When was the last time you learned something new?
Not in education, but life in general.
If we look at learning as a process of life, rather than something solely academic, we learn new things all the time.
You might have picked up a new recipe on YouTube, figured out how to fix something in your house using AI, or watched a little Jeopardy and picked up some new facts that will only help you if you go on Jeopardy.
Learning is in all facets of life.
So, let me rephrase the question.
When was the last time you learned something deeply?
Not just “figured something out” quickly, but really went through the process and struggled with ups and downs.
When I think of my answer to that question, it’s playing the piano.
At 7 years old, I started playing the piano, and that abruptly stopped a few months after my first recital when I vomited (not kidding) on my teacher’s piano. One day I will write about how that was actually my fault, the sheer embarrassment of telling you what happened is enough to withhold how it happened. I just couldn’t go back!
So, at 49 years old, I bought my kids a piano with the intent that “we” would learn. Not only them, but me as well. This is something I have always wanted to do, and my draw to musicians like Ben Folds and Chantal Kreviazuk made me always think, “I wish I had stuck playing the piano!” (to which my childhood piano teacher might disagree with!). Then I thought, “Why can’t I start now?”
So I did.
And what did I want to learn first?
Anything and everything Ryan Gosling from the movie “La La Land.”
In December of 2024, I started looking up the “easy version” of songs, and started with “City of Stars,” which is one of my favorites of all time.
And what did that process look like?
Well, at first, it was probably the equivalent of sound vomit (not the real stuff).
Each morning, I would spend time playing small parts of the song, messing up and having trouble until I could hear a few-second portion of it. And then I got that part, I went on to the next. And then the next.
It would take me about a month or so to be able to play the majority of the easy version, and the frustration I felt at the beginning slowly became joy, as I could hear the song (eat your heart out, dreamy Ryan Gosling), and I would proudly play it by heart.
I would go on to other songs, and the month it took me to learn one, took 29 days for the next, and so on. I would get through the frustration a little faster, getting to satisfaction. And then I would teach my oldest daughter songs, or at least riffs of what she wanted to play, and let her go.
The process of learning something new, sticking through the frustration, and doing it over and over again taught me that some of the most boring things we repeat can lead to the most beautiful outcomes.
It also reminded me how hard it is to learn something new. Which is a great reminder not only for the kids you teach but also for the adults you work with.
As I share in “Forward, Together”:
As a teacher, the class I wanted to teach the least became my favorite ever. In an interview, I was asked at the middle school level, what class would you not want to teach to which I replied, “Grade 9 math.” The principal obliged in year one, and must have hated me, and assigned me to teach it in year two.
And why did I love teaching that class? Because I struggled with it immediately preceding teaching it as a learner. I would go through the math and stumble along, and when my students struggled, I knew exactly why because I had the same issues a day or two prior. It humbled me into being a better teacher.
I have often said that some of the teachers who struggle the most are the ones who know the subject best. It is not because they don’t know the content, but because they know it so well that they may forget what it was like to struggle.
So the next time you are frustrated that a student is not learning quickly enough, or an adult you work with isn’t embracing something you are, ask yourself when was the last time you truly struggled with learning, and what helped you make progress?
Taking that step back to focus on your own learning might just make you a better teacher and leader.
