Learning and Teaching
Personal life experiences, observations and serendipity
Learning is my primary life’s purpose, and teaching has gradually become as important. Most other things, such as money and fame, are down at the bottom of desires.
My first school learning, after my mother’s teaching, was in kindergarten, and then became my first teaching. I gathered three other children about my age, and drew a picture in chalk on the sidewalk. “There is a body,” I exclaimed, “between the head and the arms”, drawing this new learning that I felt compelled to teach them.
That drive for learning was sparked by my mother, who expressed such excitement and pleasure when I learned or created something new. Then I constantly went after that pleased expression, by learning, and to get that look from all my teachers from K-12. By high school, I graduated with all straight A’s and highest honors. Thankfully, high school got boring and I went to an art/fashion college (MassArt) to experience further challenges. The art programs were great new learning. But, when I got to the fashion design major, I had answers from life experiences, which caused the other students to come to me for many answers to problems— an example of learning from life and people, then teaching. It used to be like this in the past, and not teach the same things one was taught.
At age 16, I went to work as a stitcher in garment factories, which was the best learning experience of my life, because it taught me the necessary learnings to succeed in the fashion industry, such as producible design ideas, pattern engineering and manufacturing for production. A good deal of the learning was serendipity, that is by chance, and by a nudge of my Higher Spirit to observe, and pay attention to what was happening around me at that moment — it always resulted in learning and producing a creative idea.
These serendipitous observations were particularly strong in what people were wearing. Often it was my perspective in observation that resulted in creative fashion design ideas. Such as: someone sitting with a bunched-up garment, and it inspired a smooth draping idea — because I always wanted to make something I saw as ugly, into something beautiful. Or someone standing with a calf sticking out, and I imagined pants with gathers at the back of the leg to exaggerate the calf standing out. I later used this idea in a children’s wear collection for a textile firm’s advertising.
In developing my own design and manufacturing business (1960s to 1980s), again, I used my life experiences as a stitcher and making patterns, to teach my workers solutions to a problem. Some used to call me: “Hey ‘Teach’, come and help me.”
In the 1980s, 90s and 21st century, I began writing books and teaching in fashion schools and colleges. In the most interesting serendipitous experience in teaching, and attempting to answer a student’s question, I would say to them or to myself, “Wow, I didn’t know that. It’s wonderful.” What serendipity!! Or, if I didn’t have an answer, I said: “I don’t know. Let’s find out.”
Parents are the first teachers:
Parents’ key responsibility is to teach their children, to love learning, which prepares them for the future and how to learn. Then each grade level teacher’s responsibility is to prepare them for learning the next grade level. Wouldn’t it be ideal if these next-level teachers test each child at the beginning of the year, not at the end, to see if they are prepared to learn this next-level class? In other words, testers should not be the ones who taught them, but those who see if the child is prepared for this next learning class.
What happens if the child is not prepared for the next level? Most often they are held back to repeat the former grade — which can destroy any motivation or love of learning. And, more serious, what happens when a child is not prepared by their parents, to learn? Then, Government has to do it, and taxpayers pay for what parents didn’t do.
I found, when teaching in schools or colleges or my own classes, in my area of expertise, fashion design, engineering and manufacturing, that I first had to “unteach” poor attitudes, and non-relevant skills. Most of these poor attitudes and non-relevant skills had been taught by “automation of teaching what their teachers had been taught”, and not learning “real-life present skills”, and then teaching them. Of course, historical skills are important to learn too, but not automatically, rather as inspiration. An analogy is inbreeding of same genetics resulting in the devolution of the species. This is happening in my field of fashion design, pattern engineering and manufacturing. The fashion industry is slowly devolving to a sad mess from the wonderful fashion industry I once knew in the 1950s to 1980s. Because there is so much adoration of celebrities, designers, actors, politicians, etc. high-priced fashions exist by paying enormous fees in advertising. And poor technology development has just made it worse — as fashion students are taught that technology will do what they have not learned to do — with more sameness and poor quality.
When I reflect on my background and experiences, I know I have many accomplishments in fashion design, education, engineering, manufacturing, technology and writing. Now I am 90, limited in what I can physically do, such as go out to teach or mentor. I tried teaching online, but the students were so unprepared for learning, and I could not help them without seeing each one to unteach them and understand their low level of preparedness. I still desire to teach and mentor, but I will have to study myself and physical limitations at 90.
Thank you for listening, and…….
