Learning

What Small Thing Would Help You Right Now?

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I just read an interesting article “Eight Words to Say to a Friend“! It’s about a young woman and her small daughter landing in Cambridge England, late at night, arriving at their college accommodation, utterly exhausted. Their friend, whom they were visiting, popped out of her apartment, hugged them, and asked:

What small thing would help you right now now?

She continues:

Not: Can I do something for you? 

Not: How can I help?

Not the terribly generic and unhelpful: Let me know if you need anything.(Anything???!)

But: “What small thing would help you right now?“

Something about the specificity, the smallness of it, was a revelation. 

These days, I’m often in the position of seeing someone needing support of some kind or other. I used to ask “Can I do something for you?” and been turned away, graciously, but my offer of help rejected, nevertheless.

I started asking, “What can I do for you?” A bit more specific, but not any more effective.

I learned as a teacher the question I needed to ask a struggling student was not “How can I help you?” but “What do you need help with?” Again, the focus is shifted from me to the learner. It worked with even the most recalcitrant kid (1).

“What small thing would help you right now?” is definitely a better question in a social situation – focused on my friend and not on me. I have to try it, the next time I’m able to offer assistance when I find a friend dealing with a stressful situation!

(1) Another critical incident (2009; Newman, Judith “On Becoming A Better Teacher”).

One of the most difficult transitions I personally have had to make has been dealing with kids’ resistance, their ‘not-learning’ as Herb Kohl (1994) calls it. Just when I think I have some control over my responses I run into a kid who pushes me back into my instinctual, authoritarian way of responding. There’s one like that in one of the third grade classes I’ve been visiting.

In my experience when kids avoid engaging, offering some support brings about a small shift in attitude. Usually I can get a kid to ‘just try’. I’ve learned that helping kids to be successful overcomes a lot of their resistance. But I can’t even get near this one — Andrew, I’ll call him. He cuts me off by turning away from me before I can offer help of any kind. His body language is real clear — stay away!

Part of Andrew’s problem is that he doesn’t read or write very well. At age nine, that’s starting to be serious. He’s bright, so he knows what the others can do and he can’t. He behaves aggressively — pinching, hitting, or jabbing his classmates with a pencil. They don’t want anything to do with him. His behaviour keeps them from discovering his shortcomings, but at a cost — by isolating himself he is unable to build friendship.

I’m flummoxed. Andrew is showing quite clearly he won’t learn from me. And each time I attempt to engage him I seem to be digging the hole deeper. Andrew evokes the ‘witch’ in me. Although I understand his antagonism, I react to it in a way that doesn’t help him. I find myself wanting to force him to try.

I have no trouble engaging Jake, who drives the teacher crazy. He doesn’t make me bristle the way Andrew does. The question is what about the behaviour gets to me in Andrew’s case and not in Jake’s. What in my own history is being triggered by Andrew and not by Jake?

Maybe it’s the way Andrew rejects assistance. When he cuts me off I just walk away. I’ve learned there’s no point in attempting to cajole him and I have no authority to insist he do anything. But I’m not happy walking away. I keep wondering what I’m doing that evokes Andrew’s resistance and what I could do that would permit us to work out a different kind of relationship (JN. Journal: 11/7/1995).

Writing about the problem helped me see Andrew and I were engaged in a power/control struggle.

I was rereading Interwoven Conversations (Newman, 1991) the other day when I came across a critical incident about Danny — a six-year old who taught me to ask “Do you need help?” before barging in. I’m barging in with Andrew; he immediately raises his barriers, which in turn angers me because it leaves me nowhere to go. Hmm. So I guess I should at least be giving him some room to let me know how I can help him before we’re embroiled in his not-learning game. I can see I should ask if he needs help and accept it if he says ‘No.’ That gives him an out and me a way of leaving gracefully. I’ll try that tomorrow morning and see what happens (JN. Journal: Nov. 14, 1995).

The next day, when I asked Andrew if he needed help he considered my offer and then told me precisely what assistance he wanted when I followed up by asking ‘What do you need help with?’ That surprised me. In other words, I discovered that asking if he needed help made it possible for Andrew to retain control of the situation. It made it possible for him to engage in learning with me. My reflective writing helped me understand what was causing my struggle with Andrew and what I might do about it.

