The semester is almost over...
I just finished the last chapter of my conservation book, Living In the Environment, and I have to admit, it makes me a bit sad. On the first day of class Dr. Wolverton told us, "... for a lot of you, this is going to be the first time you've read an entire text for a class," and well, we did. Minus a chapter here or there that didn't fit into the lesson plan, I haven't skipped chapters and have read the entire book. This class has been one of my favorite thus far... we took an unconventional approach to learning and I'd like to think that we got an (unfortunately) unconventional result: real knowledge.
Every Monday night from 6-9pm we'd get oriented and then break into groups and be left to craft answers to what were called "inconvenient and hard to answer" questions. And they were. They weren't questions that had an A,B,C, or D answer that we're tragically accustomed to or even questions that had answers that could be written down on a page. They were questions that provoked learning that I hadn't really experienced before and it is because of that, really, that I am sad to finish this book. They were questions that caused you to turn to the person next to you and ask, "What do you think?" That doesn't happen often enough anymore, and I appreciate that we not only learned about ecology but about how to work with one another in a constructive manner. That is, in truth, the only way anything important is ever going to get done.
Every Monday night from 6-9pm we'd get oriented and then break into groups and be left to craft answers to what were called "inconvenient and hard to answer" questions. And they were. They weren't questions that had an A,B,C, or D answer that we're tragically accustomed to or even questions that had answers that could be written down on a page. They were questions that provoked learning that I hadn't really experienced before and it is because of that, really, that I am sad to finish this book. They were questions that caused you to turn to the person next to you and ask, "What do you think?" That doesn't happen often enough anymore, and I appreciate that we not only learned about ecology but about how to work with one another in a constructive manner. That is, in truth, the only way anything important is ever going to get done.