Its August 1st, I am in Montreal and attending a workshop. We are in groups of 5 and it is time to open up and share stories of our childhood. I pause, I look to the corner of my mind and in an instant, Teresa my doll pops vividly into my head. “I poured all my love into that doll. She was my little precious Teresa and I loved her and she was taken from me. In an instant, my little friend was lost. ” My group of 5 develops a short play about my story. It pulls at my heartstrings as I was 5 years old when my favourite doll was so worn and ripped and then one day I couldn’t find her.
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Analogical Problem-Solving ™ is what I call teaching by living inside a story such as the Us and Them unit. Students have agency/voice to make decisions inside their class story, an analogy of life. As teachers, we carefully follow their suggestions and integrate lessons as we plan strategies that allow them to discover their learning. Students learn real-life lessons without real-life consequences. They realize at a profound level that we have so much in common. We are all connected. Ultimately the students decide war is not worth the enormous human cost. And they internalize that we are all part of the human race.