Bev, Andrew’s teacher, and I had a conversation one afternoon in which she described how she learned to accept his clear signals that he wouldn’t comply. As she wrote later

The issue of power and Andrew’s behaviour was a serious issue. I found myself challenged by the dilemma of how to give Andrew the power he needed without ‘caving in’ to his tyrannical behaviour. How could I get out of the power struggle that I didn’t want to be in and that Andrew continually created? One clue for me came when he told me one day that he didn’t want to go to music and if I forced him to go he would misbehave so that he would be sent out of the room. At that moment I knew he had it figured out — he was in control and he knew it. I had to learn ways of negotiating activities with him, allowing him acceptable choices. Instead of reacting in an authoritarian way I had to find ways of allowing him to choose to engage. Andrew has taught me that I can’t make anyone do anything he doesn’t want to; external power has limited impact; it’s internal power that makes a positive difference (BC. Journal: 4/21/1995).

Bev learned how to negotiate with Andrew. Her important insight was that Andrew was always in control and that she would never get anywhere trying to force him to do anything. Because she has become adept at reading his signals, he’s become much more involved and proficient at reading and writing and his behaviour is considerably less resistant. My coming to understand the dynamics of my interaction with Andrew allowed me to talk with Bev about his resistance and avoidance of learning. In turn, Bev and I were each able to restructure our relationship with Andrew.

Other Mothers

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Watch this video of a mother raccoon teaching her baby to climb – it has lots to say about how we might think about learning and teaching, ourselves!

Watch the mother problem solve, watch the kit figure out how to climb the tree.

Mother Raccoon can’t actually “teach” the kit to climb – she supports the young one, she positions and repositions her, supporting the kit’s efforts so the young one can figure out she has to use her claws to hang on. Mother’s persistent, she doesn’t give up; the kit finally gets the hang of it and starts climbing the tree on her own.

It’s how my grandmother taught me to make bagels, and how to knit, when I was very young. I was invited into her activity, shown how to participate. I learned to watch and try myself, figuring out what was essential in the process, what I could ignore.

Making bagels, I learned what the dough should feel like when it had been kneaded enough, how to shape the bagels by rolling a small piece of dough into a “snake”, picking up one end, rotating my hand, bringing the other end to the first, then rolling my hand to make the join. I learned how to tell when the bagels were ready to come out of the pot of boiling sugar water, what they look like when they’re baked enough. I don’t recall her teaching me these things directly, but I certainly learned them.

Knitting, the same thing – in the end I became a right hand knitter (my grandmother knitted “european” – left-handed) but the principles of how to cast on stitches, how to hold the needles, how to bring the yarn around the needle push it through a stitch and bring it back through to form a new stitch, I learned from her. After I developed carpel tunnel syndrome in my right hand, I actually switched to knitting as my grandmother did, with my left hand – it wasn’t difficult – I’d learned the technique by watching how she’d done it. I came to understand that our relationship had always been a mentoring one – I was invited to participate in her world and to learn from her many important life skills!

Interesting, I don’t remember my mother engaging with me in this way. She never shared her natural ability to play piano (which I always envied). I took piano lessons but I never learned to improvise the way my mother could. I didn’t learn to sew from her. I taught myself to cook. She aborted my passion for ballet when she refused to let me replace lost ballet shoes. I don’t remember her ever having an encouraging word for any challenge I took on.

I do remember her allowing me to read whatever novel she was reading (which transitioned me from children’s books to adult literature at an early age). The first grown-up novel I remember was “Peyton Place” – The “novel tells the story of three women who are forced to come to terms with their identity, both as women and as sexual beings, in a small, conservative, gossipy town. Metalious (the author) included recurring themes of hypocrisy, social inequities and class privilege in a tale that also includes incest, abortion, adultery, lust and murder.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peyton_Place_(novel))

At eleven I certainly didn’t understand a lot about what took place in the novel but I knew there was something illicit about this book which my mother and my aunts whispered and giggled about. My mother and I never talked about the book. She never talked about any of the books we actually both read over the years. She went to the library; I read the books after she finished them.

Consequently, I looked for other women to help me become an adult – my Aunt Helen (who lived in London, ON), Mrs. Milligan (my friend Marlene’s mother), Bobby Ballentyne (my friend Marion’s mother), Ruth Marks (whom I regarded as a big sister), many others, all who shared their lives, inviting me into an adult woman’s world. I referred to them as “my other mothers”. I actively sought out mentoring when I wanted or needed to learn something new.

