Maybe It's Not So Bad After All

Yes, the week started out on a rather unenthusiastic note, but I have to say that today I'm more encouraged about the rest of the semester (there I go thinking about the future again. Or does this mean that our happiness in the present is somewhat dependent on our perceptions of the future?).

Today for cardiopulmonary therapeutics, our assignment before we came to class was to review the basic anatomy and physiology of those systems. Then our "class" consisted of 3 rounds of trivia questions we had to answer. Prizes were given out to the groups with the most "right" answers, and our homework for the weekend is to find out more information on those questions we got wrong. In short, today was a fun way to learn about some really important stuff.

I'm describing this whole learning process for a reason; last night Rachel and Steve told us about the public elementary school system in Fort Collins. They described several different learning environments that in their non-traditional approach to learning sounded really cool. After having this experience today, I'm thinking there may be something to non-traditional education (i.e. Montessori schools, etc.) after all. I mean really, besides learning basic math, reading, and writing skills in elementary school, what did we learn to prepare us to problem solve in the real world? In a way, we need to let our kids experience what failure is, and then how to best react to it; instead of letting failure completely paralyze us, we need to learn how to effectively learn from our mistakes and better ourselves in the future. What better place to start doing this than school through creative learning processes? Ok there's my soap-box for the week.

The next time I post, I will probably have lots to say about Fort Collins, since we are leaving at noon today with Steve and Rachel for our road trip!