Blog Post #6

Randy Pausch
"Achieving your Childhood Dreams."

In Randy Pausch Last Lecture, he spoke about his childhood dreams and all of the things that he’s accomplished. This was his last lecture because he was only given 6 months to live due to tumors in his liver. This Video was filmed at Carnegie- Mellon, where he actually received his PhD. When the title of this lecture was created ironically he was not ill and after he become ill he said how ironic. The title,” The Last Lecture” was intended to be motivational. If you were going to die and had one last lecture to give, what would you say? I think it was very neat how he took that and ran with it, he made his last lecture the most motivating, funny, and spirited of all of his lectures. Randy Pausch was once told, "You're such a good salesman. You should be selling something worthwhile, like education." That is precisely what he did. He touched on the subjects that matter and focused on, “Achieving your childhood dreams.”

Wow, I mean if we thought like that as teachers more everyday it might really help us be more active with our students and hands on. I can count on one hand how many teachers that I had as a child who pushed me and made it known that they cared about me, as their student. The educators who pushed me towards my dreams and believed in me are the ones that I still remember today. Those are the teachers whose voices and encouragement stick with you throughout your entire life. That is what teaching and learning is all about and what a world we could have if ALL teachers were that powerful and encouraged students’ childhood dreams! One thing that he said that really hit me hard was,“When you screw up and no one says anything to you about it, then they've stopped caring.” This was one of my favorite quotes in the entire lecture. This is true. I am a teacher, and I sadly have done this with a difficult child. Never permanently but in the moment in one awful day, I know I have thrown my hands up and said today, I give up. I am going to remember this quote throughout my entire teaching career. And I will never make that mistake again.

Randy Pausch's childhood dreams were: Being in zero gravity, playing in the NFL, authoring an article in the World Book Encyclopedia, being Captain Kirk, winning stuffed animals at the fair, and being a Disney Imagineer. He was able to experience zero gravity with a student group, but he had to pretend to be a journalist. He said, “Do you know how easy it is to get a Press Badge?” He never played in the NFL, but he did play football and learned several valuable lessons from it. He did write for the World Encyclopedia, he became like Captain Kirk (He REALLY liked Star Trek , and referenced “Captain Kirk A LOT)by being a leader in a virtual reality project, and he manage to win A LOT of bears. Pausch says that, “Brick walls are there for a reason; they let us prove how badly we want things. They’re there to stop the people who don’t want it badly enough.”By “brick walls” he means obstacles that everyone will run into at some point. If you can get through it, then it proves how badly you want what’s on the other side. He worked on a virtual reality program at Disney. It was a virtual Aladdin flying carpet ride. They asked him to become a permanent “imagineer”, but he said no and became an imangineer consultant. He asked the question “how can I enable the childhood dreams of others?” My absolute favorite thing Pausch said was,

“To always keep the child-like wonder.”

Mr. Pausch really inspires me to have fun every single day of your life, in everything you do, and do to it with your whole heart. He is a prime example of life being too short and fragile to ever waste a minute of it not doing what you love, and being the best you can be. To me, that motivates me to be the best teacher I can be every single day, because you never know what kids have going on at home, but you want to all you can for them at school. Shape their futures, promote their dreams and believe in them, even if no one else does. Sometimes, that is all any of us need if just one person to believe in us, and what we DREAM to be.

“ Be a Tigger, not an Eeyore. Tell the truth. Be earnest. Apologize when wrong. Focus on others, not yourself. Help others.”

This reminds me of a country song called, “ Love Like Crazy.”

In this video Pausch discusses the highlights of his life and he tells you what he took from his experiences. then he tells you what you can expect to get from your own life. This lecture teaches you how to help someone else achieve their dreams, without letting you sell yourself short of achieving your own dreams at the same time.Paunch also talked about his time at Carnegie-Mellon. He mentioned that in his graduate class he did not use a single textbook. It was solely a project based course. He was so surprised by his students work he thought they all did a fabulous job. However he still told them all,"That was pretty good, but I know you all can do better." He was a great teacher he pushed his students because he believed in them. he pushed all of them and they surprised him and rose to the challenge, and became amazing.



Pausch had four main points to live by:
1.) Be good at something, find out what it is , and go after it because it makes you valuable.
2.) Work hard at everything you do, impress people, impress yourself, give your all, do your best.
3.) Find the best in everyone you meet no matter how long it may take to find, and show people the best in you, be awesome.
4.) Be prepared because luck is where preparation meets opportunity.

If you live your best life, and follow your dreams, respect others , and learn all you can, SOMETIMES your dreams follow you. Be a good person, AND a great educator. LIVE your dreams and inspire others to do the same. I was really dreading this “ Last- Lecture Video,” simply because it was an hour long but I must say it was one of the most spirit- filled and inspiring videos I have ever had the pleasure of viewing.