Students learning--color in a gray world

Color in a gray world--5 /1/2 by 8 1/2 watercolor, 140 # d'Arches paper

"It's the first time the student has smiled this semester."
So said a colleague after I was a guest speaker in a class today.

• Other students asked several questions.
• Still another blurted out answers.
• I could see eyes light up.
• There were some laughs, some smiles.
• Genuine interest.
• Wanting to know more.
• Spontaneous conversation.
• Thinking.
• Excitement.
• Curiosity.

It's what teachers long for, trying to generate interest and participation from students who have been mind-numbed by mass factory rote learning and testing overloads that make learning boring and irrelevant. 
I know from conversations with friends and other colleagues, that these reactions, the students, are what keep us going, give us hope in the mind-numbing cookie-cutter administrative world of higher education.
I saw some of these reactions today, and some on good days when I do my job well in my classes. My colleague's comment told me what was inside today....Thus the watercolor.
Here is what I see when students are learning--color in a gray world.