Today at our MALT midpoint meeting, we had the absolute pleasure of spending the day with the good folks of Table Top Inventing. TTI is ran by Steve and Debby Kurti, who are one of the genuinely happiest couples I’ve ever met. Seriously, it’s clear to see they very much enjoy what they do and are incredibly passionate about students learning through making. Also Debby is a proud product of MALT Cadre 5, so it’s clear the bar is set high on where MALT alumni end up. We spent the day blinking LEDs, printing 3D objects, and tinkering with arduinos.
But, more importantly, we spent the day reflecting on two important questions:
- What attitudes, feelings, or beliefs are holding back your inventor?
- What is the most important action you can take to unleash your inventor?
I think in all facets of life its important to be constantly reflecting on how you ended up at the attitude that you’ve originally formed. How did it get there? Does it still hold true? Is it worth reevaluating? My answer to the first question was brief:
My attitude is a reflection of limitations in which I have imposed on myself.
And in a lot of ways, that’s what I got out of today. In fact, at one point, Brian, Larissa, and I were wondering if a certain code would work to make two LEDs blink at the same time. We chatted back and forth how it could potentially not be the answer. Steve and Debby’s son, who is in high school, walks right up to us and says so matter-of-fact like, “Well, it can’t hurt to try. You can always redo it.” Now, again, this has been the whole POINT of the day, and we’ll STILL wrestling with our own self doubt. Needless to say he was right. We had it right all along. 😀
One comment that Steve made early on was that breaking things was okay. In fact, he told us about a group of fourth grader who dang near broke everything and how proud of them he was for that. I began to reflect on the only thing I could remember ever breaking in school.
It was my freshman year of college and I was taking General Chemistry. I was a mid-to-late enrollee and ended up with a 7:30am lab on Wednesday mornings. Great, I know. We were made very aware that we had a very specific kit with all the tools we needed. If anything was to break or go missing, we would be charged for that item. One day my lab partner and I were working on something out of the lab manual, and I placed the wrong plate on top of my bunson burner. It was apparently made of a material that did not take well to the plate and ended up exploding on me. After cleaning it up, I made my way over to a little check out counter where I received a replacement for whatever I had broke. And, sure enough, sometime later on when my mom received the bursar bill, she flat out asked me what the charge labeled “BROKEN LAB ITEM” meant. Shamefully, I explained it.
I’ll be honest. I don’t remember much from my chemistry lab that semester other than it was early in the morning, we wore goggles, and I made something explode with my bunson burner. It very vividly sticks out. Looking back, I have to ask myself if I rigidly stuck to that lab manual in fear of what may have happened if I veered too far. Granted, much more can go wrong in a chemistry lab. But in reality all I ended up doing was following the exact steps the book gave me and I can’t for the life of me recall a single “experiment” that we performed.
So I leave today with a new perspective. Break things because things are just things. If anything, it will be a sure sign that you’re trying something.
Final note. I was stoked to see that, as we were going throughout the day, they were building an open resource page in which we could reference later. So if you want to learn more about our day check that out or check out TTI’s website if you wish to learn more there.