A Dropout, A Junk Yard, and Meaningful Personal Learning

In the Spanish Golden Age of the early 1600's, Miguel de Cervantes delivered Don Quixote who tilted at the windmills of LaMancha. Here in the modern age, thanks to the Tornoto Star,  The Clever Sheep curator Rodd Lucier presents us with William Kamkwamba, a 21 year old Malawi man who has embraced rather than fought windmills in order to turn a negative circumstance into a hugely positive opportunity for himself, his family, and the community beyond.


Forced to drop out of school because crop failure meant there was no money to pay for school, Kamkwamba got resourceful. With only the images in a book to guide him, and a scrap yard as his Home Depot, Kamkwamba relied on his own personal need and inner drive to provide the means by which more water could be delivered to crops, and kerosene dependence could be eliminated.


Lucier describes Mr. Kamkwamba's story as one of the "pursuit of personal learning." It is that, and then some.


William Kamkwamba is an inspiration who puts Robots' Bigweld & Rodney Copperbottom to shame. Kamkwama didn't just see a need and fill it; instead, he was living with such a need his life and the livelihood of those around him depended upon his efforts and desire to pursue his personal learning.


I'm wondering right now, what issues are my students and the other 900+ 7th-9th graders in my building hoping to address? Needing to address? And, to what extent are my colleagues and I providing them the skills and  tools that might just set them off toward becoming the next William Kamkwamba?


Zeroed in on me, I'm left dreaming that what I deliver in my classroom, the opportunity to explore and investigate historical events (8th grade U.S. History), and a chance to express personal opinions and craft self-expression (9th grade English), might be the impetus for my students' journeys toward truly personal learning.


As I start the new year, I want to hold up William Kamkwamba as an inspiration, and an example of how in the face of a personal challenge, an individual can creatively, imagination, and thought. 


Very clever, Sheep, very clever indeed.
-SchlegsofTonka