Deeper knowing!

Rounding off the importance of perspectival knowing

Let’s say we have a rule: Be kind!  It is not immediately obvious how we follow this rule as, likely, it would mean different things if we were with a stranger or with a spouse or with a granddaughter.  Having a rule to apply the rule runs into the same issue.

A rule is a proposition, an example of propositional knowing.

So, to apply the rule effectively we need to apply judgement, which is a skill and an example of procedural knowing.

To apply the skill effectively, I need to have good situational awareness which is an aspect of perspectival knowing.

Is anyone recognising that to move to twenty-first-century skills we need more than propositional and procedural knowing – which schools have been historically built around – we need perspectival knowing as well.  And that comes from the right teacher-student relationship, a relationship that supports the development of student autonomy.

Seeing the perspective - Michael Holter - Shapes and Shadows

In the last four blogs I have touched on the importance of perspectival knowing: for situational awareness, for separating the meaning we make of an event from the event itself (the basis of much psychotherapy), for qualitative versus quantitative development and now as the underpinning for applying knowledge and skills in ways needed for the modern world.

It sounds like we really should be developing this form of knowing with the same importance we place on propositional and procedural knowing.  We know how to do this and about 40% of educators are already striving to do it (although they may not know it as such).

We just need to bring everyone along.

Click here to sign up for a 60-minute Q&A via Zoom on 15th October: Why support students' autonomy?  You can still download a pdf version of Why We Teach here. 

John Corrigan is an expert in helping individuals to bring their whole of mind to their daily life and increase their effectiveness and the effectiveness of those around them. This expertise scales from the individual to the team to the organisation. At the core of this work is the practice of encounter.  Earlier blogs can be found here.

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