From Sensation through Perception to Reflection:
Twenty minutes passed six, Tuesday morning, December 04, 2012 – many un orchestrated noises coming to my ears - the sighs and low prayers of awakening aged fathers and mothers, the moving feet on slippers, the disturbing sounds of opening and closing windows and doors, ONs and OFFs of the light-switches, the sound of nagging deeply inspired by your style of writing, I badly desired to make this day ‘A Day to Remember’, giving you a bigger challenge of creating simplicity out of complexity. To be frank I did not hate your approach of telling us a number of coincidental stories and portraying perception with your personal experiences and encounters. So our today’s dialogue is to investigate if Sensation is truly the root for our conscious learning. And you should go-bring-bread for breakfast from the nearby shops, the usual drones of cars moving by the main street, the to do this, happily I will take the podium on the remotely ringing bells – which I wished stage and you take the audiences’ seat. they were not school bells, the clucking of hens, the bark of the distant dogs and Mr. W: A challenge! I am glad that you come up with this ‘challenge’, actually I prefer to call this all seemed to be an alarm to my ears. an opportunity, opportunity to better articulate My being deep asleep by that moment showed how much exhausted I was on municate and collaborate with the wider comthe previous day and my late sleep- munity of readers and writers. I would not hate ing hours had also contributed to this. to accompany my rivers of articles with pleasantJumping out of my bed, I immediately sounding music, illuminating moving pictures, continued a dialogue that was going on self-explanatory animations and literature of all within me since last Saturday, 1st Dec, 2012. On that Saturday, about eleven o’clock in the morning, I was seated in Sunrise Café, sipping a mix of apricot not a mere black-and-white learner; your nature of and papaya juice and reading the arti- applying your multiple modalities in learning - the cle from Rivers of Consciousness pub- visual, the auditory, the kinesthetic, the olfactory, the gustatory and of course the auditory digital, reading the article, a theatrical dialogue where things are communicated within our mind came to existence; a dialogue about the – are all undeniable, however, what I always hope Science of Sensation and whether Con- and visualize to see is the art of creating still and scious Learning is rooted in Sensation, moving pictures along with musical harmony surprisingly the characters of the play out of the context of a writing. Yet, I appreciate were the Writer (Mr. W) and the Reader (Mr. R) instantiated from me and their and an accompanying story, which is great, but coexistences. you need to wait me a day or two so as I analyze *** the extent of the possibility and the nature of the Mr. R: Your early morning stimulated mixed beauty, like the blend of apricot, papaya writing is really inspiring and you and strawberry we have been sipping. know I am here on purpose to read the *** article “Attributing Meaning to Our A little silence; Mr. R started to turn the pages of the Newspaper, while Mr. W went into a calcuLearning”, unlike the previous articles lative world. The silence was broken by a phone on Rivers of Consciousness this arti- call, and there was unnecessary debate between cle is unique in that except our name Mr. R and Mr. W, “You, answer the phone”, “No, mistyped with double K, there are no typo errors throughout the whole article your duty to read what they are saying and I will and it is well structured with streams of take care of the writing stuff if there is a necesparagraphs and connected ideas. In the sity”, the R and the W came into a single existence - and then the phone conversation, “Hello, friend tion, I delightfully enjoyed the sail of … where are you?”, although the call was from a the boats of sensations to the extent of public phone, the where and who of the caller was coming up with crazy ideas of apply- obvious from his voice; a friend, from Avenue ing Reverse Engineering Techniques Street, near the Ministry of Education. I replied, to our childhood I imagined a little boy without a drop of percept but who have accumulated few senses. Removing one layer of sense at a time, washing away all the perceptions and experiences, I isted and was triggered with questions like what could be that sense and when was the time it happened? The walk through the streams of words in the conscious paragraphs you developed enabled me to understand the meaning of perception from a basic point of view to

Teklehaimanot Yemane

A Path for Continuous and Conscious Learning

An Internal Dialogue-Universal Reflection PART I: Characters - The writer (W) , Reader (R), Artist (A), Narrator (N) … and Others
Imagine Rivers of Consciousness as a large imaginary circular table, where educators, professionals ity of storytelling and narration, but before that Mr. W will give us a short brief introduction. Mr. R, I should not forget to thank you for reminding us before a second passed from our event stating time, and seated in the audiences’ seat, you will be engaged in critical reading, reading beyond the words and images and attributing meaning to our context, remember this is in return to the challenge which you created on Saturday and happened to be an opportunity for our creativity. If you feel you have a similar context from what tion has to be a deeply thought piece. Mr. A, our most important appreciation and thankfulness goes to you for creating the amazing your masterpiece and honourably be seated. Questions, comments, suggestions and add-ons are always welcome as usual, but not with negative intentions, please throw such things beyond the fence in

