One of the joys of parenthood is the opportunity to see – or at least catch a glimpse – of the world through your child’s eyes. This past summer, I had one of those moments as I watched Piper, our youngest, interact with a horse at a stable. The horse was in a stall, eating, with its head at her eye level. The trough was located next to the fence so that, if she wanted to, she could reach through and touch the horse’s head. I watched her standing a few feet away, sizing up the situation. Should I move closer? Should I reach in? What will the horse do? Piper moved a bit closer to the horse and stopped, so that she was standing less than a foot away from the horse’s head.
The horse – a classic, tourist-trail-riding horse that was used to being touched, prodded, hugged and ridden – barely raised its head as she approached. He took a quick look, decided there wasn’t anything to worry about, and went back to eating. Piper moved even closer so that she was inches from the horse’s head, nearly face to face. The horse barely registered her presence. Ever fearless, she leaned in and gave the horse a quick hug and a kiss on its nose.
As I watched this short scene unfold, what struck me was the sense of wonder that drove Piper’s actions. She was exploring her world, interacting with it, and trying to understand what would happen as she did. Her reaction to the horse letting her not only hug it but kiss it was unbridled joy. She laughed, clapped, took a step back, and then hugged the horse again. She had made a friend and was overjoyed by the experience.
One word that seemed to capture the moment? Curiosity.
It is at the heart of all learning, discovery, and growth. We hold it up as one of our four core values, and we consistently challenge members of our community to strive towards understanding the word in all its complexity and nuance. In fact, we think curiosity is so important that it will be our school-wide theme for the 2012-2013 school year.
From my perspective, curiosity involves three key concepts – a sense of wonder about the world, a recognition that what we don’t know far exceeds what we do know, and a desire to spend life relentlessly asking questions and seeking answers.
At some level, the challenge for schools is less inspiring curiosity in our youngest students – like Piper, our early elementary students are overflowing with wonder, a desire to ask questions, and an eagerness to understand the world – but in sustaining that curiosity as children move further along their educational journey. At Hillbrook, we have always been deeply committed to an education that nurtures curiosity and inspires a lifelong love of learning.
This past week during our opening faculty meetings, I had an opportunity to hear countless ways in which teachers spent their summers striving to satisfy their own curiosity. Tinkering at the Tech Shop, leading a group of Hillbrook alumni through the rain forest in Ecuador, studying music in Ghana, exploring the teaching of reading and writing with colleagues at Teacher’s College at Columbia University, and discovering the power of games with internationally renowned-speaker and educator John Hunter. Our faculty are true lifelong learners, continually asking questions, seeking new answers, and reveling in the exploration process.
Next Wednesday at our opening Flag, I will challenge each member of our community to approach the 2012-2013 school year with a spirit of curiosity. As parents, I encourage you to not only celebrate your child’s curiosity but to consciously model your own curiosity when appropriate moments arise. We all need to adopt a “curiosity mindset,” one that values learning, growth, risk taking, and exploring what we don’t know, instead of a cautious mindset that plays it safe and focuses on things we already understand.
Whether a student is entering Hillbrook for the 10th year or for the first day, they all have new things to learn, new people to meet, unexplored problems to tackle, great book to read and re-read, and concepts to revisit, re-engage, and understand with a new set of eyes.
At the close of our opening faculty meeting, I shared the following T.S. Eliot quote:
We shall not cease from exploration
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
Welcome back – I look forward to a year of exploration, curiosity, adventure and an opportunity to know each of you and our school again for the first time.