Occasional Paper

I recently had the opportunity to have an ultrasound, and check the well-being of my first child. While it seems like I would be the most familiar with my body and its occurrences, throughout this experience it truly seemed foreign to me. The appointment began with the technician asking me a few ‘standard’ questions. I was able to answer these questions, but I could tell that I was beginning to feel uncomfortable with the jargon that was being used. Although the image was magical when it appeared on the screen, I had a very difficult time making any sense of it. The technician’s explanation of each image was thorough, but somehow seemed to contribute to my sense of confusion. The shades of black and grey that filled the screen moved rapidly, and didn’t remain in one position long enough for me to orient myself to them.
I consider myself an intelligent person, who is educated and well read. Despite having read fairly extensively on the topic of pregnancy, I felt lost when confronted with this situation. When I reflected upon this experience later, I couldn’t help but relate the feelings that I had had to the way my students must feel when confronted with new material. I quickly realized that it is very difficult to truly explain a subject that you are well acquainted with to an individual that harbors no knowledge. As teachers, we try our hardest to utilize the resources that our education bestowed us but it is still easy to forget that each individual brings their own schemas to the table. What is common knowledge to one person is foreign to another, who lacks the necessary background experience to interpret it in the same way. Often times it is assumed a language arts teacher doesn’t have to approach this disconnect as often as other content teachers. However, I must remind myself on a daily basis that literacy is not a universal skill, and that some of the materials I teach may be interpreted as I interpreted the ultrasound. Following this experience I will always remember that information can always be interpreted in a myriad of ways, and just because an explanation is thorough does not mean that it is successful in relating meaning.