My way of trying to make sense of what Jay has developed is to translate it
into my exploration of how students learn from their classroom experiences.
I have been looking at why different students sometimes learn quite
different things from their participation in the same activities. One
reasos seems to be the permeability of membrane that encloses the sense of
self (I know this has shades of dualism, but it makes sesne in this
context). Some students interact with others as though their being was out
there in the social interaction. They give the sense that they are what
they are doing. Other students keep themselves a mystery. Maybe they are
struggling with understanding, maybe they are afraid of ridicule, maybe
there are more powerful things dominating their feelings at that time.
When you talk with these students afterwards, those who are out there in
the activity have acquired a great deal from the activity. Those who
remained inside themselves may not even remember the activity at all.
And, of course, those who do most to shape the activity, who play with it,
make up jokes, creatively push at its boundaries, are those who are most
openly, fully engaged in the activity.
Which suggests that openness to internalisation is the playground of
externalisation. That those who become the activity are those who do most
to recreate the activity.
Which takes my thinking back to Jay's earlier piece on the integration or
identity of the rational/emotional. That it is in the trusting, emotional
openness to participation with others that rationality arises. I think?
So many ideas, so little time to comprehend them all!
Graham
Graham Nuthall
Professor of Education
University of Canterbury
Private Bag 4800
Christchurch, New Zealand
Phone 64 03 3642255 Fax 64 03 3642418
http://www.canterbury.ac.nz/educ/ultp.html