I’m sensitive to moments. Special moments that carry significance and weight. Bizarre moments almost unreal in their experiential influence.
Once on a movie set, I had a true out-of-body experience when a high-strung freelance make-up artist absolutely laid into me, verbally ripping a new one when I asked an innocent question regarding my lighting and how it was affecting the star’s makeup. Even as the verbal tirade progressed, my consciousness floated up above the stage floor and into the lighting grid where I found myself staring back down at the confrontation between me and that irate cosmetologist.
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| Photo: Lambert and Company |
Such “special points in time” mark lessons or conceptual breakthroughs, those so-called “learning moments” too good to miss. They need not be carefully structured and don’t always require a classroom. Some of the best ones happen alone and in private, or at least when in some internal zen state where its impact blankets out all surrounding distractions. I explicitly remember a few teaching moments from my own youth… why you never grab for a feral farm kitten or what happens when you stir acetone with a plastic milkshake spoon salvaged from some drive-in burger joint.
In my later years I instructed at the International Film and TV Workshops in Rockport, Maine; later at the Media Technology Institute in Golden, Colorado; and eventually as professor in the broadcasting program at Metropolitan State University of Denver. I know there are many different types of learners, and students who will do best within a specific approach to instruction. Experiential learning is especially significant in the broadcasting field.
Although now retired, that’s why the following scene had such an impact upon me:
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| Photo: Whole Foods Market |
Weekly shopping chores brought Lynne and me to our favorite local market, that natural and organic chain recently snapped up by online giant Amazon. The latent hunter-gatherer within enjoys these treks, where I can prowl produce and chart charcuterie. This store’s cheese section often has tasting bites available from small stainless steel dishes, with tongs for picking up the morsels without fingers. It was there that I found myself second-in-line to try a bite of the Herve Mons Camembert. Directly in front of me in the tasting line was a small boy, perhaps first-grade, and a slightly older brother, both joining their mother in the grocery expedition.
I’d actually run into this young tow-headed pair earlier in bulk foods, where the two youths grabbed a single plastic bag and busily filled it with scoops from each and every nut and chocolate bin in the section, while mother shopped elsewhere. Mentioning to these kids that each item was SKU’d and priced separately did briefly flit through my brain, but instead I elected to just observe. When one morsel missed their bag and spilled to the floor, they were quick to snatch the treat and appeared ready to pop it directly into their mouths. Instinctively, my brain stem evaluated application of the three-second rule, but instead I merely blurted aloud “nice catch, no waste” as they swallowed. They’ll learn later, I thought to myself.
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| Photo: Whole Foods Market |
But, back to the present offering of cheese samples. Mom was some distance away, examining boxes of imported crackers and older brother was gleefully rearranging summer sausage price tags. Alone immediately in front of me, the youngest reached for a bite. Tightly clutched in his left hand was a large box of organic goldfish crackers, his selection for mom's shopping cart, and with his right hand he used the tongs to properly pinch one camembert cube. But, you see, with both his hands occupied with clutching and holding, there’s no way to transfer the cheese from the tongs into his mouth. I saw him pause. This was going to be a learning moment, I thought.
Instinctively, his right arm (with the captured morsel) started toward his mouth, which slightly opened but then closed again as his hand came to a stop. I do give him credit, he’d been taught the sanitary pitfalls that come from eating with the serving utensil. But what to do? He held the pale yellow bite, hesitating. I watched, waiting to see how this crisis might resolve itself. I sensed his dilemma, the conundrum of the moment. Let go of the prized crackers to free up a receiving hand for the sample? Or forego the tasting altogether?
In this moment, I flashed on the old tale of the Sumatran Monkey Trap.
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| Photo: SurprisinglyBrave.com |
Common to many cultures (and centuries before Robert Pirsig repeated it in his tome on Zen and motorcycles) this fable describes catching monkeys without harming them. Basically, the process involves either a hollowed-out gourd or even a glass bottle, filled with nuts or sweets or other monkey goodies. The secret is the precise size of the hole in the gourd or the neck of the bottle. The baited container is chained down in a clearing and before long, curious monkeys appear. The boldest will slide their open hand down inside the bottle or gourd to grasp a handful of treats, but in clutching the prize their fist becomes too large to pull out of the container. Simian greed (a well known trait) prevents the animal from escaping because it refuses to drop the reward in order to pull it’s own hand out of the trap.
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| Photo: AZ Press |
The monkey isn't incapable of learning from the experience, but the capture technique is so successful apes seldom get a second chance (although in Central America there's an old adage that translates roughly into “the experienced monkey doesn’t put his hand in a bottle.”) But human children are active learners, able to set simple goals, to plan and revise. Cognitive development involves acquisition of perceptions regarding structure, numerical order and basic physics. Cognitive development requires remembering these outcomes to understand and solve future problems.
Back to the emerging learning moment unfolding in front of me... I could see him pause to process. You could almost hear the gears spinning in his monkey brain. He leaned back a bit, as though distancing himself from the puzzle might help. He was on the precipice of a primordial learning moment. His head cocked quizzically. Silently, I connected and sent encouraging mental vibes. “Your choice will matter. You must decide, and in your decision comes self-actualization. Yes, little dude, yes!”
And then… “Here honey, give me the box.”
His mother steps in, dutifully saves the day, blindly rescues the child but hopelessly destroys the developmental moment. Yet, I don’t blame mom. Perhaps she just instinctively did what moms must do. I applaud how she allowed what might have been a domestic chore to become instead an experiential field trip. And this was imported fromage he wanted to try, not an effing Velveeta brick. In context, her boys were actually quite well behaved in public.
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| Photo: Capital City Pediatric Dentistry |
But I was struck how hovering at a distance, holding back and silently observing from afar needs to be one of the parenting tools. Cognitive learning opportunities often come in moments of intellectual, if not physical, solitude. That’s when it’s both your decision and your consequence. The parental rescue of “here honey, always let me help” has its place... but like the glow of electronic device screens or the hysterical disclaimers from product warning labels on the most innocent of products... caution too can be sometimes overused.
That’s what I learned.
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