Life on the farm in the summer….
You can swim in the river.
You can feed the cows.
And you can go for a drive with your 13-year-old nephew…
With the 13-year-old behind the wheel!
Learning Without Studying
Saturday I drove across the mountains to spend a few days with my sister and her family.
A few hours later I was being taken on an unexpected ride.
Sure, I was a little nervous.
But we weren’t going on the highway, only the farm.
Just to be sure he knew what he was doing, I asked, “So how did you learn to drive?”
“I don’t know,” was his reply.
“Did your dad give you lessons?”
“No.”
“So how did you learn?”
“I don’t know.”
And then the four words I really didn’t want to hear: “Want to go fast?”
As I put on my seatbelt, I thought about the question, is it possible to learn something without a school? Without a book of rules? Even without a teacher?
This is called “unconscious learning.”
Dr. Harry Witchell from Bristol University says unconscious learning is “learning without necessarily being able to describe what it is that you’ve learned.”
This is what you did when you learned your mother tongue.
What you did in English class in school was “conscious learning.”
In my opinion, conscious learning is good for passing tests.
Unconscious learning is good for conversation.
It’s a fascinating topic.
Let’s explore it more this week…