Narrative Theory

I've been thinking about the concept of "story" and the study of narrative theory as it pertains to educational opportunities. When I taught Advanced Placement Psychology, one of the items on the test was a section about all the old, dead people who were the philosophers, scientists, sociologists, and doctors that developed the discipline. I found a book called The Story of Psychology and I chose to read little snippets in conjunctions with presentations I had students do on each of the biggies, like Freud, Pavlov, Descartes, Locke, Jung, James, Skinner...(you get the idea.)

My students really enjoyed this aspect of learning about the people, because they didn't just have to memorize information for regurgitation on a timeline. The interrelationship of these people to the discipline, their historical context, and the impact on our current understanding of psychology is fascinating when the people are brought to life and not just a list of data.

It also created fascinating conversations about what they were learning in history, science, math, and literature. I made a pointed effort to connect what we learned in AP Psych to what they were doing in other classes, because I wanted them to understand the value of a broad based education. In order to understand why YOU do what YOU do, you need to understand yourself, as well as why other people do what they do. And then you can understand why you feel what you feel, think what you think, and then you can know WHO YOU ARE.