Reading as a pathway to inclusive learning

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Learning, in essence, is a creative and collaborative process between the learner and the facilitator of learning. Have you seen that I have deliberately avoided the term “teacher” because it always assumes that one is the recipient of the learning experience and one is the originator of the learning experience? In a truly engaging teaching and learning experience, every participant exchanges roles and also oscillates between being a learner and being a facilitator of learning.

An effective facilitator always learns from her students. And learners always learn from the facilitator and also sharpen the facilitator’s worldview through their engagement with the teaching and learning material, engagement with the facilitator, and engagement and inquiry amongst them as learners and co-creators of knowledge.

A good read achieves the interchange of ideas, knowledge, and worldviews. A very good story or poem, amongst other reading genres, is highly engaging and allows for the participation of all involved in the learning process and experience. Reading is not transactional. The narrator in a story, for instance, takes the reader on an imaginary journey. They travel the picturesque journey together. They visualise the beautiful sights together. They savour the morsel of the journey, as it were: the thriving and verdant vegetation, the beautiful and mellow yellow sunsets, and the whispering of the wind caressing vegetation!

Effective writing is a mental and emotional journey. With every description, gripping narration, and twist in the tale, the reader is engaged and sinking her teeth into the fibre of the story. The reader also anticipates how the story will end, how the plot will proceed, how the narrative will turn out, engages the writer of the art, and unravels the meaning embedded in the suspense.

The reader also senses the effect of the narrative through her understanding of the sentiments evoked, the sensibilities evoked, and how those aspects of writing all holistically help to create meaning.
Let’s try a compelling and engaging narrative that clarifies what we have been labouring to put across.

“Your surroundings—your country, your neighbourhood, your home—have a very powerful influence on you. They affect how you think, how you act, and sometimes even how other people see you. Some very famous writers, from all countries and times, have travelled thousands of miles from their homes, visited and lived in other countries, explored other cultures, and yet they never wrote about anything except the places they started out from. No matter how far off they wandered, in their imaginations they always lived in the same place and thought about the same thing—their home.”

This is a very beautiful and evocative piece of writing. It illustrates that good and effective writing is quite evocative. I have also said that effective writing is inclusive and participatory. Have you noticed the inclusive part in the extract above? Well, it is there.

I have chosen an extract that evokes the picture of home and the sensibilities it arouses. Home is a place of warmth, and that strikes a responsive chord in many hearts. More often than not, many people have fond memories of their home. As you were reading this story, I am quite sure that you were visualising your own home. You visualised every sight, every sound, and every sensibility associated with the intimacy of home.

So here we are! We have demonstrated the beauty of effective reading and its connection with participatory and inclusive learning. Let’s meet again for yet another installment next week.

Vuso Mhlanga