Magic Valley NLP

As part of the work for my NEA grant I created short articles about NLP and education. 

NLP opened a new way of looking at the world of education for me and for my students.  I trust it will d the same for you. 

Happy browsing. 

Presuppositions are thing we presume to be true. They may not be true in all situations but we treat them as true as a tool to create a map for our world. Enjoy this little article that contrasts an adult map to a child's map of the world. 

Presupposition: The Map is not the Territory

This story came to me off the internet on a joke page and it is so “the map is not the territory,” that is had to be shared. 

An elementary school got a new librarian. She prided herself in teaching the children responsibility, and decided that instead of checking out children's books by writing the names of borrowers on the book cards herself; she would have the youngsters sign their own names. She would then tell them they were signing a "Contract" for returning the books on time.

Her first little customer was a second grader.  He looked surprised to see a new librarian. He brought his allotted four books to the desk and shoved them across to the librarian, giving her his name as he did so.

The Librarian pushed the books back and told him that he was supposed to sign them out himself now. The boy laboriously printed his name on each book card in neat print, and then handed them to her with a look of utter disgust.

Before the Librarian could even start her speech he said, scornfully, "That other Librarian we had could write."

I laughed and thought how often we see the world from our adult eyes and forget that our students see the world in an entirely different and sometimes utterly delightful way. 

This can lead to challenges.  We expect the children to know the reason they are going to school.  We expect them to know that they will need a job someday to support themselves and be contributing members of society. 

We forget that the reason they may go is because they are “supposed to.”  School may have no meaning to them.  If we can create that meaning and let them have a bit of our map to enlarge their map with it will help them focus with greater depth and enthusiasm on the real reason they go to school.  Part of the job is to create larger, more detailed maps for our students to carry into their future. 

© by Debrah Roundy 2008