Some years in the past, after I was nonetheless working as a instructor, I had a scholar come to me in a state of misery. Like many younger individuals her age, she was having bother becoming in. All the pieces from her hair to her garments to her total demeanor made her stand out, and in consequence, a few of her fellow college students had taken to calling her a “weirdo.” I’m not happy with all the things that I’ve achieved in schooling, however I’m happy with what I instructed her subsequent. I instructed this scholar the reality.
I instructed her that she WAS bizarre – and that the entire greatest persons are. I instructed her she was one in every of my favourite college students due to what made her distinctive. I instructed her I might do all the things I may to make the varsity safer for weirdos like her, and that within the outdoors world, all the good developments got here from individuals who didn’t slot in.
Each educator is aware of that weirdness is what makes our college students develop. In spite of everything, curiosity, creativity, and significant thought don’t bloom in a stagnant thoughts. So as a substitute of wringing our fingers over the social ecosystem, let’s encourage our college students to suppose weirder.
Listed here are simply three advantages to letting college students embrace their internal weirdness:
- Innovation: Innovation requires weirdness. All creativity is, by definition, totally different from all the things else that’s on the market. One technique for selling innovation in our personal lecture rooms is by encouraging college students to seek out various pathways to answering a query. For example, as soon as they know that 35+17=52, see what number of different methods they will provide you with the very same sum (35+20-3, 35+10+7, and so forth.). Or, if you happen to actually wish to shake issues up, ask college students to think about the perfect improper reply to a query — the reply that’s the most incorrect or which highlights a standard false impression. This strategy teaches college students to hunt out new views and strategy concepts with an outside-the-box mindset.
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