and their visions of competency all directed toward the well-being of the society and national prosperity. It won’t be too far!...’ a sensible talk from inside, I was not sure who said that. When the friend quickly swallowed two cakes along with a cup of tea - I think he hadn’t had his breakfast, we together left for the sake of the business of the day, Saturday. *** Customarily, Sunday is not supposed to be a busy day for me, but this Sunday, the 2nd December, of 2012 was a truly activity-packed day, from nine in the morning to four in the afternoon, except an hour and half or lesser of the lunch time, which I didn’t even attended it with my heart; the Mr. W and Mr. R of me have been extensively working individually, although unnoticeable to my senses, Mr. W with his assignment of creating a poster illustration and an accompanying story and Mr. R with his reading stuffs like Wireless, Wired, Isolated, Networked, Uncontrolled and Secured and more… of that kind. About four o’clock in the afternoon Mr. W awakreading things yet? You see, in collaboration with my illustrative poster in two versions, one with clear transparent background and the other with a ure are all the same, also I have prepared a draft of the story”. And continued; “now I suggest lets go home, have a bath and take a little rest in calmness and during that time we will narrate the story bein me (Mr. N) to assist me in the storytelling, but don’t blame me he will not appear until then.” Mr. R was not happy, he has always thought of becoma narrator appear? Any way they all Mr. W, R, A and N shrank into one, making me and went for the Sunday bath. *** After the bath, the condition was very cold to the warming or a little nap under the blanket, but I didn’t like that, so I quickly went out to the nearby road, to catch the rays of the sunset. The sun looks like a ball due making a goal behind the distant mountains, banana-shoot-kicked by an experienced and Stadium, where the players play in the skies and the football funs watch form the planets, shouting like no before. The rays of the vanishing sun strike

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Triggered

friend said, “I am around and coming soon”, in no time he appeared from the front door of the café, objects, on living things, on the road. As I was there table in front of me, he said “haven’t you read your article yet, I have read it before two hours and this sun bath of that day a lasting memory. There was a time it is nice and simply, artistic I like it”. I have murmur from inside, the eager Mr. R burst out and said, “What about The poster, the illustration and and for this friend it is his fourth time. Emotional- the story, I think you were supposed to tell us by ly I said, ” I want this to be a more deeper review, now Mr. W?” knowing that there could be a conyou do that in black and white or post it on face- triggered a Manager in me (Mr. M) in advance, and book”; and continued “This is only an easy say- gave him full responsibility to manage the theater and the characters to play. Comforting his suit and is another thing in which we are striving for”. ‘… adjusting his tie to its knot, Mr. M mounted himself to the stage. Mr. M: You are right Mr. R; we are on the way to start the narration soon, I have been lost in the beauty of the sunset, the rays, the mountains, the the skyline. These are the true revelations from the beauty of nature. This is not all a mere presence of things, situations or coincidences, beyond the sensation of sun bathing, we should see the role play of these things in beautifying this short moment and we should yearn for that. I want you all to perform by keeping this masterpiece in mind. This Mr. W and A have been working with their artistic creature - The poster and the illustration, and we have invited Mr. N to perform his aesthetic capabil-

Ages after ages I accumulated knowledge to get the higher stages My legs too busy and my eyes crafty hunters Only to find myself in lakes of forgetting and fatigues Worse yet made me resemble the dumb computers In which they can count only up to one My beauty was in giving more sense to daily chitchats And emotions never made me better But my human discernment remained unanswered Searching day and night to what its real realization is Then only I understood That life is reached not by accumulating As the sea took all the water of the rivers for millions of years And its saltiness never changed nor its headlands filled But by giving! When giving you begin to see who you are The past and future are painted in clarity Being human is tasted its unique identity The days of gratefulness arise And you feel the dimensions of perfection beginning to sprout.

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Nolawi Abrham from Asmara

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“When we tell stories and process them, using reflective dialogue, we create the possibility for changes in ourselves and others. Our capacity to express ourselves through narrative forms not only enables us to reshape, reassess and reconstruct particular events, it allows us to learn from discussing our experiences with individuals who may raise alternative views, suggest imaginative possibilities and ask stimulating questions…..Through dialogue shaped to explore experiences in depth multiple perspectives can emerge.” Angela Tomkins, LEARNING AND TEACHING GUIDES

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