“We all learn in our own way…” – Grace Pilon
May 3rd, 2014 | 
Author: I’ve been asked to republish my June 16, 2010 article on WorkShop Way, one of the best ways to truly educate children. WorkShop Way is a sensitive and sensible combination of specificity, structure, and genuine caring for–and about–students (and teachers and parents!). – Doc Meek 😮
Photos from WorkShop Way (TM).
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We’ve been blogging about changing the world, or changing the world by changing ourselves.
Many have suggested that instead of the focus being on changing the world or changing ourselves, the focus should be on LOVE.
We are not talking about the popular culture version of love here. We’re certainly not talking about sensual love. We are talking “filios,” “brotherly love” or “sisterly love.”
We are talking about simply caring about others (say, children and students) in a genuine personal way, no matter what their academic performance is, no matter what their behavior is.
This is not easy. We do have to learn to love and respect ourselves first, completely, with our combination of strengths and weaknesses, as we learn to love students completely with their combination of strengths and weaknesses.
If love and respect are performance-based, if love and respect are conditional, they don’t work very well. Not safe. Not secure. No ultimate trust. Students need the trust to move ahead confidently.
Respect and love are effective!
And they are do-able.
Teachers or parents, for example, are not just simply purveyors of subject matter or rules.
In the classroom this translates, according to Grace Pilon, into paying attention to specific and obvious TRUTHS that apply to all of us, and certainly to students. She liked to see teachers put up LEARNING TRUTHS posters in their classrooms.
The LEARNING TRUTHS
- We respect the rights of others.
- It is intelligent to ask for help.
- It takes courage to be willing to risk.
- We are free to make mistakes while learning.
- Everyone has a right to time to think.
- We don’t have to know everything today.
These learning truths posters are not just for decorating the wall with “nice sayings.” The teachers refer to one or more of them daily, in the course of the day’s lessons, so that the students will learn how to apply them effectively. ……………………………………………………………………………………….
This applies to children in the home environment as well.
This needs more discussion in a future posting.
Filios,
Doc Meek, Neurological Learning Specialist, Sherwood Park, Alberta, CANADA, Wednesday, June 16, 2010
P.S. Recently Susan Bostik commented on the above post, and I replied to her post as follows:
Dear Susan,
I am very grateful that you have reminded us all of the value of a single child, of every single person in this classroom called earth.
Many a child struggling in school (or simply bored to tears, struggling in a different way, eh?), has been saved by Grace Pilon’s Workshop Way.
You can prove this for yourself by checking out any of these links:
Official Website: http://www.workshopway.org/
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pu4RT_IOyeE
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Workshop-Way/487160230516
Academic Journal:
http://www.ascd.org/ASCD/pdf/journals/ed_lead/el_199009_harmin.pdf
Doc Meek: https://docmeek.com/what-can-one-teacher-do/
Not only is the child saved (revived, survived) in school, they grow up to become better parents at home (or wherever they work elsewhere), and better members of their communities, their churches, and everywhere they are in this… our common classroom…
Mother Earth.
Susan, thank you for pointing us to the nature of true education:
It’s ripple-out effect, spreading its value in ever-widening circles—for all time and all eternity—and throughout the entire cosmos (known and unknown to mankind).
And to womankind of course. :o)
They (womankind) are what makes the world worth living in, and living for.
Yes!
Doc Meek, Neurological Learning Specialist
Sherwood Park, Alberta, CANADA, Tuesday, April 29, 2014
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Dear DocMeek,
Although not a teacher or education person, I was Grace Pilon’s last protege. We spent eight months together, more or less ten hours a week for eight months (in 1984) while she guided my understanding of the philosophical and psychological underpinnings of Workshop Way. Though she had twenty seven consultants and had taught thousands of teachers in some aspect of WW, she didn’t believe anyone understood the implications of what she had “stumbled across,” as she put it: “the secret of human growth.”
The last thirty plus years of trying to deal with the introduction of this idea has naturally been a fascinating story. Having been an unusually successful advertising fellow did not prepare me for the mission.
Appropriately applied WW introduces the “new kind of person” both A.H. Maslow and Jonas Salk believed required for intelligent navigation of the 21st century. A creative group I belong to is in the process of organizing a presentation to our new (Louisiana) governor in order to convince him to help install five to seven elementary school demonstration models in neighborhoods across the state – in order to set the stage for the state’s emergence as “a learning society” – the only appropriate response to the impending challenges we face as a nation and planet.
I’d like to correspond with you if you are up to it. There should be a way we can work together in bringing about the changes the world needs.
Best,
Robbie Robertson. New Orleans
504 861 8261
weareterradolphins@gmail.com
http://www.anewcure.org
Robbie Robertson: Yes, by all means let’s find a way to encourage the use of Grace Pilon’s Workshop Way wherever and whenever!
Please email me directly: docmeek (at) gmail (dot) com