To teach, use TELL, SHOW, and DO

(From my original Blogspot)

As a mom, I'm struggling to learn how best to help my children learn. Here are a few things I've been thinking about.

Teaching generally consists of telling, showing, and doing. When you want to teach a class of kids a math concept, you would probably introduce it to them by telling them about it. Next, you would reach for that whiteboard marker and show them an example. Last, you would guide them through actually doing the problem. After some successful doing experiences, the kids could then be said to have been "taught" the new math concept.

But what interests me most about this idea is that with educating or kids (or people in general), "tell, show, do" is something that gradually gives way to "tell, show," which eventually just becomes "show." This happens both because of healthy, developmental letting go of supports, or because of unhealthy and premature breaking away from supports. I'll explain.

When you help a young child tie his shoe, you use all three ways to teach: tell, show, and do. First, you tell: "Tying a shoe is useful. There are benefits to tying a shoe, and it is not hard. You have to combine the strings in this fashion." You then take the strings and let him watch. After watching, you ask him to try, guiding him as he makes his attempt.

When teaching your young child about honesty, you tell him about the concept: "people trust you when you are honest; and, honesty means telling what actually happened or how you actually feel." You can show him honesty by role-playing a scenario, or pointing out honest behavior in others, or reading a story about honesty. You then help him "do" honesty by requiring him to live it. He is consequented or rewarded by how he "does" honesty.

There is a point in time when how the child "does" is not in your control as a parent. I can tell and show and require the doing of honesty, but at some point, if the child chooses not to "do" honesty, then the parent is only left with telling and showing. And, if the child is stubborn or slow developing and will not/cannot "do" tying the shoe, again the parent is reduced to being able to tell and show shoe tying. So, the first of the three to be discarded is "do."

The next of the three to vanish is the "tell". If individuals do not want to "do" something, often the next thing to go is that they don't want to hear about it either. Again, parenting offers a good example here. A belligerent child might not be open to hearing about how you want them to behave. Or, on the flip side, it may no longer be necessary, due to positive moral growth, to discuss the matter.

Whether the "tell" must vanish due to positive growth or a premature breaking away from supports, the only thing that is left is "show." This showing is simply your example; the way you live your life. It is as basic as the fact that you value your shoes tied, and you tie them yourself, to the way you live your life: honest, disciplined, or whatever it may be.

When teaching, we show and tell the concept, then help those being taught to actually do it. But whether for good or ill, when telling or helping them do the action is no longer effective or necessary, we are always left with showing. We continue to teach by the example we set. In that way, we all teach, every person we meet, every day of our lives.

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