Abel: Portrait Of A Paleontologist As A Young Man, And Kids In Da Pool

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Meet Abel.

Abel is French and Ethiopian. He's a very engaging kid, and because of this, because of his need and desire to connect, his mastery of English will come quickly.

Sometimes a child's proclivities are manifest early and clearly, as we've observed in Rosa and Lucie's artistic talents, Franklin's critical lawyer-istic intellect, and CJ's quiet attention to detail.

Abel is a young naturalist. He personifies Gardner's naturalistic intelligence. Abel collects, sorts, cleans, labels, groups, regroups, then collects some more. He has an abundance of curiosity. It's remarkable, and utterly unique amongst the students that I've worked with.

In this way, teaching is a privileged position from which to observe/study the presence of a child's natural proclivities in the context of an individual psychological landscape nested within a family dynamic. There is a complex interaction between a child's temperament/s, their natural talents, and the quality of the support/obstacles emerging from the child's family. While I might see that a student is naturally disposed toward some skill or talent, this disposition is embedded in a life, in a psychological landscape.

Perhaps the most we as educators can do is to look for these dispositions, these proclivities, identify them, call attention to them, and feed them in whatever way we can, at best promoting an apprenticeship around them, with a local expert, so that no matter the context, whether personal or familial, the seed has a chance to grow, and will attract help.

Does the naturalist in Abel occupy large enough property to withstand the obstacles that naturally arise from life?

Recognizing the talent, valuing it, and feeding it through apprenticeship is necessary. How else is it to grow?

It is our hope for Abel that he one day be excavating for fossils in Ethiopia with the same love and joy that he enjoys now. In the moment, I can imagine him as a curator at the Natural History Museum in Addis.