Walk the Talk: Sequel

Walk the Talk: Sequel

This is a sequel to our blog of July 8, 2015 “Walk the Talk.”  In that blog, we pointed out that young children often lack the vocabulary to communicate effectively.  However, they are keen observers of their world.  What they see forms lasting impressions and memories.  Later in life, these images may be linked to language and other memories.  We should all keep the following quotes from Jim Henson and Robert Fulghum in mind.

 Actions speak louder than words.  When children detect inconsistencies between the words we say and things we do, it is confusing.  What they retain is unpredictable.  What they think and feel about it may be latent and subconscious.  When it is revealed, it may not be what we intended.

Consistency is one of the many challenges of parenthood and teaching.  Children and students are similar in that they don’t know what they don’t know.  They build their knowledge base from their observations and experiences.  Their simplistic view of the world is to trust those closest to them.  They are quick to notice inconsistencies in behavior and speech.  Put yourself in the place of a dolphin newly arrived at an animal park.  You are hungry but the trainers are not feeding you.  So you slap the water with your tail.  The trainer looks up, sees this, and tosses you a fish.  Wow!  These land critters might be trainable after all!!  So you repeat your action and you get another fish.  Aha, you think, this may be easier than you thought.  The next day, you see another land critter near your pen, and you slap your tail on the water.  But this time, the land critter doesn’t toss you a fish.  Hmm, you wonder.  And you repeat your action several times and still don’t get a fish.  The land critter walks away.  What’s going on?  It’s seemed so simple the other day.  Why didn’t the land critter feed you?

After a while, another land critter approaches.  You do your tail splashing, and it tosses you a fish.  Finally!!  Food!!  But if you don’t get food, you get confused.  You might stop doing a tail slap and try something different.  But it would be confusing to get food sometimes and not get food at other times.  Your brain scrambles to try to find a pattern to make some sense of it.  And if you don’t find a pattern that effectively predicts the outcome for your efforts, you get frustrated and possibly discouraged.  If this continues to build, you might think about escape before you starve to death.  You might just write off these land critters as unreliable and unworthy of any further effort on your part.

It doesn’t take much to transfer the dolphin idea to a home or classroom.  The resilience of the human mind is such that no matter how dismal or dire the situation may be, there are individuals who rise above it all and succeed; there are those who are utterly destroyed by the system; and there are a bunch of folks that manage to muddle through and may not be highly successful along with those how haven’t been destroyed but are greatly discouraged and cynical.

If more people can heed the words of Jim Henson and Robert Fulghum, we can hope to get more children going through life on a more positive trajectory.  Of course it matters greatly the example the children see.  Join S.E.E.D.S. in trying to make the world a better place by walking the talk.  Give your children and all children who see you, a great example of what it is to be a good decent human being.