Knowledge & Literacy & a Personal Challenge

Reading, thinking critically, knowing, understanding - this is all so important for all of us. Learning shouldn't stop at the end of our school days. Maturing shouldn't stop at a certain age. Keep growing and keep striving to be a better person - even if just for yourself.

Knowledge & Literacy

When I got sick, the one thing that bothered me the most was not being able to read and comprehend as well as before. I have always loved books. Reading allowed me to see more of the world without ever leaving my room. Reading was how I learned to feel connections with other people in this wide world of ours.

Now that my brain is somewhat healed, I can better read and comprehend the written word. However, there is something about seeing a lot of letters on a page that frustrates me. Sometimes, the letters and words seem distorted. For that reason, I have learned to appreciate audiobooks.

And, thank God for audiobooks. For the past 7 years or so, I have gotten back into the habit of reading or listening to all the writers and poets I love. Zora Neale Hurston is a favorite and I have come back around to others such as those by Oscar Wilde, Alexandre Dumas, Shirley Jackson, Countee Cullen, Sylvia Plath, Nella Larsen, Claude McKay, Lorraine Hansberry, and Harper Lee. 

Even though I started reading at an early age, I have only recently begun to think about all the books, authors, and poets I've avoided. I have never read most of Shakespeare or any of Virginia Woolf, and I just put Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" on my list because of a Bible Study I've been doing.

Yesterday, I started putting together a list. During the coming winter months, I'd like to touch on or get through:

• The Art of War (Sun Tzu). A nephew of mine suggested this one years ago. The Bible study reminded me.
• The Death of Common Sense (Philip K. Howard). Oddly, I saw the author mentioned in the obituary of a television voice actor.
• The History of Knowledge (Charles Van Doren)
• The Federalist Papers (A. Hamilton, J. Madison, and J. Jay)
• The Ninety-Five Theses (Martin Luther)
• The Antiquities of the Jews (Josephus - translated by William Whiston)

It's a short list but some of the works are very intensive and will take me the rest of my life. (I also plan to re-read and study the U.S. Constitution, something I haven't done since my last year of school.)

A Challenge

One book that I have read before and recently read (rather listened to) again is Cultural Literacy (E.D. Hirsch, Jr.). The first time I read this, I made it a goal to start honing my cultural literacy skills. Then I got sick. Last year, I found a copy at my local library and made a note to read it again. When I did, I was encouraged to pursue a very specific challenge: to study for the U.S. Citizenship Test.

I have always been amazed (and sometimes ashamed) by the hard work of many people who come to live in the U.S. and make it their permanent home. Like too many natural-born citizens, I take so much of my citizenship for granted.

When people come here and, starting with less than I have, and go on to do more than I have, that's beautiful. It's also a reminder that I - and many of you - could be doing so much more here. We could be more appreciative of our freedoms and opportunities. We do, many of us, squander so much of that.

The challenge I have given myself is not to prove anything. I just want to study for the test for my personal learning and growth. 

There are many resources online. I started with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Naturalization Interview and Test page. Looking at the test and study resources listed, I decided to just go with other (less official) sources. Right now, I'm looking at this site. There are offerings of "free" training resources I want to check out.

If you are interested in just taking a quiz (it might encourage you) there is one. If, like me, you want to practice for taking the entire test, this is one link. I had initially just thought about practicing for the Civics portion only.

What strikes me is that people only get 2 attempts at passing the actual exam! Think about that. Think about the work that someone - who may not even speak English - has to put in to become a citizen. Maybe we all should have to take this test at some point in our early school years.

I will post about my progress as often as I can. I have not set a start date yet.

Peace

--Free

Surface Knowledge & Going Deeper

 Reading a Reddit post about the Rosetta Stone today reminded me to never stop learning. The Stone is one of those things that we hear about all the time without a lot of us really knowing what it is or why it's important. Surface knowledge.

We live in the age of the internet, being "connected" and having access to so much information that we don't absorb details. Surface knowledge.

How many of us are fortunate enough to have a good education? How many of us who have access take full advantage of a good (or even decent) education? 

I honestly believe that many of us didn't realize the importance (and good fortune) of having that access. I don't think that I did. For me, getting just through school was the thing. I was a nervous and shy student. My family, being military, moved around a lot. I never spent more than a year or two at any one school. I'd start at a school and have to get through the anxiety of being the "new kid". By the time I stopped feeling so lost and out of place, it was on to a new school. I believe my older sister felt the same. My brothers, who are more confident and outgoing, all did really well. They are all very "book smart". They really enjoyed their school years and have fond memories about every set of teachers and students they interacted with.

Now that I am much older, I still have the social anxiety and awkwardness of my youth. But now I have the internet. I have access to information of all sorts literally at the fingertips on my keyboard. Not learning about stuff in this society means I am mostly dumb on purpose. Ain't that a shame?

Before I got sick, I was too busy working and enjoying being healthy to take full advantage of all this free knowledge. Now, I have more time but my brain works at half-power. Still, I just cannot get enough of learning. I'm not great at retaining what I learn, but I still get to explore.

When I saw the post about the Rosetta Stone, I did some Googling and - wow.

For all of you out there with a healthy body, mind, and brain, I urge you to take advantage. If you even have 1 hour - even just half an hour - of time that you can set aside for it, go deeper. Please. 

Today, I spent about 40 minutes looking up information about the Rosetta Stone. While I was at it, I wandered down a few rabbit holes and picked up some information about language and culture in general. I will talk more about cultural literacy in just a moment and you will see why I think it's so important.

You can start by picking a book that you've always heard about but never got around to reading. You don't even have to read the book if you don't have time. You can look up notes about it or find a cheat sheet for it. I can't tell you how many lists there are of "Books Everyone Should Read...". Good Reads has a "General Knowledge Books" list.

Years and years ago, I read Cultural Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know (by  E.D. Hirsch Jr.). That was the first time I started thinking about how I had shorted my own education post-school. Even though I'd had challenges during my school years, there was nothing really stopping me from going further and deeper afterward. I was just too busy working and being young and cute.

Coming up on that Reddit post and then writing this blog post has encouraged me to get another copy of Hirsch's book. I highly recommend it to anyone who agrees with me about life-long learning. Just because we are no longer in school - or see ourselves as "brainy", there is no reason at all not to continue learning. Maybe we wouldn't be in such an awful mess as a nation right now if we... Never mind. That's a whole other blog post!

I guess the main thing I want to get across is that we let things keep us from learning and growing. Shame is a big obstacle. I was always horrible with math but once I had to use math skills in a job that I loved, I got so much better. (Sadly, those skills were the first to go when I got sarcoidosis). What I have learned since my brain decided to be funky is that there should be no shame in going back to the basics to learn anything. My sister bought me a math book for children when I was first laid up in bed. I had nothing else to do so...  These days, when I am curious about something, I will start with the basics - looking for books written "for beginners" or for children. No shame, people. 

These days, with so much information available to so many, there is no excuse not to at least attempt to learn and grow. Barring health and developmental problems, we are only as dumb as we choose to be.

By the way, here is the Amazon author page for Hirsch. I plan to take a look and see what else he's written.

Peace

--Free