Randy Pausch, born in 1960 was told a month ago he has 3-6 months to live due to having 10 tumors in his liver. Dr. Pausch is a public speaker and in this video he gave a speech at Carnegie Mellon University about reaching childhood dreams. He began his speech talking about his life dreams he had and how he achieved them. Dr. Pausch said, "When you're screwing up and no body is saying anything to you anymore that means they gave up." I absolutely love that quote! That's exactly right, if someone is getting on to you to try and get you to do it right that means they still have faith in you.
His dreams ranged from small to large such as being in the NFL. He never did get to actually be in the NFL but he did practice, try, and put a lot of hard work into it. Dr. Pausch brings up 'brick walls' he says the brick walls aren't there to stop you from acheiving your goal but to show you how bad you really want it. Dr. Pausch has experienced incredible things throughout life such as make a virtual reality at a time in life when that was really expensive and technology hadn't advanced that far yet.
Once he had completed his childhood dreams he wanted to help others complete his dreams. Being a professor, he was able to begin helping his students enable their dreams. This speech you could read between the lines and understand what Dr. Pausch was trying to say with his stories.
We as educators, can help encourage our students to keep the drive for what they dream of doing. Teachers have a bond with their students that differs from any other bond. We encourage, shelter, advise, discipline, care, and better our students. It's like we're the mother duck and they are our ducklings. The brick walls Dr. Pausch mentions will arise in our students' lives and when they do we need to be there to tell them his famous quote. That brick wall isn't there to prevent you from reaching your goal it's to show you how bad you want it so you can try harder. Life is about experience and excitement, when I have my own classroom my students will definately know what those two words are!
Hi Stephanie,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed reading your blog post. I agree with Dr. Pausch childhood dreams are very important. When I start teaching,I plan to make it my duty to make sure every child reach their dream. I was wondering do you have any childhood dreams?
This is a good reflection of Randy Pausch's Last Lecture. However, the assignment was to identify his methods of teaching then elaborate on those strategies.
ReplyDeleteHey Kenesha! Thanks for your comment! I do have some and one is to become a teacher!! I'm on my way to becoming one so I can say one of my dreams are coming true!!
ReplyDeleteHey Jacey,
Thank you! What I took from him is he wants to encourage his students and teach them that when they come to the brick walls to not give up. Also, he mentioned life is about excitement and experience and so I want to make sure my students get both out of my classes! Could you give me some more of his methods that I missed? Please! Thank you!