CHAPTER 1

Engaging Your Child's Passion to Learn—Naturally

Is there anyone who has spent time with very young children and not been in aweof the natural intelligence and resilient passion to learn that they bring intothe world? Is there anyone who has not delighted in coaching those children totake a first step? Is there anyone who has not agonized while trying to helpthem with their homework? Almost every one of you, like me, has witnessed thedelight of discovery diminish and stiffen as those children march through therigors of school and "growing up." Does it have to be that way?

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September 1962. 8 A.M. Janey Rothchild was the first one to burst into theclassroom when the bell rang. She was clutching a large dead frog close to herchest. Tony Esposito was right behind her. His hands were full of dry mapleleaves and an empty turtle shell. Samantha and Jessmyn's arms were entwined,their grubby hands grasping a lifeless snake, a broken tree branch, and severallarge gray rocks. Within minutes, twenty-five disheveled six- and seven-year-oldswere crouched on the polished pine floor, their forest treasures carefullyplaced in the center. "How do you know these things are dead? How can you tell?"I asked.

Janey traced the bumpy back of the stiff frog she had found. "I can tell," shesaid. One tear traced a white track down her dirt-smeared cheek. "It doesn'thave its light anymore. That was its soul and it went on a sunstick elevator upto the sky. Just like my little brother's."

All of us knew Janey's little brother had died the week before. When shereturned to school after the funeral, she brought with her the questions shewasn't supposed to ask anyone. "What does it mean when something is dead? Whydoes it get cold? Where does its mind go? Can it still love you?"

Those questions were what prompted my homework assignment. I had asked eachchild to bring in something dead from the natural world. For two hours, the kidspoked and probed into the mystery of death. One after another told stories:"When my parakeet died, it got all hard like this snake." "When my grandpa wasin the box in church, I touched him and he was all cold so I know he didn't goto Hell, because that's the hot place." "Yeah, but maybe love is hot and so whensomething dies, the love goes out of it into the people that cared about it.That's why they get all hot when they cry."

When the principal came in at lunchtime, he asked me what the mess was in themiddle of the floor, and demanded my lesson plans for that day. Three-and-a-halfdecades later, I can't remember how I justified what we had been doing in termsof the semester's curriculum. I don't even remember if any of us figured outanswers to Janey's questions. I do remember getting a letter from her though,ten years ago. She had become a first-grade teacher. She wrote to tell me shestill remembered that day. It was when she discovered she would always love tolearn.

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September 1996, midnight. Still teaching, but now I work with adults inbusinesses that are striving to become learning organizations. On thisparticular evening, I was trying to play pool with seven guys from the seminar.(They were the ones who had sat for three days with their arms folded acrosstheir chests no matter what I said or did.) When my first shot resulted in thewhite ball careening off the table into the soda machine, it was pretty obviousI was there for some reason other than the game. The guys patiently did theirbest to teach me, but I finally told them the truth. I was there to learnsomething, but it wasn't pool. "What I really want to know is why everyone callsyou the 'Clay Layer,' and why you don't seem to want to be at this seminar."

Clovis took the cue stick out of my hands. Maybe it made him feel safer. Hisvoice was scratchy as if his words passed over sandpaper before leaving hislips. "Listen, Dawna, we know the company hired you to promote this new visionthing about becoming a learning organization. We know you're just doing yourjob." He paused and took a long swig of beer. The others snickered behind him."You gotta understand so you don't take it personally. They call us the 'ClayLayer' because no matter how much money they spend on their vision statement,and no matter how far down the company it trickles, it stops with us." Clovis'hand pointed emphatically toward the center of my chest, as if it were the cuestick and I was the eight ball headed for the pocket.

"They can tell us we gotta be at this seminar. We'll come. We're real good at'GTTM'—Going Through the Motions. But no matter what they do, they can't make uslearn."

I backed myself into an invisible corner of silence, trying to comprehend whatit would feel like to be so adamant, so bent on refusing to learn—when learningwas what I loved as passionately as life itself. Finally I replied, "OK, guys, Iagree with you. No one can or should try to make you learn. Certainly not me.But help me understand why it's so important for you not to."

Jimmy stepped up next to Clovis and put his hand on his shoulder. I had beenwatching him earlier, during the breaks in the seminar, quietly moving wordsaround on the magnetic poetry board we had set up at the back of the conferenceroom. "We know they think we're stupid, Dawna. We know they think we've got whatone manager calls a 'victim mentality.' They say we're not taking responsibilityfor making things change around here, like kids who whine about hating homework,just so they don't have to do it. They tell us lots of stuff like that. Butthere's two things no one ever does and until they do, it's GTTM and they can'tmake us learn."

Jimmy was a master. He knew exactly how long to wait smugly in silence until Ihad to ask, "OK, OK, tell me. What are the two things?" He lowered his voiceuntil it was barely above a whisper, and each word was spoken separately, withgreat care. "One—they've got to ask us what we know already. Two—they've got tolisten to what we tell them about what's wrong, without...