London, GB | Formerly of New York, Buenos Aires, Fife, and the Western Cape. | Saoránach d’Éirinn.

Higher Learning

Via Mere Comments.

During my first day of school I was going over a hand out entitled “Great Expectations” — a summary of what I, my students, and their parents should expect this year. One of my expectations for my students was: “I expect you to make mistakes and learn from them.”

A hand shot up. “Mr. Letendre, how do we learn from our mistakes?”
I went up to her and said, “Hold out your hand.” She did and I slapped it smartly.

“Hold out your hand,” I said again.

“No!” she replied.

“Congratulations!” I said. “You have just learned from your mistake.” I turned to another student. “Hold out your hand.”

“No!” he replied.

“See, you learned from her mistake. The only way we humans learn is by making mistakes. Thomas Edison made 1,000 mistakes before he invented the light bulb. It’s better to learn from other people’s mistakes. Do you know what we call learning from other people’s mistakes?”

“No,” the class answered.

“We call it History!” I proclaimed.

Another year of teaching had begun.
Published at 11:37 pm on Thursday 26 August 2004. Categories: History.
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