to recognizing what we don't know --- and begin to fill that void.
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