December 14, 2022
Wednesday
The Power of Reading and Story at Maranyundo
Wednesday morning was beautiful. The sunshine presented all the campus…landscaping, buildings, tiled walkways…in all the vibrant colors and textures that make this campus such a beautiful context in which to teach and learn. Even in the throes of the exam period, there is a comfortable feel to the place as the girls walk together in comfortable groups heading to their exam rooms or sit along the wall of the STEM building reflecting on their exam preparation and checking off the exams that are done. The very essence of the place seems to be breathing deeply.
Today Sister Laetitia arranged for Joni and me to meet with the students in the Reading Club who did not have an afternoon exam. Sister said several girls have been reading Becoming by Michelle Obama. I had given them an article by E. O. Wilson called The Power of Story. It is a short piece that I give my students to read in the Role of Story class I teach at Tufts University. Wilson recounts his lifelong fascination with ants that inspired his career as a biologist and his teaching at Harvard University for over 4 decades. He believes in the power of story to teach us all to understand science, mathematics, the study of life. Story can bridge what he sees as the false gap that has been created between the sciences and the humanities. If the STEM subjects were taught using more stories, more narratives, we could all remember facts and begin to see our own lives reflected in the work of scientists.
Since developing the Role of Story course (based on the original course taught by my former colleague Dr. Martha Tucker) I have been using material from the text Shaped by Stories, by the late Marshall Gregory. Gregory believed our natural penchant to seek out and create narrative to make meaning of the world is how we develop our ethical sense of the world. It is at the heart of how we learn and what we learn. “We live in stories and stories live in us,” he wrote. Joni and I took that sentence as the theme of our meeting with the MGS Reading Club.
After introducing themselves, we began by showing them a copy of the Becoming text I had borrowed from the MGS library. It was well worn! How many students had been choosing that book. Immersing themselves in Micelle Obama’s story: of her childhood, of her early education, of her time at Princeton, of her work as a lawyer. And then the story of meeting her future husband and a relationship of love and respect that brought them to live in the White House as first family of the United States. We asked the girls what story of Michelle Obama’s life now lives in them as they pursue their own personal story of Becoming here at Maranyundo School? The girls were pleased to share their ideas.
As they recalled the passages of the book that were meaningful for them…her
humble beginnings, her experiences in school, her choice to attend Princeton,
her commitment to her family even as a busy lawyer and later as first lady…it
was clear that these students are becoming skilled, insightful readers.
We talked about how each of us are always becoming…and how the becoming
that is central to Obama’s life reflects the motto of MGS: Respect, Responsibility
and Leadership. The central tenets the students are learning here are the same qualities
that Michelle Obama has learned and keeps learning that give her hope, joy, and
a commitment for a better future for all of us.
We all live by narrative, every day and every minute of our lives. Narrative is the human way of working through a chaotic and unforgiving world.
And this:
Because science, told as a story, can intrigue and inform the non-scientiflc minds among us, it has the potential to bridge the two cultures into which civilization is split--the sciences and the humanities. For educators, stories are an ex- citing way to draw young minds into the scientific culture.
We urged the girls to continue their interest in stories and reading all literature even as they learned the STEM subjects, to seek the stories of scientists and mathematicians who have made so many important contributions to our understanding of the way the world works. We showed them that there are copies of E. O. Wilson’s writings in the MGS Library!
Finally, we asked the girls to tell us what themes or topics they would like to continue exploring in their reading group. They immediately offered a variety of topics: women’s empowerment, mental health issues among young people, climate change, artistic expression of story, recipes, writing stories and different forms of public speaking. It is clear from the breadth of their interests and the enthusiasm with which they read and “live in stories” of others, even as they live to make their own story of becoming educated young women here at MGS, a strong Reading Culture is a vital part of the experience of Maranyundo Girls School.
Happy Reading Everyone!
Linda V. Beardsley
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