DW: Does TOC have the same relevance to kids who don’t have such
severe obstacles to overcome?
KS: Absolutely. What it helps people do is to make sense of things. Many
times,
even in affluent communities, students are motivated only because
their parents want them to achieve. But learning does not make sense to them.
It doesn’t seem relevant. They’re doing it only because they have all the right
environmental factors. What could be unleashed
from those children if we
could present information to them in such a way that they could derive their
own answers instead of providing answers that were simply memorized? It’s
all about unleashing people’s potential. I have felt many times as a teacher
that disruptive behavior comes from the high
achievers as well as the low
achievers—because the high achievers are bored! In TOC we have a way to
differentiate instruction with one learning process. To bring them all with
you.
DW: What is your goal for TOC For Education?
KS: I see empowered learners, enabled learners, and the real joy of lifelong
discovery. All those platitudes that we aspire to, I see them being practically
achieved. As well as people being kinder to each other. I see this as the real
language of civility. Once I had to give a presentation about TOC to a group
of teachers. We put on a play with some of my students. And afterwards the
students were saying, “Mrs. Suerken, what’s going to happen? This is so
effective, there won’t be any problems left.”
I thought, that will probably
never happen! But that’s the way they saw it. I wish you could come to our
conference in Serbia in May! We’re going into Thailand this month through
an organization called the Girl’s Brigade, like the Girl Scouts. We have
somebody in Singapore who is taking
it into the sports council, into sports
applications. We’re in Malaysia. My new director in the United States, he’s
going to start a private school next fall and he’s writing all of the curriculum
based on TOC. Really, I think we’ve just touched the tip of the iceberg.
