What did Lindsay Weir really learn?

A few weeks ago I was watching this high school comedy-drama Freaks and Geeks on DVD, which was recommended to me on Netflix. I became entranced with the show and the cast of characters and was sad as I started to watch the finale because I didn’t want it to end.

For those who have never had the pleasure of watching, Freaks and Geeks centers around a teenage girl, Lindsay Weir, and her family, friends and school in a Detroit suburb during the early 1980’s. The students of her school, McKinley High, like in most other schools, must bear the burden of being labeled. Although there were many different subcultures in the school, the show revolved around the academically unmotivated, adventure-seeking and fun-loving “freaks” and the intelligent, nonsexual, rule-abiding but socially awkward “geeks.” Lindsay did not fit into either crowd, but tried to mold herself into a freak because she was drawn to their love of adventure and new experiences, and disregard for academic pressure. But she also was a Mathlete champion and discontentedly drops out of the club so she doesn’t portray herself as a “geek.”

In the final episode, Lindsay embraces her “inner geek” after her “freak” friends get her into trouble with her parents by encouraging her to break the law. She re-joins the Mathletes and wins her way to the top and is given the opportunity to attend a prestigious summer program at the University of Michigan that only a handful of the brightest students in the state get to attend. Her parents, teachers and guidance counselor are all very happy for Lindsay because they always saw her as a star student, and not one of the freaks. But Lindsay is not sure she wants to go to this program and is overwhelmed by the looming expectations and academic pressures. Her hippie-like guidance counselor gives her his copy of the Grateful Dead’s American Beauty and tells her to “think about it.” That same day, two “Dead heads” see her carrying the record and comment that “it will change her life” after she listens to it. When she goes home and listens to the record, she looks entranced and “freed” as she dances around her room. The next day she tells her folks that she will go to the academic summit. The show (and the season) end with Lindsay on the bus with the Grateful Dead playing in the background as her family waves goodbye. I was sad that Lindsay was forced to choose between her friends and being academically successful, but when she gets off the bus one of her “freak” friends is there to give her hugs and smiles and together they hop on a van with the two Dead heads and go to spend two weeks following around the band while her parents think she is at the academic summit.

As soon as the episode ended, I knew that I wanted to write a journal entry about Lindsay’s learning experience. But then the tougher question emerged, “What did she actually learn?” It is hard to put into words, but I know that she learned something, because I have been in Lindsay’s shoes before, and I remember feeling like I learned something.

I looked through my notes and saw many aspects that rang true in Anna Sfard’s Participation Metaphor for Learning. According to Sfard, a person learns by being part of a team or community and acts according to its norms. In the participation metaphor, you can’t look on as an outsider and learn about a group, like Lindsay you have to learn about a culture by becoming a part of it. The “teacher” in the participation metaphor is the expert participant who preserves the practice. In this particular case the teacher is probably the two Dead heads, the guidance counselor and maybe Jerry Garcia. Lindsay’s job as student now is to participate and try to “belong.” Looking at McKinley High now through Cognitivist glasses, I see students everywhere who are trying to make sense of their environment and molding themselves to fit into it. You see Lindsay strip off her pastel-colored cardigan and slip into an oversized army jacket before heading off to the concert.

The guidance counselor did a very cognitivist thing by lending his copy of American Beauty to Lindsay. He gave her the space and environment to listen to the album and reflect and explore until she came up with an answer on her own. This observation contributes to my view of learning because what better way to think deeply and reflect on something than by listening to music? I remember before introducing us to the next book we were to read in class, Ethan Frome, my English teacher made us listen to “Elenor Rigby” by the Beatles. At the time I didn’t see the point. You read many books in high school and college and can easily forget them. But now I listen to the lyrics “I look at all the lonely people, where do they all come from?” and think of my English teacher and how she was getting us to understand what loneliness meant. I grew up in a very loving family and always had tons of friends so I can say that I never experienced deep loneliness, but that song helped me experience it in another way.