I’m 18, taking a community college class in linear algebra. The mechanics are taught impressively well. I understand what to do… but I don’t understand why.
So one day, I raise my hand. “Can you tell us what linear algebra is for? Who uses it? What does it let them do?”
The professor responds. “We don’t deal with applications in this class.”
I never figure out if this professor really thinks students shouldn’t need the answer or if the question catches her off guard, but it makes me wonder. Why not give your students a reason to learn besides degree requirements and GPA? Why not take the opportunity to facilitate learning rather than memorization?
And why not respond to a direct question that has such a clear answer? Because it turns out linear algebra has a lot of applications.
I do well enough in the class, but the only thing I remember is this contrast: how well she teaches the material, and how poorly she justifies why we should learn it.
A few months later, it’s my first winter in college. I’m on a university-organized trip to Italy taking an economics course, condensed into three weeks, on the history of the euro.
Today, I remember how the cities we visited looked. I remember how they felt to me. I remember the texture and taste of some of the food we ate. I remember the weather and several historical sites we visited.
What I don’t remember? Is almost any of the academic material. Folks, it. Was. Dry.
Of what I was supposed to be learning on this course, I remember only two things, both of which made an immediate impression.
One is another student’s presentation on the liveliness (to put it mildly) of Italian politics. My own presentation: Not Memorable.
The second is this:
A professor from the major university nearby joins us for a few days to speak about Italy’s transition to the euro. She speaks seriously, at length. I struggle to understand what she’s talking about. Even now, I can picture her walking and talking, but I don’t know what she’s saying.
Until I ask her a question. “How did the transition to the euro affect you?”
Unlike the linear algebra professor, she answers.
There were two exchange rates from lira to euro, she says. One for salaries, another for prices. In a short time, the income she and her husband make was effectively cut in half.
She describes being unable to buy her daughter an ice cream in the street. This professional, well-put together person, this careful speaker, begins to cry.
And suddenly, all the material we’re supposed to be learning is real. It matters. It affects the day to day life of this person before us.
Nearly two decades later, I remember.
One of the hardest things about communicating with people is meeting them where they are, understanding what they need, what they care about. And then giving them that.
Has there been a time when someone did a particularly good (or terrible) job of meeting you where you were? I’d love to read about it—please share the story in a comment below.
This Glass Has Water 
Smart observations, nicely written!Neshikot,Imma
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Thank you!