I like this phrase. It\u2019s a chapter heading if not a book title I\u2019ll use. The Dalai Lama used it in a recent book, just noted on another blog post today. But his book—really, quite good—reminds me that there is a pedagogy, an art of education, a way to bring minds forward towards the achievement of these values.<\/p>\n
The Dalai Lama and others have approached this from the perspective of what the individual can do alone. The idea of there being a method for teams learning these skills together may be too advanced. In general, committees work off of the lowest common denominator. They\u2019re hobbled by the weakest link. But committees generally work form an individualistic perspective—what are the \u201copinions\u201d of each party?<\/p>\n
Instead, there is another way that is aligned with what I call \u201caction exploration.\u201d It is a combination of teamwork and experiential learning, and it doesn\u2019t assume a priori that there is any \u201canswer\u201d or \u201cbest way.\u201d It opens to more creative responses that may not be perfect, but it is good enough, and satisfies all the players. Or it\u2019s a response constructed together that no one had anticipated ahead of time.<\/p>\n
We must not underestimate the previously relatively ignored powers of collaboration, the soft power of people encouraging each other, shifting from competing to collaborating, from the illusion of \u201cbeing right\u201d to offering ideas, along with a willingness to modify them based on feedback. It\u2019s not a group in the sense of several \u201cpatients\u201d in \u201ctherapy\u201d with a \u201ctherapist.\u201d That\u2019s too one-down, disempowered, turning towards the knowledge of the authority, and curiously separated, rather than truly integrated. (Yes, it tries to be a group, but this set up is hobbled by the artificiality of its foundation, which is to focus on how each individual is neurotic and how to fix it. There\u2019s no group project here.)<\/p>\n
In action explorations, there is a collaborative effort. It might be focused for a while on the plight of an individual (e.g., in therapy); but also it can be focused on a situation faced by a group or class or collective, as in sociodrama. It could be a real social problem in the present or an anticipated difficulty. Sociodrama can be used to explore the past and to better understand a wide range of situations, adding a layer of psychological understanding to merely knowing \u201cthe facts\u201d historically. (After all, different parties attend to different facts and give them different interpretations! What is victory for some is a cheating-generated defeat. In real life, folks don\u2019t play by \u201crules\u201d that guarantee fairness.)<\/p>\n
A key point here is that action explorations combine experiential learning and collaborative learning; and the latter—collaboration—includes all the emotional issues in the social field—people supporting each other and feeling supported in turn. (These factors are tremendously important and should not be taken for granted!!) In ideally constructed collaborative learning, people encourage each other, play with, give feedback, apologize, forgive, express positive intentions to value feelings and good relations, express positive expectations, and engage in other interpersonal maneuvers. <\/p>\n
Truly collaborative learning contrasts with the hyper-individualistic and even competitive ethos of much schooling in Western cultures\u2014and other cultures, too. So it hasn\u2019t been obvious until recently.<\/p>\n
I must emphasize the power of the synthesis of experiential learning, learning by doing, action explorations, and small group rather than competitive individual efforts. Each element, experiential learning and collaborating with others, builds on the other. In addition, there are innumerable techniques and side-principles, as well as a wide open breadth of subjects.<\/p>\n
So I\u2019d add these two procedural elements to the curriculum of the education of the heart, and recognize that together they offer a kind of creativity development, an unlearning of old and rather deep habits that no longer serve (if they ever did), and a more socially engaged form of re-learning of more adaptive responses. The part that is creative is that the learning often doesn\u2019t have answers figured out by anyone else ahead of time. Sometimes indeed there are no answers, only a clarification of the issues or needs involved and a negotiation as to how best to have everyone feel that the solution seems fair. (Indeed, there are some contexts where there are \u201cright\u201d answers\u2014but what must be realized is the variety and preponderance of situations in which the idea that there is or should be a \u201cright\u201d answer is a misleading illusion.).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I like this phrase. It\u2019s a chapter heading if not a book title I\u2019ll use. The Dalai Lama used it in a recent book, just noted on another blog post today. But his book—really, quite good—reminds me that there is a pedagogy, an art of education, a way to bring minds forward towards the achievement […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25,11,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-play-and-spontaneity","category-literacy","category-wisdom-ing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/450\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blatner.com\/adam\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}