I Could See They Were Happy

I'm beginning my journey back to the US after a week in Vietnam where I've been a presenter and participant in an extraordinary event called the International Conference for Happiness and Well-being in Education hosted by TH School here in Hanoi. I plan to share some of my thoughts and insight with you here on the blog over the next several days. Today's post is a bit from one of my keynotes.

At the beginning of each new school year, I make a habit of asking parents, "What are your goals for your child?" Among the most frequent answers is some version of, "I want my child to love learning."

Good news, I say, goal achieved. They already love learning. Every single one of us, from the moment we are born, are ready and eager to learn. We perceive the shadows moving around us; detect the jumble of sounds that vibrate in our ears; the scents, textures, and temperatures that swirl around and through us. Our bodies signal us with all manner of feelings and emotions. And, at bottom, learning is that amazing process by which we strive to make sense of it all. Perhaps "love" is the wrong word for it. It goes beyond that. We learn in the same way that we breathe: we must. It means we are alive . . . So, you know, goal met!

By far the most frequent response I've received from asking this question of thousands of parents of young children, however, is, "I just want my child to be happy." 

Happiness is another matter entirely. For one thing, happiness, like the other most important things -- life, love, or art -- is impossible to define, even if we know it when we experience it.

The Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle asserts that happiness stands alone as the only human emotion that tends to disappear the moment we recognize it. It's elusive. When we stop to consider our happiness, we can always find a fly in the ointment. We tend to feel happy when we are deeply engaged in whatever it is that brings us happiness, but the moment that engagement is interrupted, the moment we step out of it, we find our happiness is in some way incomplete. As Aristotle saw it, the only way to know whether or not we've lived a happy life is from the perspective of our deathbed, when we can look back with satisfaction over all the people we've loved, the things we've accomplished, the obstacles we've surmounted, and say with certainty, "Mine was a happy life."

There are those who tell us that we can "choose happiness" and maybe it's true, but personally I find it an impossibility for more than a few seconds at a time. I might wake up and tell myself, Today I'll be happy, but then I stub my toe or discover I forgot to buy coffee and my best intentions evaporate. What I can do, however, is pursue happiness. This is what we are doing when we are deeply engaged in any self-selected activity and, I assert, it is in this pursuit that we are happy.

This is what play-based, or self-directed, learning is all about: the pursuit of happiness. 

Loitering about our playground, I came across a five-year-old purposefully arraigning some of our "loose parts": an old bicycle tire, the guts from a defunct washing machine, a wire basket, the base of what was once a rocking horse, logs, planks, and other odds and ends. I stopped to watch her, keeping my distance so as not to interrupt her flow. She was so fully engaged in her pursuit that the rest of the world was clearly in the background. I was curious about what she was doing, but I didn't dare interrupt her flow because I knew, the moment I did I would risk derailing her important process of creating meaning from meaninglessness, her purpose for the moment, her pursuit of . . . happiness?

She wasn't smiling or laughing as she worked, the stereotypical signals of happiness. On the contrary, she wore an expression of concentration and focus. She was, it seemed to me, alone in her self-selected activity with her purpose. 

As I observed her, another child approached, also observing, then another child. Soon they began to get engaged in whatever it was she was doing. I was far enough away that I couldn't hear the words being spoken, but I did, now, see smiles and hear laughter. Before long, a half dozen children were arraigning those parts. The girls purpose had become, for a time, the purpose of a community and, from the outside looking in, I could see they were happy.

Goal accomplished.

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I've been writing about play-based learning almost every day for the past 14 years. I've recently gone back through the 4000+ blog posts(!) I've written since 2009. Here are my 10 favorite in a nifty free download. Click here to get yours.

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