The Researcher's Guide to Eye Yoga

According to Csikszentmihalyi (1997:30, quoted in the lecture notes for Leeds University MA TESOL Oman- we must be accurate now ;) ), the relationship between the level of challenge and the level of skill in learners will determine their response. If the challenge is high but the skill is low, for example, the result will be anxiety, while low challenge and moderate skill will lead to boredom. Does any of this sound familiar? The good news is that when both challenge and skill are high, the result is ‘flow’, which is when “time flies while you’re having fun”. Not sure my skill level is all that high, but I find hours slipping away while I am reading and taking notes. While the flow is great, this is not good for eyesight, and I am suddenly realizing how many of the academics I know wear glasses… coincidence? Perhaps not. (Incidentally, I’ve always been drawn to the option of wearing glasses, but certainly not to the obligation!)

During my recent stay at Sivananda Yoga Ashram in Thiruvananthapuram, in India’s gorgeous Kerala province, we were taught a series of “eye yoga” exercises handed down from the ancient yogis. It is interesting to note that these self-same exercises show up in modern optometrists’ offices. The exercises are especially recommended between sessions of reading or computer work, where the eyes are focused at short range on a small area. What makes the exercises effective is that they re-engage the muscles involved in peripheral and long distance vision. And if you have been wondering why this is at all relevant to researchers, this last matter is key: peripheral and long-distance vision.

Because I have been reading recommended books at a pace, (students are allowed the loan of one book for one week by Majan’s library- and that’s generous considering the general book shortage), I have become quite deeply ensconced in the world of each book of the moment. Since our course covers such a vast spectrum of information (from the development of language teaching approaches to the most recent bones of contention in TESOL), each book zooms in on a tiny area. That wonderful saying about not seeing the forest for the trees puts it so well. Just like my eyes need a break from the reading to re-engage my peripheral and long-distance vision, so does my mind. After finishing Doing Teacher Research (Freeman, 1998) this evening, I stepped back to look over the big fat file for this module and regained valuable perspective. Eye yoga for the researcher’s vision is as important as the researcher’s sight- even more so.

Course preparation is going swimmingly, and I’ve decided to write out my lesson plans, since the Language Through Arts course has never been taught before. The existing materials are minimal and it will be very important to show students that the course is substantial and to be taken seriously, even though they are bound to be more interested in the fun part- and graduating at the end of semester. In my Debating and Communication course, it was such a delight to fall back on the lesson plans I had created before the semester even started, and the second time I taught the course, to have the annotated lesson plans for even more insight. Yes, the seasoned teachers snicker, but once the semester starts to roll I won’t regret this little bit of forward planning. All six of the classes (three groups with two sessions of two hours each) are in the same room, and I’m hoping my colleagues will agree to grouping the desks rather than keeping them in rows. If not, we may be doing a lot of furniture moving. The prospect of having storage space (the class is a converted dorm room with six built-in cupboards!) and letting our projects line the walls of our very own classroom studio is thrilling. I have very high hopes for this course, despite the knowledge that smaller hopes than these have been dashed before. No illusions there, but I won’t let that bring me down.