During the course of the interview, we talked a bit about his childhood, and he told me a story that impacted me more as a teacher than as a writer.
The story goes something like this: He had always seen, heard and been guided by disembodied spirits. It was a way of life for him. Being a child with this gift in the spiritually dark times of the 40s and 50s didn't help. People called him a freak, but didn't hesitate to ask his mother if Hans would give them a "reading" if they suffered from marital or work related problems. It always puzzled him, but he was a good boy, and gave these hypocrites their readings.
He never did well in school. He suffered from ADD and dyslexia, and consequently, failed more than his share of tests. One day, at the tender age of nine, King hit rock bottom. This is what he told me: “I was coming home from school and was so depressed. I sat on a bench and just started to cry because I failed another test.
And, I said to Spirit (his unseen Guides) — they had been with me forever — I said, ‘What is all this? I mean, why me?’ And this very big voice came out of the bench and said, ‘Hans, in your case, less is more. The less you know of what they think you should know, the more you will learn about what we think you should know. And what we think you should know is what will benefit you and mankind. And from that day, I never worried about it again.”
Now, it doesn't matter for the purpose of this blog entry whether you believe in psychics, mediums, fortune tellers and the like. I tell this story not to get you to call Hans and ask for a reading, but because, as a teacher, it struck me very profoundly how God had more say in his test scores than his teachers did.
And so I got to thinking, how often does God do that? Shut our brains down in school because Divine Will didn't like the lesson(s)? How often does God prefer you fail a test because hey kid, you have other things to do, and what Spirit sees as necessary isn't in the school curriculum.
There is much talk today about the failure of public schools. Teachers are being blamed for just about every poor test score a child gets. And I have always thought, ever since this interview, who do we think we are that we have usurped the will of the Divine to insist that what we know as mere mortals is more important than what God knows?
I have since then pondered with great frustration over the handful of students in my class each year that stymie me. What am I doing wrong? How can I change up this teaching strategy to get this baby angel to understand and retain the information I am trying to give him? And more vexing: what if I have no control over this child? What if God has other plans?
I am not saying this to wiggle out of my responsibility as a teacher. It just begs the question.
What do you think?
Great way to address this issue. I was talking to my next door neighbor yesterday, the mother of a 6-year-old girl and a just-turned-4-year-old boy, and we were comparing their learning styles. The girl is highly intelligent but incredibly worried about doing everything exactly right. The boy, who decided he wanted to learn to ride his bike because all the other kids were doing it, just went out and did it. He flung himself off a diving board into a lake (because the other kids were doing it) as his mother watched in quiet agony, since he'd just learned to swim last year. 20 or so flings later, he decided he was done and ready to move on to something else. While I realize it is impossible for a teacher to cater to every child's learning style, I think we have done them a great disservice for trying to box them into a single mode of learning. Few parents have the time or energy to provide additional stimulation so you're left with a bunch of frustrated kids, teachers, and parents. The kids know what they need. We're just not willing or able to listen to the way they communicate it.
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