On 5th of September 1888, in the Madras Presidency of British India, a prodigy took birth; a prodigy that was about to make an impact on not just his motherland, but also the world. Dr Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan was not just a President to India, or a knighted scholar, but also a distinguished Teacher; a Teacher that tried to change the face of education. On this 5th September, which also marks the birth anniversary of Dr Radhakrishnan, India celebrates her 56th Teacher’s Day, as a tribute to him. While the world moves towards modern learning and teaching methods, we must not forget the great teachers who have lived through history and enormously contributed to education in the society through their exceptional efforts. And what better day to reminisce their work than Teacher’s Day?
Teaching has always been a profession which all ancient civilizations cherished. From the days of Aristotle, Confucius, and Chanakya to contemporary educators like Richard Feynman, and Anne Sullivan, humanity has witnessed the power of efficient teaching throughout history. Let us have a look on how learning has always been experience centric throughout history, through the endless efforts of the great gurus humanity has ever witnessed.
Aristotle — Becoming Virtuous Through Subjectivity
Aristotle is one of the most accomplished philosophers the world has ever witnessed. This great teacher established his place in human history by writing papyrus scrolls on and about physics, biology, zoology, metaphysics, logic, ethics, aesthetics, poetry, theatre, music, rhetoric, psychology, linguistics, economics, politics and government. His great expanse of works earned him great leverage in ancient Greece.
Aristotle was an apprentice of Plato, under whom he took majority of his education. He believed that knowledge is a subjective experience and depends directly on the students’ perceptions. Aristotle in his great works on Ethics wrote about his Theory of Virtues. He taught his students how learning is all about perceiving this reality first hand, analysing its properties and then interpreting it through thorough logical inquiry. Aristotle, hence laid one of the first milestones in the history of experiential learning. One such example of how experience and instinct could build a better person lies in his work on Ethics and Metaethics. Aristotle believed that all human virtues had two extremes that he termed as Vices. These Vices were either extremes of how a human could react to a situation. Aristotle preached his pupils on how to become a virtuous being by actually practicing what was taught to them in real life. One of the prime examples is his greatest students, Alexander The Great.
Aristotle laid the foundation to how experience makes human beings better and virtuous. Throughout history, his work has been revered as a prime example of experiential Learning.
Anne Sullivan — Teaching a Deaf-Blind Child How to Read and Write
In 1880, on 27th June, a girl child was born in the Keller family of Tuscumbia, Alabama, United States. The new born girl wasn’t like any other other girl; she was diagnosed with the acute congestion of stomach and brain which made her a deaf-blind child. Helen Keller could never see and hear. However, this major obstacle in her life did not stop her teacher, Ms. Anne Sullivan, from teaching her student to read and write in Braille.
Anne Sullivan was an esteemed teacher in Keller’s life, and also served as Keller’s governess. She stayed with her for 49 years of her life. Teaching Keller to read and write was an arduous task because she had never been able to associate words with the subjective experience of knowing how things were. This was evidently due to the fact that she was unable to see and hear. This limited her cognitive abilities of association of what she has just learnt and how to connect it with the objects around her. Sullivan was in for a huge challenge.
After isolating Keller from her family in order to better educate her, Sullivan began working to teach Keller how to communicate with the outside world. During one lesson, she finger-spelled the word “water” on one of Keller’s hands as she ran water over her student’s other hand. Keller finally made her first major breakthrough, connecting the concept of sign language with the objects around her.
Thanks to Sullivan’s instructions, Keller learned nearly 600 words, most of her multiplication tables, and how to read Braille within a matter of months. News of Sullivan’s success with Keller spread, and the Perkins school wrote a report about their progress as a team. Keller became a celebrity because of the report, meeting the likes of Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, and Mark Twain.
As evident it may seem, Sullivan somehow took Aristotle’s abstract views on subjectivity and experiential learning to a new level by educating a deaf blind child by practically applying them on her student.
Feynman — On Quantum Mechanics and Intuition
Richard Feynman is widely recognised and known for his famous lectures on Physics. His groundbreaking works on path integrals in Quantum Mechanics made him the proud recipient of a Nobel Prize. But what did he have to offer to the grand scheme of learning through experience?
As evident as it may seem, it becomes important to connect the notions of having a rich experience in something and having an intuition for the same. An Engineer or a Scientist who has learnt through problem solving and has had enough experience in doing so, develops an intuition about his subject; an intuition that does not falter. The lectures of Feynman are a perfect example of how strong practice and practical use of knowledge lead to a strong instinct.
In his works now very famously residing in bookstores and libraries as “Feynman’s Lectures on Physics”, Richard Feynman has taught physics with simplicity; granting clairvoyance in places which are primarily counter intuitive, like Quantum Mechanics. Feynman made a mark in history not only as an accomplished scientist, but also as an accomplished professor.
His contribution to the practice of experiential learning is evident through one of his statements about Set Theory:
It will perhaps surprise most people who have studied these textbooks to discover that the symbol ∪ or ∩ representing union and intersection of sets and the special use of the brackets { } and so forth, all the elaborate notation for sets that is given in these books, almost never appear in any writings in theoretical physics, in engineering, in business arithmetic, computer design, or other places where mathematics is being used. I see no need or reason for this all to be explained or to be taught in school. It is not a useful way to express one’s self. It is not a cogent and simple way. It is claimed to be precise, but precise for what purpose?
Feynman strongly opposed the use of rote learning and pushed his students to apply physics and mathematics to actually understand it. Being a guide to 31 doctorate students, Feynman made a great impact on what experiential learning and intuition could do. What else can justify the use of subjectivity in learning if not the fine lectures of Feynman?
In a Nutshell
As we see in history of the world, learning through experience and having a hands-on approach in all disciplines has always been an effective part of learning. From Aristotle’s abstract ethical theory and its practical relevance, to Feynman’s lectures, we see how learning by doing is the best way to learn. One can go on listing famous teachers throughout history that changed the face of education, but what matters more in this era is to learn from history — another way to learn through experience!
On this Teacher’s Day, let us take a moment and understand how students learn and how they should actually be learning. The likes of Anne Sullivan and Aristotle have taught us the importance of hands on experience. Now is the time to turn this theoretical knowledge to a tangible solution.
Psst. A little something before you leave!
Thank you for taking out the time to read this blog! If you enjoyed reading it and would like to read more about educating in the modern world, go check out these blogs as well!
