Call of Stories: Teaching and the Moral Imagination, The

Journal of Engineering Education, Oct 1998

Robert Coles' book The Call of Stories: Teaching and the Moral Imagination has had a deep and abiding effect on me. It tells the story of how his career as a doctor, writer, and teacher began in a course in American literature where he was introduced to the stories and poems of William Carlos Williams. Coles developed a close relationship with Williams where Williams taught him to always listen to the patient, not only listen to his story but confide to him one's own story. He learned that only through stories could he fully enter another's life. He writes:

aDr. Williams was constantly urging me not to allow natural egotism to obstruct a larger view of what it is that any profession offers in the way of moral possibilities and hazards. So often, he pointedly reminded me, students soon to become doctors, lawyers, architects, businessmen, teachers, or engineers are understandably preoccupied with their performing selves, with matters of technique, of knowledge - even though, he insisted, `it is your response to the ethical questions that will make you what you are'. . .that the ultimate test of a person's worth as a doctor or teacher or lawyer has to do not only with what he or she knows, but with how he or she behaves with another person, the patient or student or client." (pp. 118-119)

In the chapter on Stories and Theories, he reveals his revelation that the critical root in the word "theory" is "I behold." He suggests a visual metaphor as when we go to the theater. "We hold something visual in our minds; presumably, the theory is an enlargement of observation." "All too commonly, however, some of us use theory more as a badge of membership than as a visual stimulus." His teacher, Dr. Ludwig, kept insisting that what ought to be interesting is the unfolding of a lived life rather than the confirmation such a chronicle provides for some theory.

Dr. Ludwig urged him to let each patient be a teacher:

"Hearing themselves teach you, through their narration, the patients will learn the lesson a good instructor learns only when he becomes a willing student, eager to be taught." (p. 22)

Parker Palmer, as well as many others, stresses the importance of creating connections with students and with great subjects (the academic material). In an earlier column I mentioned E. M. Forester's famous line from Howard's End, "Only Connect. . .!" In order to connect, however, we must first listen to the student so we have something to connect with. Robert Coles' stories and insights in The Call of Stories can help us learn how to listen. As William Carlos Williams taught Coles:

"Their story, yours, mine - it's what we all carry with us on this trip we take, and we owe it to each other to respect our stories and learn from them." (p. 30)