Chapter 3 — Teaching with “both hands,” raising children to use “both hands”
Serialization of Growing Sustainable Children; and, Schools Worthy of Our Affection
My best guess how, in the next 100 years, whole-child K-12 schooling can evolve worldwide.
Hello, to those of you taking or considering K-12 teacher training courses, of any kind. Hello also to future generations of K-12 activists. I see you out there in the mists of time…
To facilitate the coming discussions, I wish to share some useful rhetoric for teachers and Cultural Creative parents so they can talk more and talk more easily.
The way I conceive of teaching is simple. See if you agree: K-12 teaching is easier when teachers use both hands, right and left.
Anyone disagree?
I think of a teacher’s “two hands” this way.
Our right hand is our healthy, rational capacity for Thinking.
Our left hand is our healthy, rational capacity for Feeling.
These two function much better together, than if we only use one at a time.
Isn’t it more fun to work with teammates, collaborators and cooperative colleagues?
We can work internally with one hand tied behind our back; or, both hands as equal partners.
This is relevant within the most limited domain, the Domain of One Person, One Teacher, One Parent.
What’s its relevance to K-12? Do we wish our children to grow up one-handed or two handed?
Rise and fall of the two-handed meme
Several generations ago, 1975–1985, Cultural Creatives talked about our left and right brain hemispheres as each of “two hands” and how they work best together.
If you’re old enuf, you may recall an older version of this rhetoric: The “two hands” of whole-brained education: logical-sequential thinking, in our left brain hemisphere, working together with its partner-teammate, Gestalt-oriented, face-oriented, feeling-oriented, color and sound-oriented, right brain hemisphere.
By 1985, this rhetoric was unable to develop, did not evolve. Specifically, it could not progress to either:
- a general holistic experimental method; nor,
- could it ground itself in any daily personal practice.
So as a piece of mainstream psychology, the topic faded away. By 1990–2000 the Decade of the Brain, as sanctioned by the US Congress, Right~Left brain was abandoned. The topic did not re-emerge until Iain McGilchrist productively revived brain lateralization in the 20-teens.
The Two-handed Approach to K-12 Schooling is useful rhetoric for parents and teachers to understand each other; and, each others’ struggles with children.
Don’t parents and teachers want students using both hands, not living one hand tied behind their back?
More than two hands?
Those readers aware of Rudolf Steiner’s conceiving of Imagination, Intuition and Inspiration may already be thinking about more than two hands. What about Imagination, Intuition and Inspiration?
Each of these can be conceived of as an additional “hand” we have available on an “as needed” basis.
Raising self-propelled problem-solvers
Some problems we face in a family and in a classroom are mental, practical problems. Other problems are emotional problems, negotiating with others so everyone needs are known and addressed, within the highest good of all stakeholders.
Self-propelled problem-solvers of all ages prefer working with multiple hands over working with only one hand.
Best Practices in Interpersonal Competency
I also like the idea of effective Cultural Creatives as individuals who are:
- Emotionally Intelligent,
- affiliative (interested in cooperation and collaboration),
- willing and able to play on a team; or
- willing and able to lead a team.
If you like the above metaphors, then, you and I have similar ideas about teaching and K-12 graduates.
The above metaphors build out in more precision older, fuzzier ideas of “whole-child education” and, “whole-brained education.”
We can also conceive of “two hands” as as:
- A right hand of rational problem-solving, working together with its partner, its teammate,
- A left hand of Emotional Intelligence and interpersonal competency.
The whole topic of Holistic Brain Balance is not germane here. The above I think is sufficient for K-12 teaching now. As long as you find terms for Wholeness workable for you, this is what matters. Maybe you can improve on my words above.
Practicing using ‘our two hands’ in our life, alternately or both at once, together, as useful, invites every adult to make more new choices rather than reacting on auto-pilot, on automatic.
Maybe as teachers, we can make the practice of using both “hands” easier for the next generation.
Q: Do workable, effective, profitable Team Human schools exist today we can use as role models?
A: There’s no certification for this. Easier to talk about schools striving to be more in alignment, on all levels, with what is workable and timely and practical for the next seven generations.
NEXT ~ the crucial K-12 insight: Sensitive Periods — “To give children the right experience, at the right time, for the right reasons” ~ Adapted from Socrates, Plato, Aristotle
