25 hour learning challenge

When I was in high school, I took an anatomy class which was the class that "planted the seed" for me that would later turn into my major in college. One of the major components of the class that the students were graded on was our ability to dissect animals and use the specimens to learn various facets of anatomy. For the final exam, the students needed to learn all of the muscles of a cat, which is a considerable amount of material to learn. In order to do so, I discovered that one class period a day of studying anatomy would not be sufficient; I would need to study for homework. What ensued was a group of my friends and I studying a dead cat's muscular anatomy in my parents' backyard, much to the chagrin of both my parents and my pet cats. In this instance, the people who were supporting our learning included my teacher for letting us take the cat home, my friends and my parents for being so supportive of us learning what they thought was a foul thing in the backyard. The skills that I learned from my high school class went on to support me when I was studying similar subjects in college. I came into my college classes with a background in anatomy that my classmates were lacking. Another learning experience of mine happened a couple of weeks ago. In my primary classroom we are studying birds, and I wanted my 1st and 2nd graders to appreciate how hard a bird needs to work in order to make a nest. The students were working in partners, and they were required to find the materials to make a nest, find a safe place for their nest, and build a nest. I had a few real birds' nests to show my students, and they were excited. They asked if they could use water in order to hold their nests together, just like swallows make mud nests. I told them that they could do so, since birds in the area also have access to water. What resulted were 10 amazingly well made, well hidden man made bird nests, plus an outdoor water fountain that was so clogged with mud from my students that even after 3 hours of working for unclogging purposes was still not draining. What I learned from this, or re-learned from this,is that so much of teaching is logistics. The next week when we tried the same assignment again, I provided my students with a bucket of water from which to dunk their muddy hands. What these two experiences indicate to me is how much I benefit from hands on learning. For both of these assignments, the learning wasn't pretty, but the way in which it happened was completely necessary. Both learning processes were satisfying and I was able to learn so much in both instances.