Barber, Teacher

Lessons from the sink

This week we finally made it to the barber shop. My kid takes his long locks seriously so this was an endeavour. Enter Mojo who took care of my son and in doing so took care of me. Over the past three years my attempts at offspring haircuts have been very flawed. My excuse is that he’s ticklish and I’m impatient. (And then there’s the reality check that skills need to be learned! And then practiced! Teacher’s college 101. I have done neither).

As I sat and worked on emails a few feet away I half listened to their small talk.

8 year-old: “So how long have you been here?”

Mojo: “Since April. We’re new.”

8 year-old: “How many haircuts have you haircutted?”

Mojo: “I dunno, maybe 1000? I’ve done a lot of kids.”

8 year-old: “We’re learning about animals at school. I have a cat.”

Mojo: “Have you seen the movie Soul? Doesn’t someone dead end up in a cat?”

8 year-old: “Ya, that’s right. Biology.”

Putting scientific miseducation aside, the whole thing was hilarious and beautiful and generous.

I’ve thought about that encounter a lot this week while teaching an MEd course about assessment and evaluation. In education we talk about these terms incessantly—about giving grades (or not!) and validating our reasons for why and how much. In our class discussions I try to interrupt certain ideas. It’s not easy for experienced educators to change their minds. It’s not easy for any of us is it? So when I attempt to shift the conversation around marking and grading to relationship building I start with questions: What does it mean to try to assess without context? What is there to evaluate if there’s no understanding of the life behind the submitted paper or project?

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

In one of our meetings this week my sister said that before a script can be written we need to assess the story’s purpose. Its deeper meaning—the “why.” That why determines the story’s impact. And even if the why isn’t explicitly shared with the audience it must still be known by the creator.

I think Mojo and my son understood the assignment. In the barber shop those two were asking all the right questions, getting into the nitty gritty of each other’s “whys” to assess real needs and wants. Instinctively they recognized that to assess a story’s impact requires an evaluation of its “why.” And to do so is a relational work. To know someone’s story is to be engaged with them in all of their messy humanity. It is in the details, through whatever is revealed in the barber chair, that I find hope. And care.