I watched in horror, covering my eyes often, as he tried to teach the card game to his kid.

It was evident that the dad had been learning how to play and now wanted to share his enthusiasm.  The problem is that a 6 year old does not learn a card game the same way that a 50 year old does, and dad was not aware of that.  He was too preoccupied with sharing all his ideas and techniques.

It was painful to watch the kids face as dad explained the finer details of trump and card counting.

It would have been better if the kid just spaced out and stopped listening entirely, but the kid kept trying to grasp what his dad was saying, probably because of the enthusiasm.  But, the dwindling  self-confidence was growing across the kids face.

The intention from both the dad and his son was touching.

The actions that accompanied that intention were, well, not so good.

Empathetic Observation & Chunking Information

It reminded me of a musician who visited my son’s classroom years ago.

He was an excellent guitarist.  He played beautiful music.  And he was the dad of my kids preschool classmate.

I was looking forward to his classroom visit, as was Z (my little guy).

But, the visit was a disaster.  Complete dud.  He taught a class as if he were talking to college students, not 4 or 5 year olds.  He talked about music theory.  He talked about harmony.  He talked about different kinds of guitars.

He didn’t play his beautiful music.  And the kids were done after the first 2 minutes of his 30 minute visit.

Being able to communicate information at an appropriate level for kids is a skill – empathetic observation.  And it’s a skill that all parents, teachers, grandparents, aunts and uncles ought to learn.  Because when you help a kid to learn something, it feels great and they feel a sense of accomplishment, but when you confuse a kid with information that is too difficult, not in the right order, or they can’t understand, they end up feeling crappy and not capable.

Message from Captain Obvious

And Captain Obvious says we don’t want our kids feeling crappy and not capable, we want them feeling powerful, creative, and resilient.

At one point dad noticed his kid was having trouble and was not picking up the game quickly;  phew.  Unfortunately, in that moment he chose the easy (and far too common?) path.

The Easy path is to  blame the learner – “They aren’t ready.”  “They aren’t that sharp.”  “They’re stupid.”  “They’re lazy.”  “They aren’t paying attention.”

The Hard path is to take ownership – “I wonder how I could make that easier for them.”  “Where is a better place to start?”  “Are they following me?”  “Are they building on what we have already talked about?”  “How do they learn?”  “The way they understand this is going to be different than how I understand it (and probably at a different level).”

The subtlety of self-esteem

Teaching someone is so, so much more than transferring the information in your head to someone else’s head. Listening to understand and watching to understand will provide you everything you need to know about what the kid needs if you are paying attention.  It will provide you the exact information about what information or practice will be most helpful.

This is a skill that we can learn. But, to learn it, we have to get our self out of the way.

Empathetic Observation is a skill that as parents, teachers, and caregivers, we must learn, so that our young people feel over and over again, that they are capable, that they are resilient, and that making an effort makes a difference.

Their sense of self depends on our ability to figure them out.