What’s Pokémon Go got to do with The World Cup

 

An imagined, whimsical letter from the fictional Department of Integrated Learning

Dear Mary Anne: 

Everyone at the Integrated Learning Department wants to acknowledge your efforts throughout your lifetime to connect the dots, to draw the lines between “seemingly” unrelated things. Seemingly is the keyword; there are interrelated truths in so many things that seem quite different from each other.

Simply look at the polarization of political opinions in the United States and around the world. It is clear that these very divergent opinions are all held by people with the commonality of being human. Other commonalities include, they all had a parent at a particular time, and they likely have at least one friend they care about. Really, one of the objectives of our department is to help people realize they don’t have to look too far to see how you can learn one thing from a particular discipline or category and then see if it applies to something else. 

We are particularly enchanted by your recent effort equating Pokémon Go to all that is involved in winning the World Cup. Your comparisons are simple but we take them to heart. Good on you! Pokémon Go and the athletes who aspire to win the World Cup do indeed share many aspects, among them the commonality of participating in actions categorized as defense, attack and stamina. That alone is a demonstration that how one thing is done and understanding those structures can be applied to something else (seemingly) completely unrelated.  There is real benefit from that understanding.

Richard Bolles did great work in and helping people understand the whole idea of transferable skills and integrating learning in WHAT COLOR IS YOUR PARACHUTE. The fact that his book has been updated and re-printed every year since first published in 1972 through Ten Speed Press, is a testimony to how important integrated learning is.

We are also especially fond of Annie Dillard’s aphorism, “how we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.“ Lots of people have said some version of it including you, “How you do anything is how you do everything.” Bravo!

We hope this letter finds you well and provides you with continuing encouragement to keep celebrating that developing an understanding of one field of interest allows for a better understanding of a completely (again we will say seemingly) unrelated field of interest.

Keep on integrating your learning!

From your friends at the 

Department of Integrated Learning 

 

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