Comments on Art of GTD, Zone by Zone: Teach a child to ride a bike (without breaking you...

Ya, teaching being robbing was a bit of a shocker ...

2009-08-12T05:29:07.678-07:00

Ya, teaching being robbing was a bit of a shocker to me too. Especially after dedicating my life to human growth & development. For me I have come to contextualize it as treaching being spoon feeding. Giving dirtection and support that is unrequested. I find my self saying, "let me know if you want support.". And things like that a lot. Instead of following my gut and jumping in to "help." Allowing for the discomfort of cognitive dissonance.

Also, there is a different level of pride in learning when my sons discover/learn on their own then with my input. Let's continue this conversation. It is stirring me up a bit. I also have choosen a school for my sons that follows this philosophy. Their school is based on a school in England called Summerhill. They call it a free school environment which really means child dirrected. My kids are at Playmountain Place in Culver City, Los Angeles. (www.playmountain.org - I think).

Also, are you familar with Ken Wilber and integral theory? His AQAL (all quadrants, lines, levels, types, & states) model is also deepening my thinking about my work in corporate training and coaching as well as my parenting.

Be well,
Doug

Doug, Thank you for your comments. I really enjo...

2009-08-12T03:38:08.130-07:00

Doug,

Thank you for your comments. I really enjoyed your thoughts.

I love the design and philosophy behind the bike you referenced. This is a great starting point for new bikers.

Regarding "When you teach a child, you rob them of the opportunity to discover."... this is an interesting thought. I has me thinking deeper already. I will need to explore the site you referenced to get more context.

I also took a look at your blog. It looks very interesting. I am excited to read some of your posts and articles.

Thank you for connecting and sharing.

Mike

Hey Mike, I love how passionate you are in your pa...

2009-08-11T22:12:26.754-07:00

Hey Mike, I love how passionate you are in your parenting. It inspires me to greater depths of presence in my parenting my 4 and 6 yr olds.

Here are my thoughts on your bike post.

First of all, I have approached my parenting with a possible different philosophy. I picked this philosophy up from Maga Gerber (http://rie.org/). I grabbed a hold of a phrase that struck a chord with me. I loosely quote her, "When you teach a child, you rob them of the opportunity to discover."

I struggled with this personally. I found/find myself wanting to teach my children stuff all the time. What I have come to realize is that I only need to create the environment for discovery.

I am very excited about my kids learning to ride bikes and your blog post helped me think more deeply about it.

Here are some of my random thoughts:

- Without realizing it, I isolated discrete skills to be mastered in riding a bike. The first skill was balance. We got a bike for Jack without pedals. These are called push bikes. The seat is pretty low, so that Jack can sit on the seat and push himself flat footed. At first, he would keep at least one foot on the ground at all times for balance. As he picked up the balance skill, he would start to glide with both feet off the ground.

You can see a great example of this in an Amazon customer review for a push bike. Goto http://bit.ly/19FUow and scroll down to the customer review section and watch the review.

- Then we added pedals. Jack insisted on riding his first pedal bike in the parking lot of the bike store. He did awesome. Screamed at me to let go. And he was off. He remained in full control. My thinking on this, is that with balace mastered, he could focus on the new skill of pedaling. Also, we got a hand brake. This was critical because pedaling backwards seems to be a whole different skill from pedaling forward.

- He discovered all this on his own. Without knowing it, I provided the environment that supported him discovering the skills discretely and in progression. (Yes, I have a big smile on my face realizing this.)

- He mastered the balance skill before moving to the next skill. He rode the push bike in a wide variety of circumstances for about 2-3 years before starting with pedals. How often do we as adults push ourselves beyond our capacity too fast and too soon? Then end up defeated, deflated, and give up.

- He was in control. He got on the bike one time on Christmas morning. He felt awkward and got right off. He didn't get back on the bike for a good 2 or 3 months. We just kept the bike around and available. After a while, he started exploring it and figured it out. It helped that he saw people riding bikes at the beach. This created some motivation for him to learn.

Ok, I will stop here. I hope this is helpful... Thank you again for creating the post that caused me to really look deeply at what occurred in human developmental perspective.

- One last thought, my 4 year old picked it all up much much faster. He got his own push bike and quickly mastered riding it through the house without hitting walls or anything...

Take care Mike,
Doug Miller

Tara, Thank you for your generous comment. I is ...

2009-07-04T04:16:33.246-07:00

Tara,

Thank you for your generous comment. I is good to hear from you. I hope all is well in your part of the world.

Mike

Hi Mike, You never cease to amaze and inspire me!...

2009-07-03T19:15:03.364-07:00

Hi Mike,

You never cease to amaze and inspire me! Your kids are so blessed to have a dad like you.

Happy 4th!
Tara