{"id":234,"date":"2023-05-10T04:23:44","date_gmt":"2023-05-10T11:23:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/?p=234"},"modified":"2023-05-10T04:23:44","modified_gmt":"2023-05-10T11:23:44","slug":"what-does-struggling-to-learn-mean-to-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/what-does-struggling-to-learn-mean-to-me\/","title":{"rendered":"What does “struggling to learn” mean to me?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

When someone tells me that they struggle to learn and that they’re unsure if they can learn what I’m trying to teach them, I often think back to my own struggles and try to put myself in their place through my own experiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What does it feel like to struggle with learning?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I’ve struggled to learn my whole life which is likely why I fell in love with learning and get such as visceral joy when I see others make the positive connections it takes to learn something new.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Balancing Rocks<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It’s fleeting.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It’s the knowledge that a concept that others around me grasp so readily is just outside my reach. Like a rock so delicately balanced on a pile of stone that the slightest change in its surroundings will cause it all to crash down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I use the word knowledge intentionally despite it being only a feeling (and a lie at that) because, in the moment of that struggle, there is no ambiguity about it. In that instance, I am the only person in the room that is failing to grasp something.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That feeling of dread, that if I stop focussing on learning for fear of losing my limited understanding of it is overwhelming at the moment but upon reflection a substantial reason for the struggle in the first place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Messy Office<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It’s a mess.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It’s the knowledge that when I look away for just a moment, the learning disappears or at the least disconnects from me for a time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When I was a child I remember a teacher, it was likely around grade six, telling me that my desk wasn’t well organized and a messy desk was why I couldn’t find what I was looking for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At such a young age, I knew she was talking about more than my desk and developed a coping mechanism of associating new concepts with mental triggers such as imagining them as a TV show, designed to help me find what I was looking for by remembering the trigger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Imposter Playing the Piano<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It’s fake.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It’s the knowledge, as an adult, that I’m an imposter and that I have to work harder than everyone else to learn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That feeling is especially present when studying something new in an academic setting, I once heard that if you wanted to learn to skate you shouldn’t ask Wayne Gretzky to teach you. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Being surrounded by and learning from, people who are so much better at every aspect of a subject simply amplifies the feeling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Lost in a Forest<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It’s being lost.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It’s the knowledge of being lost when even the map is in the wrong language.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Struggling to grasp a new concept at times feels like being lost, knowing that there’s definitely a way out but not knowing where to start, let along how to get out of the confusion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s a lie.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

It’s the knowledge that none of this is true and that the feeling of struggling to learn is overwhelming and undermining. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s the knowledge that my struggle to learn is what has made learning, and my love of learning stronger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And finally, it’s the knowledge that every time I’m in front of a group of learners talking about something complex, there is a moment when they know they are no longer lost, alone, or struggling to make that connection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For me, these days my struggles to learn are about me overcoming the feelings I now know we all face, and hoping that people around me can do the same.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When someone tells me that they struggle to learn and that they’re unsure if they can learn what I’m trying to teach them, I often think back to my own struggles and try to put myself in their place through… Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":302,"featured_media":235,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-234","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-personal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/302"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":240,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234\/revisions\/240"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru0285\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}