Learning When To Be Quiet
Oct 29th, 2009 by David Svet
I used to teach. I was on the design faculty at The Ohio State University. It’s a wonderful way to live and I’m very glad that I had the opportunity to do so. The kids are fantastic and it’s great fun to help them learn and explore their creative intelligence. The role I most enjoyed was to provide information, challenges, and inspiration while determining when to be quiet and let them figure it out. It always amazed me to watch the freshmen come in the door — wide eyed and excited. I always wondered what their background was and what drew them to want to become a designer?
I’m also a parent. I just sent my son to college. He’s double majoring in graphic design and animation at Missouri State. Why, I have no idea. He’s great at math and physics. My wife and I are really enjoying watching him make his way through the first round of foundation studies that every designer before us went through, including us. We nearly fell down laughing when we saw a comment he posted on Facebook stating how he was amazed that there was homework in his art classes at college! This is coming from someone who listened to his parents tell him about design school his entire life — I now have written proof that I was being ignored.
I also tried to teach him to draw from the time he was little until he left for school. He would happily draw, but wanted nothing to do with instruction. He wouldn’t even look at any of the drawing books that I bought for him. So, I was resigned to letting other teachers teach my son. It hurt, but he learned a little. Now I see his drawings from school and I can see that he is learning a lot very quickly. It’s fun! He also listens now when his mother and I talk about design — with a shocked look of amazement that we know about the things he is learning in college!
He came home to visit last weekend. He brought his cardboard chair project with him (not the one above). (Everyone who ever attended design school and is reading this is now laughing about their own chair.) His chair was quite the sight. It took all of my reserve and my wife sitting on top of me to keep me from telling him how to fix it. But he built it himself, took it back to school, and did well in his class. Now as I scrape off all of the dried glue that dripped from his chair onto every flat surface in my shop, I realize that now he’s ready to learn. Now he wants to know. He wants to do. He wants to understand. Now he is someone else’s curious freshman. All the time that I pushed, he really needed me to be quiet and forced me to do so. It’s nice to learn things from him.
Ah, we have a very independent son as well. Always wanted to do everything himself, specifically asking us to let him handle his own projects. It definitely pays off, though! And it’s so fun to see them learning and growing.
restraining oneself from ‘interfering’ with the organic learning process can be challenging, especially if you’ve been conditioned to teach, instruct, and even coach—and have a type A personality
the path of mentorship is one where pupil/protégé/paduan (any other ‘p’ words?) is nurtured through guidance/feedback and at some defining moment is set free to discover their own strengths, weaknesses and given the proper opportunity to experience the learning on their own.
a valuable reminde of a lesson that applies to many aspects in life, including orgs and their respective philosophies on mentorship
I have resigned myself that teaching my kids other than right and wrong and the values of our family, teaching is best left to people other than their parents. I’m a PSIA certifiied Ski Instructor, but I put my kids in ski school and they are much more open to skiing. We ski for fun. I’ll let the other instructors teach.
Time and place I say.