Sunshine and the Scientist: What We Actually Care to Teach
From the Scientist
While Sunshine and I have been strategically planning the future of Kid Lit Motivates, we stopped to consider our primary goals. While we discussed content and presentation at length, we realized something important. Content is less relevant to us than we previously imagined. Our learning philosophy is a framework upon which any content can be laid. We can provide tangible manipulatives, customized resources, and entertaining metaphorical overlaps for any number of topics. To date, we’ve created customized resources in music, science, self-awareness, and social skills, to name a few.
Resources generally tend to be created for specific subject areas or content blocks, and assume a standardized development of skill. We develop our resource content based on the interests, potential interests, and needs of our clients. If we’re creating class sets for teachers, we work toward curriculum goals with social and academic areas in mind. When we consider large scale presentations, the design is aimed at subjects we believe will enliven, encourage, and engage. What interests parents and kids alike? What sparks the imagination? What do we all need to know, and how do we need to know it? We pair that content with manipulatives and anchoring resources, which we customize to be adaptable to the widest audience possible.
Throughout all of these events, presentations, festivals, and sessions, one thing remains consistent across the ages and stages, content and framework: we are teaching, empowering, and modeling different ways of thinking. Content is malleable and process is paramount.
Our greatest passion is teaching young people methods and awareness of thought. To think is to be.
There are many different modalities of thought. While the steps of writing a lab report can be memorized, it is more valuable to understand and employ scientific inquiry in a variety of situations. Where a small percentage of children will grow up to pursue the sciences in theoretical or practical form, the majority of children will benefit from awareness of the scientific method, a structured approach to thought. To be a scientist is to learn how to ask a question, look at available evidence, gather data to interpret reasonably, then determine what questions come next. This way of thinking is a skill once thought to be innate that is being lost or downplayed in our current climate.
Can thought be taught? It is a skill to employ thought deliberately. Scientific inquiry is a skill, in that there are specific tasks to be completed in a certain order, which can be learned, much like tying a shoe or cooking a soup. And as a skill, there are those who will learn more naturally, by observation or instinct, and those that need a more strategic, scaffolded approach. We, Sunshine and the Scientist, excel at modeling and scaffolding presentation and engagement.
Other modalities of thought are important as well. Sunshine places a lot of weight on philosophical inquiry, a way of thinking that allows one to ask questions, of hypothetical or actual nature, until a satisfying reasoning is formed. Philosophical inquiry enables communication, builds community, opens our minds to other perspectives, and develops one’s own beliefs. There are things people passionately believe that have been reasonably approached and there are things people believe passionately that have never been considered deliberately. Philosophers are thoughtful, deliberate, and open-minded. We aim to teach philosophical inquiry for this reason.
Thinking empathetically, the needs of the one and the needs of the many are valuable and acknowledged. Empathetic, sensible thinkers are caring and kind, making for more civility and acceptance in the community at large. This way of thinking also enables the thinker to be more communicative and aware of their own needs. Learning how to prioritize the feelings of others is another way of thinking that can be acquired as a skill.
A state of synthesis is the effect of thinking musically, a way of gathering, processing, and deciphering information at a rapid rate. The senses are never more synchronous than when musicking, as a host of sensory inputs are bound by temporal constraints. To think musically is to combine sight, sound, movement, the presence of others and the self, and to find a harmonious balance in a metered, directed amount of time. It is objectively more engaging of the brain than any other modality of thought, due to the temporal element, and it enhances neuroplasticity (the brain’s ability and interest in learning). Sunshine and I are both musicians and are driven to communicate the benefits we’ve experienced first-hand from thinking musically.
Scientific, philosophical, empathetic, and musical thought modalities are but four of many ways to think. They represent different approaches to problem solving, connecting with others, and building community. The greatest thinkers are comfortable moving between thought modalities and help move society forward with innovation and imagination.
This is what Kid Lit Motivates is aiming to provide. Social and academic content presented in engaging, memorable ways, intending to enhance and model a broader mechanism of thought, an open-mindedness, a structural belief in a movable, self-empowered and self-aware cognition.
The Scientist
Kid Lit Motivates is a small business, based in Long Island, New York, which designs custom educational resources for academic and social goals.
