Sunday, October 19, 2014

Running away with Inspiration

I've hated all of my english classes growing up. I adored writing and reading, and I still do, but english classes always made me extremely squirmy and put me in a foul mood. All english class was to me was being told to read a random thing and then being told what it meant, or learning how to write in just the proper way so that we could be ready for high school (and then in high school so that we'd be ready for college). I hated it.
And then, in my sophomore literature class, we started a section on Mary Shelley's classic, Frankenstein. After I managed to actually read the first assigned chapters (as opposed to just using SparkNotes or something like that), I fell in LOVE with the book. I read a couple more chapters that night just to see where it took me. When I came back to class the next day, I told my teacher all about my first experience with the book. 
My teacher was incredibly young and new to teaching, and I had a hard time respecting her in the classroom. She and I conflicted a lot in class and I wasn't a very good student to her.
But that day, Ms. Boman did something for me that I'll never forget. She let me break away from the class lesson plan, assigned readings, and end project for Frankenstein and she let me read it at my own pace. Each day she'd allow me to leave the room and read on my own, and I didn't have to get caught up in the stop-and-start readings with the class or even the chapter reviews. She simply assigned me a different project at the end of the year and let me share my analysis of the book at the end of the section. I was all like "…w-huh?"



I can't imagine how the book would have been different for me if my teacher just told me to just stick with the class and follow the program, even though I was way ahead pace wise. Being able to run away with that book how I wanted to allowed me to develop my own relationship with it and experience it in my own way, and now it's one of my favorite books of all time. 

I think about this story a lot when we discuss children's media and the experiences of Caroline Leaf. When Leaf was able to pour her heart into something she felt inspired by, a beautiful piece of art was created. When children are given proper freedom with media and creative mediums, their worlds expand. I felt like I didn't have to rebel when I was given the freedom to learn at my own will.

While I don't think this works with everyone, it was an incredibly formative experience for me and I feel strongly that artists and children both should be given this freedom at some point in their education.

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