Love in the Transmission of Learning?

This morning is the first snowfall of 2020, at least as far as official counting of such things goes ((There was a dusting last week, a quick flurry here and there. Apparently, these magical moments of quick snow don’t count.)) .

As I do when I see snow, I tweet such:

Snow.

— Bud Hunt (@budtheteacher) February 3, 2020

I’m not sure why, except as a moment of joy for me, a declaration that I see magic in the world as tiny ice crystals float their way down to earth.

This morning, Katie sent along a memory of our shared experience with snow, a poem I love to read whenever I can to whomever I can: Taylor Mali’s “Undivided Attention.” She followed it up with an essay by Seymour Papert. As she wrote:

https://t.co/bsd9Ln0cEE

I feel this thought from Seymour Papert and Taylor Mali's "teach like first snow falling" are both turning the teeth in eachothers' gears

— Katie Henry (@KatieHenryDays) February 3, 2020

And I went looking for the connection. As I thought, I realized that one, the poem, was about what it meant to embody love in the front of the room, to captivate through magic and wonder. And the other, the essay, was about discovering something one loves, and finding ways to connect that precious thing or idea to other ideas, to use magic and wonder to make sense of the world.

Then I remembered where I had heard that idea before. I wanted to rehear the video, but my old post no longer had the right link. It took a minute, but I found it again:

That entire series of interviews is worth your time. They’re chock full of fine moments like that one.