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Showing posts from April, 2013

Quote: John Holt's ideas on learning

What we want to know, we want to know for a reason. The reason is that there is a hole, a gap, an emptiness in our understanding of things, our mental model of the world. We feel that gap like a hole in a tooth and want to fill it up. It makes us ask HOW? WHEN? WHY? While the gap is there, we are in tension, in suspense. Listen to the anxiety in a person's voice when he says "This doesn't make sense!" When the gap in our understanding is filled, we feel pleasure, satisfaction, relief. Things make sense again - or at any rate, they make more sense than they did.  Holt, J "How Children Learn,"  p.291