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Mary G
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| Posted: May 15 2008 at 8:39am | IP Logged
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I just finished reading, How to Think Like Leonardo daVinci: Seven Steps to Genius Every Day by Michael J. Gelb.
It really got me thinking about my home-learning environment and how I could translate Gelb’s writing into my home; not to make DaVinci’s out of my kids, but rather to ensure that I give them the tools necessary to be the “genius” God wants them to be in whatever field or endeavor God sets before them.
Here are the seven steps in a nutshell:
1. curiousita – an insatiable curiosity to life and an unrelenting quest for continuous learning
2. dimostrazione – a commitment to testing knowledge through experience, persistence, and learning from mistakes
3. sensazione – a continual refinement of the senses, especially sight, as the means to increase experiential learning
4. sfumato (literally “going up in smoke”) – a willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox and uncertainty
5. arte/scienza – a development of whole-brain learning through a balance of logic and imagination, art and science, (I would add, faith and reason)
6. corporalita – a cultivation of grace, fitness, poise (through handcrafts and exercise)
7. connessione – a recognition and appreciation of the interconnectedness of all things; also known as “systems thinking” or “holistic approach” to learning.
So, how would you do this in your home? How would you encourage or develop these steps – which really aren’t steps but rather attributes or tools for learning? Do you do these things already?
For instance, I try to model “curiosita” by always reading, learning and consistent quest for knowledge. We do lots of hands-on, experiential learning (like cooking math) to help the kids “own” the knowledge.
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MaryG
3 boys (22, 12, 8)2 girls (20, 11)
my website that combines my schooling, hand-knits work, writing and everything else in one spot!
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lapazfarm
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Sounds just like my homeschool.
On a GOOD day! 
Ok, all kidding aside, I need to read the book, but it really does sound like a better-organized and elucidated description of what I am trying to achieve in our school. Those are my educational priorities/desired attributes almost to a T.Just add cultivation of a desire for heaven and you've pretty well got our guiding principles.
How do I accomplish them, or at least try? Ideally, everything we do is, hopefully, aimed at developing these attributes.It would be hard to list it all here. My blog is an attempt to share some of it.
I will think on this and see if I can come up with some specifics.
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Theresa
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Willa
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It sounds very interesting! Maybe a summer read for me.
Honestly, I think those are the things I am trying to achieve in my home too, but I notice that some of them are attitudes or "habits" that the child would have to embrace for himself.
It would be interesting to try to decide what kind of education would be most likely to foster those kinds of habits and traits.
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Willa
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Mary G
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Willa wrote:
Honestly, I think those are the things I am trying to achieve in my home too, but I notice that some of them are attitudes or "habits" that the child would have to embrace for himself.
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The book is written for adults (altho it does have sidebars for parents trying to encourage these things in their children). I agree that some are habits that need to be embraced by the kids -- but how do we nurture, encourage and support what's needed to help the kids obtain these habits.
I really don't like the term "steps" as I don't think there is a natural progression from one to the next but rather an environment that encourages all 7 traits/habits/facets of learning y'know?
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MaryG
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lapazfarm
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Right. They seem more like "attributes" or "characteristics" of lifelong learners rather than "steps" to me.
Going back and reading the list, it seems to me these are the very things that the typical public school curriculum kills in a child.
Still thinking on how/why I feel what I do is different from public schools and therefore puts my children in a better position to develop these attributes.
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Theresa
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Mary G
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lapazfarm wrote:
Going back and reading the list, it seems to me these are the very things that the typical public school curriculum kills in a child.
Still thinking on how/why I feel what I do is different from public schools and therefore puts my children in a better position to develop these attributes. |
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Therese, do you mean drill-and-kill or teaching to the test rather than allowing the children to "own" the learning thru curiosity, experiential learning, teaching to the senses, etc?
I think where home-learning environment has a bonus on the "real school" setting is the realness of what we do, the 24/7 aspect of it all and our own love of learning that we bring to our children ...
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MaryG
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lapazfarm
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Yes, Mary that is what I meant. That and the deadly boring textbooks, and the discontinuity between subjects,the inability to go in depth into a subject of interest, leading to superficial coverage of everything. Basically the "standardization" of our children's minds.
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Theresa
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Willa
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It occurred to me that most babies and toddlers have all those qualities that you list, Mary... maybe not the arte/scienze but most of the rest. So why do we tend to lose it as we get older?
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Willa
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Mary G
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Willa wrote:
| It occurred to me that most babies and toddlers have all those qualities that you list, Mary... maybe not the arte/scienze but most of the rest. So why do we tend to lose it as we get older? |
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Good thought, Willa! Very much the "act as children" aspect of Jesus' teaching -- maybe that's why we embrace it so much ...
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MaryG
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4Real Forums : Philosophy of Education
Topic: DaVinci Learning in the Home?
