"All Wise People Change Their Minds"

As a boy, we would occasionally catch my mother in what we saw as inconsistency. Instead of denying it, she would reply, "All wise people change their minds."

It could be frustrating, but it's a response that has served me well throughout my adult life, not because it's a defense against accusations of hypocrisy, but rather because it's true.

The great American poet Walt Whitman phrased it perfectly:

Do I contradict myself?

Very well then I contradict myself,

(I am large, I contain multitudes).

Albert Einstein said, "The measure of intelligence is the ability to change." Stephen Hawking put a different spin on it: "Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change." Neither of these undisputed geniuses ever took an IQ test. Indeed, Hawking famously said that they are for losers.

As educators, intelligence falls into our balliwick. Parents come to us knowing that their children are intelligent. They've seen it with their own eyes. "My Angela can already write her letters." They've heard it with their own ears. "My Marcus makes up such stunning songs." They've been present for the genius of their first word, their first step, their first mind-blowing question. They remember when this baby couldn't talk or walk or write or sing, and now they can. This child is obviously intelligent. They've seen them change, day-by-day, from a newborn into a child and they come to us educators to foster that obvious intelligence. 

The protagonist of Octavia Butler's novel Parable of the Sower is a 15-year-old named Lauren whose special "genius" is hyperempathy. In the face of a dystopia caused by a combination of greed and climate change, she invents a religion/philosophy she calls Earthseed:

All that you touch

You Change

All that you Change

Changes you

The only last truth

Is Change

God

Is Change.

All that evidence that parents see as intelligence is a function of change and intelligence is about both our ability and adaptability when it comes to this "last truth."

If humans were fixed entities we would have perished long ago. If we didn't contradict ourselves, if we did not contain multitudes, our species would not have demonstrated the intelligence to survive. Intelligence cannot be measured by tests, but rather by close observation of behavior. As neuroscientist and author Antonio Damasio says, "Bacteria and plants are intelligent. We can tell by their behavior."

This is what we do when we observe the children we have set free to play. We take note of their behaviors, we notice, like their parents did, how they change and grow, how they shape their world and how the world shapes them. When they are being harmed, of course, we step in, but when they struggle, which is a far different thing, we stand back because change is in the offing. This is a moment for them to show us their intelligence.

Change is often uncomfortable, it requires failure and struggle, and it demands courage. When we swoop in with our "teaching" or "help," we too often rob children of this opportunity apply their unique intelligence. My heroes are those children who rebuff our interventions, shouting, "I do it!" They know that if they are to change, if they are to grow, if they are to behave intelligently, then it must be on their own terms.

We have some control of their world in the form of our classroom environments. We provide space, materials, and other people. We make them safe, beautiful, and varied. We provide opportunities for change, but it is the children themselves that must do the growing. And we can never forget that there is a whole world beyond our classroom wall over which we have no control.

Intelligence can't be measured, but it can be observed. Intelligence is about changing and adapting. An intelligent person becomes a new person with each passing day. An intelligent person contains multitudes. An intelligent person is a new person each time we meet them.

What we call schooling is far too focused on those tests for losers, those IQ tests that prove little more than the ability to pass tests. A psychologist who administers these tests to preschoolers told me that, at best, they are valid for six months because "young children change so fast." They are too intelligent for a damned test.

Play (or self-directed learning) and observation is the gold standard if intelligence is our goal. Learning is always about change and all wise people change their minds.

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Even the most thriving play-based environments can grow stale at times. I've created this collection of my favorite free (or nearly free) resources for educators, parents, and others who work with young children. It's my gift to you! Click here to download your own copy and never run out of ideas again!

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