Education speaker shares innovative insight

Author: Addason McCaslin

"We don't do math," explained a fourth-grader to her incredulous parents. "We don't do science or social studies either."

Steven Levy, the award-winning educator and consultant for Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound, who spoke in Twilight auditorium on Monday afternoon, has an approach to education that surprises many people at first because they think that surely there can be no value in a fourth grade program that does not teach any of the basic required disciplines.

Fortunately, "Mr. Levy's" students learn not only everything they need to satisfy basic educational requirements, but they also gain valuable experience tackling problems that confront many adults on a day to day basis.

Levy's teaching deviates from the traditional method of fragmented and segregated subjects and tries to harmoniously integrate all disciplines into practical life problems. He elaborated, "[We] try to [set] the learning of our skills in the context of real work that we're doing and real decisions that we have to make." Levy's students correctly say that they do not approach math, science or social studies as distinct subjects, because all these are woven together into the problems they work through.

"[The perfect classroom] would be empty - there'd be nothing in it. [Students] would have to make whatever they got." Levy emphasized the need for students around the age of 10 to delve deeply into the origin of the things around them, and to understand and appreciate what goes into the amenities of life that people usually take for granted. His students take a nearly empty classroom and fill it with bread, clothes and even furniture all crafted from scratch by their own hands.

This aberrant method of learning provides the basis for Levy's integration of subjects into real world problem solving. His students designed and built their own desks using newly-learned mathematics and history of colonial architecture. They analyze, reflect upon and re-approach problems that appear during construction, which completes their education in a way unattainable through textbook-style learning.

"I figure the world is not broken up into different subjects," explained Levy, who believes that students work and learn much better when facing problems as they naturally appear, rather than as the highly processed and idealized forms found in textbooks.

Katrina Uhl '05 reflected on her experiences in Levy's fourth grade class. "It's had a huge impact upon the way I think about the way I learn, and the way I think about how to teach others. It was a completely unique experience," she said. Now that she is nearly ready to graduate as an English major with an Education minor, Uhl plans to use elements of Levy's unusual teaching style to engage young minds and help them develop a confident and mature view of the world.

Middlebury College tries to educate students with a less drastic but similar style to Levy's, explained Trish Dougherty, coordinator of the Teacher Education program.

"The College's aim has been to educate students in the liberal arts tradition who can bring their learning to bear on practical and significant real-world problems and concerns," said Dougherty. Middlebury's emphasis upon real-world practical application of skills applies to all its students, but in particular to those studying to become educators themselves. The Teacher Education program helps graduates to nourish the minds of future generations in the same spirit of liberal education and real-world application seen at Middlebury and particularly in Levy's classroom.

Uhl said she still benefits from the lessons she learned with Levy and her own experience serve as testament to the great effect teachers can have on their students.