In movies, we see the teacher as savior, who pours her heart and soul into her students until that single moment when it just clicks for the kids. While everything has been a struggle until that exact moment, everything changes in an instant. We all know this as the lightbulb moment.
While Hollywood dramatizes the learning taking place in a classroom because they usually only have ninety minutes to work with, it makes sense that the lightbulb needs to go on at some point. We all know though that movies are way different than real life.
In actuality, the learning process is messy, disorganized, and a struggle. We do see some lightbulb moments, the instant that it finally clicks for a student. But that instant click is usually preceded by weeks to months of trying, teaching, forgetting, retrying, reteaching, different methods, slight failure, slight success, reteaching again, more success, complete failure, and uh, finally.
Take a deep breath because you need one after the process. The lightbulb going on is the end of a very arduous process in which learning takes place. As a teacher, I’ve been there when the click happens. When done right, it’s a beautiful thing. But at any point during the journey, it can feel like you are repeatedly banging your head against a wall. It feels like it’s never going to happen, that the struggle is too much to overcome, that it’s all just too much. But that’s exactly when you need to dive in more deeply as the teacher. You need to find that one more method that may just do it. If it doesn’t, you need to go back to your toolbox, or the toolbox of your neighbor. You need to find that one thing that is going to work in this exact moment for this exact student.
The lightbulb moments are important because it’s when the students finally realize they’ve learned. But it’s all those moments within the process, the failing, and getting up and doing it again, that actually make the difference.
Yes, click happens. But only after the messy, disorganized, struggle of learning happens first.
Rich
