Discovery Learning - Exploring New Ideas

“So, on beyond Zebra!

Explore!
Like Columbus!
Discover new letters!
Like WUM is for Wumbus,
My high-spouting whale who lives high on a hill
And who never comes down ‘til it’s time to refill.
So, on beyond Z! It’s high time you were shown
That you really don’t know all there is to be known.”
(By Dr Seuss, from “On Beyond Zebra”)

Remember what it was like to be a child discovering new things and going off to explore in your own backyard or local area with your friends? In times gone by, it was quite normal for parents to send children off to play for the day, calling out after them, “Be home before its dark.” Yes, I know many parents today would be shaking their heads in horror at this notion; it seems we have become very protective.

But back to Dr Seuss and discovering and learning for yourself, just like Christopher Columbus. For hundreds of years it was commonly believed by most people and even the wisest people before the fifteenth century that the world was flat. It was only through the courage and perseverance of Columbus and others (who lived to tell the tale) that one of the most rigid of ideas and truths was proved to be incorrect and this myth dispelled forever as a result. It makes you wonder how such major misconceptions can persist for so long, doesn’t it? Just goes to show that we ‘don’t know what we don’t know until we do what we don’t usually do’.

This revelation came to me only recently when I was given some prints of very rare maps of the world from 1500s and 1600s. What is amazing about these maps is that they clearly show the outline of Australia and yet even today we still hear people telling our young students that Australia was ‘discovered’ by Captain Cook in 1770. What of the indigenous people who arrived in Australia some 40,000 years before? What of the other explorers who mapped huge parts of our coastline but never received the same recognition as the English explorers?

What must it have been like to go exploring in these times? It must have been unbelievably difficult - battling the seas, battling a way forward in unchartered territory and battling the superstitions and fear of the men on the journey of discovery into the unknown.

In Gordon Livingston’s book, “The Thing You Think You Cannot Do”, there is a chapter titled, ‘Fear Springs from Ignorance’, where he points out:

“We are afraid of what we do not understand. If life is a process of discovery, we are in a constant search for guidance. Our imperfect maps of how the world works have many blank areas, and like the cartographers of old, we fill these spaces with dragons. We begin to control our fears in our battles against ignorance.”

If the truth be known, all of us have our own set of fears that require tending. In the absence of knowledge and understanding, we worry and fear more. Livingstone, a renowned author and psychiatrist, notes that the less information we have about something (or someone) the more threatened we are likely to feel about it (or them).

The good news though is that our mind and perceptions are not fixed in time but change and adapt according to our experiences and new learning. In his book, “The Art of the Idea” by John Hunt demonstrates how rapidly our mind can assimilate new information from the most cryptic of scripts:

“I cdnuol’t blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, mnaes taht it dseno’t mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the hmuan mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.”

It’s hard to imagine that our mind is capable of translating such a mess and make sense of it, isn’t it? To think that we need only know the first and last letter to decipher the text is amazing. What are the implications for our thinking and learning?

According to Hunt, the tired an negative see the contents of their brain as a passive instrument with a dwindling capability while the energetic optimist actively rearranges this ‘storage facility’ – the brain – to increase its capacity. Hunt argues that the easiest way of achieving a positive mindset is to do things you don’t normally do. Breaking the ‘conformity-creep’ says Hunt, keeps you ‘battle ready’ because as much as we want an epiphany or some light bulb moment, the truth is, that often an idea just reveals itself. By keeping our minds ‘fertile’ even the smallest of thoughts have a chance of growing into something extraordinary.

He suggests that the easiest way to see this in action is to go on a holiday because it’s a different experience from the norm. Going on a holiday allows most of us to unwind, to relax and explore new things and experience new sights, food and people. As a result, most people return from a vacation feeling energised and more optimistic about the future. We think and see things differently and we are more open to new ideas and learn more, absorb more and assimilate information differently too.

So have a wonderful holiday and remember to enjoy different experiences and come back relaxed and energised!


Karon Graham