10 minute speech (deliver like a conversation!)
Students at good schools are known as scholars. Scholars have to know how to do research and how to write the results of their research. These writings are known as “research papers.”
At All Saints’ Episcopal School students begin learning how to research topics in Kindergarten. It is there that five year olds learn about famous persons (such as Amelia Earhart or Abraham Lincoln), write a report, and then deliver the report to the class. It’s great to see these little scholars dress up like the subject of their reports! Their parents are there, cameras are clicking, and everyone has a wonderful time.
By the time students are in the middle school, they are writing formal research papers complete with rough drafts, title pages and references. No dressing up. No parents. No clicking cameras. No one has a wonderful time. Wait! Strike that! I meant to say, “everyone just loves writing research papers!”
This year, for example, I wrote a paper for my language arts class on Galileo. Last year, in the same class, I researched Daniel Boone. Next year I plan to write about Bart Simpson. Just
kidding! I’m really going to write it about . . . ummm. . . I don’t know yet.
I had to write my first real research paper when I was in fifth grade. It was for art class. The teacher makes all of her students write about a famous artist. I had no idea what to do! Then I thought: what about those Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? They had the names of artists, right? Maybe I could write about one of them.
Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, and Donatello were all artists of the Renaissance. They were all Italians. And they were also the names of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles! The Renaissance, as you scholars will immediately recall, spanned a time period from roughly the 14th to the 17th centuries. The word itself means “re-birth”. There’s actually an English word, “Renascence” that means the same thing, but no one ever uses it.
So I began to write. In fifth grade I wrote about the sculptor Donatello who really understood perspective. In sixth grade it was
Raphael, who served as the chief architect of St. Peter’s in the Vatican. This year it was Michelangelo whose sculptures of David and Moses in Chains, and whose painting of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel are among the greatest artistic works ever known. And next year I actually DO know that I will write about Leonardo da Vinci. By the time that paper is finished maybe I will know what everyone thinks is so special about the Mona Lisa!
A rat. A rat Sensei. A rat sensei who names four teenage boys who have become turtles with special skills . . . after Renaissance Artists! What could be more ridiculous? And yet, my interest in these cartoon characters eventually became the subject for some serious research. I actually became (yes, I know this is hard for some people to believe) intellectually curious about them as I did my research.
That’s a funny thing about research. Most teachers will tell you to begin researching something you already know a little about; something you’re curious about. Something you might want to learn even more about. Sometimes that works. Sometimes it doesn’t. But when it DOES work, it becomes less like work and
more like, well, I won’t say “play”, but I will say it’s a lot less like work! Looking up something on the internet or in an encyclopedia or from a library book doesn’t sound like fun, but the truth is, it can be fun if the subject is truly interesting.
A kindergarten student wonders why the sky is blue. A first grader makes a leaf project. Another young child wonders how the Lost Sea was formed.
A middle school student groans when a research paper is assigned.
At some point, it seems, the natural curiosity of most younger children goes away. It’s replaced by trying to avoid finding out about new things. I wonder why this happens. TV? Video Games? Sports? Too much homework? Mean teachers? Lazy students? Hmmmm.
Research, very simply, is a search for knowledge. Who would try to avoid that? And yet it is true that many (maybe even MOST) middle school students try to AVOID finding out about new things. OK, maybe that’s not quite accurate. Finding out a new “cheat” for a game, getting to a new level, or figuring out how to avoid “Noob Tubers” in Call of Duty might require finding out
new things. But finding out academic questions is definitely something to be avoided or even hated. This seems wrong to me. And yet, when one of these papers is assigned to me, it feels SO RIGHT!
In the news right now we are learning that the hole in the ozone layer above the arctic circle is the largest it has ever been. Dangerous levels of ultraviolet radiation are now entering our atmosphere through this hole. At the same time, people who claim to believe in a loving God are busy killing each other in the name of that God. In parts of the world there are famines that have been going on for years. Right here in southern Appalachia there are people who go to bed hungry each night due to a lack of food. The vast water supply underneath our western and Midwestern farmlands is dangerously low. Fossil fuels are becoming harder to get, and when we do get them, they pollute our air and produce greenhouse gasses. Cancer, birth defects, deadly viruses, and other horrible health issues are everywhere. There are a lot of problems in the world. How will they be solved? The answer is that somebody has to do research and come up with solutions. And who is going to do that? Well, one thing is for sure: it’s not going to be people who avoid learning new things.
As just one example, human beings have been using the power of sun since ancient times, and yet only a tiny amount of the energy consumed by the world today is solar power. Why? And why are there wars? And why are people starving when there’s enough food to feed everyone on earth?
And why is the sky blue?
Scholars . . . people in schools who look for knowledge . . . ought to love the question “why”. It should be the fuel that they need to dig down deep into the problems of our day so that tomorrow will be a better day for everyone. And if they solve the problems (either by themselves or with a team effort) they should share their knowledge with the rest of the world. They should write it down. They should write research papers.
I can’t believe I’m saying this! But you know it’s true and I know it’s true. Schools give us the tools that we need now . . . and that we’re REALLY going to need later in life.
Michelangelo said this while slicing a pizza, “Yes, friends, the new tubo ginsu. Wa-hoo! It dices, it slices, and it makes French fries!” That was the turtle. He was describing the invention of a new knife. The artist Michelangelo said in his old age: I am still learning. Both of these have something to tell us. Invention, curiosity, and research are all related. We should share what we learn..
It’s true. I do not look forward to checking out more books from the library, to typing a rough draft, to figuring out how to write a bibliography from the internet with two or more authors, or constantly checking “word count” to see if I’ve reached the magic number of 700 words for my paper. But on the other hand, I do want to make the world a better place. And if I have to learn the correct way to do research, then so be it. Besides, like I said before, maybe I’ll discover why the Mona Lisa is considered to be such a famous painting!
I thank you for your attention. Now let’s get busy. We’ve got a lot of work to do. Somebody out there in the audience needs to focus on that hole in the ozone. (1,433 words)
