ARCHIVE - autobiography

First Seminar book & Written Preparation

Due week 1 -- the first seminar of the retreat

The first book we will read and discuss is Oliver Sacks’ Seeing Voices: A Journey into the World of the Deaf (Vintage Books, 2000). The book is available to order at Evergreen’s bookstore: http://www.evergreen.edu/bookstore. If you are local and decide to walk in to get it, make sure you talk to the customer service folks and tell them the book is for the FALL, they will go into the back room to get it for you.

In addition to creating a profound exploration of deafness, Deaf culture, and learning, Dr. Sacks wrote this book as a documentation of his own transformation and deepening understanding of fundamental concepts of what makes us human. According to Sacks:

My journey has taken me to look at language, at the nature of talking and teaching, at child development, at the development and functioning of the nervous system, at the formation of communities, worlds, and cultures, in a way which is wholly new to me. (xii)

We want to start with this book at the beginning of our journey into the profession of teaching as a way to enact what social scientists describe as “making the familiar strange.” We hope that the reading of this text will encourage you to challenge your own assumptions about language, child development, learning, and teaching. Moreover, this text provides an excellent model of qualitative research, in which Sacks draws on a rich variety of primary and secondary sources to formulate his arguments.

Please read this book thoroughly and carefully and write a 2-3 page response before our fall quarter retreat in which you include what you’ve learned about the following ideas and questions:

His ideas about the nature of language and learning; and
His ideas about biological and cultural factors involved in learning.
How does he get you thinking about the relationship between learning and schooling?
What questions and insights does Sacks provoke for you about your future work as an educator?

Your written insights will help you to prepare and contribute to the focus of seminar discussions. In addition, we plan to read them as a way to know how you are making sense of the book.