Smashing Pumpkins

(This is a photo of my foot after me and some of my classmates spent about 5-10 minutes kicking/throwing pumpkins at each other).

On the day that we went to the pumpkin patch with our EDS 150 class, we had a lot of fun. Some might say that we had too much fun, however i feel that this is rarely the case for anyone. Upon arriving at the pumpkin patch, the lady who worked there explained that many of the pumpkins in the field were rotting and told us that it was okay if some of us wanted to bust up the pumpkins if they were rotten. I of course had never done this before so when I found myself in the field with a group of my friends i could barely control my inquiring mind when it asked the simple question, "What might happen if I kick a pumpkin very hard?" Well, as you can see, I did not let that question go unanswered.

I think that this was a great experience at the pumpkin patch and it truly taught me some things that I did not know before hand, and I also did a lot of thinking about what happened during this experience while it was happening and on my way home. The thing about inquiry is that it works best when you're doing something and when I was kicking these pumpkins it might have been ridiculous, but i really did learn a lot. I learned that if pumpkins rot they smell awful, the become soft on the outside, the seeds remain inside the pumpkin still, and that depending on how rotten a pumpkin is should definitely be a determining factor when it comes to whether or not it is a good idea to kick it. I think that through this experience I learned that when I am teaching in the future that it is very important that while having fun can be an important byproduct of an activity, it should never be the goal, and certainly there should be something to learn from it. I also think I learned that it is very helpful to learn as a community, and that when you have fun you retain the knowledge gained much easier then you would have otherwise.