Lunging for Knowledge

There are those very few, but sweet, sweet lucky times that a teacher or parent accidentally stumbles onto a way to motivate a child. Sure, we all hope that students will become self-motivated learners who truly desire truth and understanding because they recognize the life-long value of curiosity and questioning. We hope that it will be our eloquent words of heavenly wisdom that inspire little fires of love for learning in the hearts of our students. The reality is that most students see little in school other than a hindrance to their social lives and an impediment to a happy home life. Motivating them is difficult and requires creativity, patience, and luck. One has to find that one thing that makes them want to make an "A" on their weekly vocabulary quiz.

One of my classes of Freshmen desires to see me do this:

"This" is a classic fencing lunge. Somehow, many moons ago, I told my students about my experience taking fencing as a college PE class (I am sure that it related somehow to the day's lesson). I was not terribly good at it, but I was flexible and someone broke a foil on my sternum once (which is actually a sign of poor fencing--I told my students it was because of my great strength). My students were intrigued that their overweight, short, nerdy teacher had ever done anything so interesting before and plied me with questions. One of my classes insisted that I perform a lunge so they could picture what I was describing. I refused. It was time to take the quiz, I said. Their faces fell. My spidey senses were tingling as I thought through the problem: where they truly interested in the mechanics of a lunge, or were they more like racing fans, unconcerned about the driver so long as he crashes dramatically? Was this another opportunity for them to laugh at the teacher or a chance to teach them something they had never seen before? Would this take me up or down the "cool" ladder?

After the quiz, I told them that I would perform a lunge as soon as the entire class made an "A" or higher on one of the weekly quizzes. It was, I hoped, a perfect solution. I would never have to perform a lunge because they would never be able to live up to their end of the bargain, and they wouldn't think me a killjoy for refusing to perform the lunge. The entire episode would, I was sure, be soon forgotten.

We are sixteen quizzes later, and they are genuinely still trying. I am surprised, but pleased, and I hope to inform you before the year is out that I have performed a lunge for the class. Until then, I have a standing appointment at the local sports medicine clinic.

Peace