Today, I frequently turn to YouTube as a source of information and technique but it’s not quite the same – the two way act of sharing is absent. There is no subtle feedback letting me know whether my approximation is getting better or not. I’m pretty much on my own as a learner.

Fortunately, I have a lifetime of trusting I can tackle something new and find a way to become reasonably proficient. I attribute that to the many mentors who have shared what they were able to do and supported my explorations along the way.

The reason I reminisce about this, is an article I read recently in the New York Times: He Lives in the Double Helix of My Cells, but I Do Not Know Him (by Zach Gotlieb). Gotlieb, a child of artifical insemination who has never met his father although he discovered he has 20+ half-siblings, writes about Father’s Day. He says he “realized that I’d had fathers all along — dozens of them. There were teachers, coaches, other people’s dads, family friends, my beloved grandfather. For me, these father figures are a collage of wildly diverse personalities and perspectives giving me more fathering combined than an individual dad could possibly provide. Biology is strong, but it’s also easy. The people who father me do it for no other reason that that they choose to.“

He made me remember my “other mothers” – the women who took me under their wing, shared their lives with me, encouraged me to be intrepid, audacious, undaunted, adventurous. Because of them I cultivated talents and expertise I would otherwise never have discovered and honed.

I know lots of people who resist wading into unfamiliar territory – they’ve learned to avoid the new and subsequently miss the experience of expanding their horizons. I’m guessing the absence of good mentoring either at home or school accounts for their reticence. Failure, without support to continue trying, can make it difficult to take risks.

I’m always open to tackling something unfamiliar. Recently one the Afghan immigrants I’m spending time with helping learn English was applying for a job that required a knowledge of WHMIS (what’s WHMIS? – Workplace Hazardous Materials Information System – I searched for a way to explore the training myself so I could coach Ahmad through the certification. Turns out he didn’t need the certificate right now, maybe later).

I’m always interested in learning new stuff. I’m not afraid of taking on a challenge. I learned that from the women who took an interest in me.

Gotlieb says: the word “father” has evolved for me, from a noun to a verb.”

The same is true for “mother”!

The Receipt

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A couple of months ago my youngest great-nephew (age 6) decided to start a business – he loves sparkly paper, saw a business opportunity, and decided he should sell some. His father and grandfather are businessmen, so with dad’s help he built a website with images of different kinds of sparkly paper, information about the “founder” himself, statements about “100% satisfaction guaranteed”, “Committed To Quality” – but the bit of information that makes me chuckle every time I see it are the hours of operation:

Open after school Monday – Friday (except closed on Wednesday – he has dinner with his maternal grandmother), after swimming class on Saturday and all day Sunday! He provides a phone number and email address as well as a contact form so you can place an order. The website has been dynamic – becoming more and more focused (I noticed two small typos when I looked today) as he figures out how a business website needs to function.

I think I was his first (maybe his only) customer. I began an email conversation about types of sparkly paper, cost of each sheet, how to send payment… I got succinct answers to my questions. I finally placed an order and received in the mail two pieces of letter-size sparkly paper. I sent a cheque to the house with a thank you note. This all happened about a month ago.

Today I get a receipt in the mail:

Receipt for $12

My academic career focused on literacy learning in children and adults, helping teachers understand the ways children figure out how reading and writing work and what instructional situations support rather than hinder their literacy development. The receipt is a wonderful artifact of a six year old negotiating an adult literacy form – confirmation of a transaction.

He’s got the company name and the quantity of paper I purchased, and the amount I paid him. What leaps off the page for me are his attempts at writing the numeral “2” – his sense of direction is still ambiguous and we see in both instances where he wants to write a “2”, he starts from the right instead of the left, crosses it out and changes direction. He’s got all the letters in “received” and his guess at the “ee” vowel is a common writing error (remember the “rule” – “i” before “e” except after “c”? However, there are quite a few English words that actually use an “ie” spelling after a “c” (science, conscience, sufficient…) and vice versa that use “ei” after other letters (protein, forfeit…)). He’ll sort that confusing spelling situation out in the same way the rest of us have – through reading and writing, trial and error, along with a bit of memorization.

It continues to amaze me just how much we can discern about a child’s literacy strategies from such a succinct sample of writing.