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Randy learns the head fake—a situation in which someone believes that they are learning about one thing, but are really learning about something different—from his old-school youth football coach, Coach Graham. Randy believes that youth sports, in general, are an example of the head fake, as most parents don’t care so much whether their kid learns about the intricacies of the sport. Instead, they want their kids to learn about “teamwork, perseverance, sportsmanship, the value of hard work, [and] an ability to deal with adversity.” Similarly, Randy’s software project Alice is designed to teach kids how to create video games and make stop-motion animated movies. But, really, it teaches them the fundamentals of how to program computers without the kids even realizing it. Finally, Randy’s last lecture is, in itself, an example of a head fake—the title says it’s about how to achieve your dreams, but it’s really “about how to lead your life.” In Randy’s view, one of the best ways to learn something important is to believe you’re really learning about something else.
The Head Fake Quotes in The Last Lecture
The The Last Lecture quotes below all refer to the symbol of The Head Fake. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Introduction Quotes
Under the ruse of giving an academic lecture, I was trying to put myself in a bottle that would one day wash up on the beach for my children.
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This quote occurs in the first passage that Randy writes in the book, right after Jai’s foreword. It tips readers off to the fundamental head fake that underscores the entire narrative of The Last Lecture—that, though Randy’s lecture is supposedly about achieving your dreams (and thus how to lead your life), the deeper purpose of his book is to leave a piece of himself—of his beliefs, ideas, and personality—behind for his young children to remember him by. The notion of teaching one thing (like how to achieve your dreams) in order to actually teach another thing (like telling his children Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam o
Chapter 7 Quotes
…even though I did not reach the National Football League, I sometimes think I got more from pursuing that dream, and not accomplishing it, than I did from many of the ones I did accomplish.
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How you perceive failure is all about attitude: you can view it as a negative or as a positive learning experience, and the latter is how Randy chooses to view the fact that he did not make the NFL. This quote occurs after Randy discusses his deep love of tackle football, which began during his formative experiences playing peewee football under the tutelage of Coach Jim Graham, an old-school strict disciplinarian who believed in hard work and learning the fundamentals. Randy isn’t a good enough football player to play professionally, but his experiences on the football team taught him valuable Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis. Voluptatem accusantium est. Molliti
The second kind of head fake is the really important one—the one that teaches people things they don’t realize they’re learning until well into the process. If you’re a head-fake specialist, your hidden objective is to get them to learn something you want them to learn.
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This quote occurs at the end of Randy’s chapter about football being a formative experience for him, as Coach Graham gave Randy a “feedback loop for life.” Up until the day Randy wrote The Last Lecture (and presumably until his death), Coach Graham would continually pop into Randy’s head to ask the question: Are you working hard enough? And then Randy would re-evaluate his strategies and time management, and often work harder. However, the most important thing Coach Graham taught Randy is “the second kind of head fake” (as opposed to the first kind, which is literal misdirection, like when Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui
Chapter 27 Quotes
…if it is presented as a storytelling activity, girls become perfectly willing to learn how to write software. In fact, they love it… Everybody loves telling stories. It’s one of the truly universal things about our species. So in my mind, Caitlin wins the All-Time Best Head-Fake Award.
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This quote occurs after Randy tells of his creation of the Alice software project, which is software designed to get people of all ages (but especially kids) to make animated videos as well as video games, while at the same time teaching them real computer programming skills. One of Randy’s students, Caitlin Kelleher, sees that the program doesn’t seem to be as effective or enjoyable for girls as it is for boys, so she sets out to remedy that problem. Her solution isn’t to change the software much, but instead to frame it in a different way. Rather than ‘programming Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperiores. Ut aliquam officiis. Unde enim nesciunt. Commodi necessitatibus voluptas. Accusamus eaque omnis. Velit eaque error. Possimus corrupti soluta. Qui aut a. Rerum voluptas debitis.
Chapter 61 Quotes
“It’s not about how to achieve your dreams. It’s about how to lead your life. If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself. The dreams will come to you.”
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This quote occurs on the very last page of the book, where Randy explains that he ended his last lecture by revealing the fundamental head fake that underscores the lecture. This quote explains how Randy’s last lecture, and the book The Last Lecture itself, are examples of the “head fake” because, although the lecture purported to be about achieving childhood dreams, it is really about how Randy believes people should live their lives. So, Randy believes, if people lead their lives in the proper way, always keeping their childhood dreams in mind, then the dreams will come to them. In Dolorem et quae. Exercitationem non aut. Eveniet dolor non. Incidunt dolores sunt. Ad dolor at. Quia aperiam eligendi. Ut veniam voluptatem. Aperiam consequuntur mollitia. Provident expedita delectus. Occaecati ea suscipit. Optio ut iste. Voluptas aut occaecati. Accusantium recusandae voluptates. Explicabo minus tempore. Nostrum dolor asperi
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"My students can't get enough of your charts and their results have gone through the roof." -Graham S.
The Head Fake Symbol Timeline in The Last Lecture
The timeline below shows where the symbol The Head Fake appears in The Last Lecture. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 7: I Never Made It to the NFL
...to deal with adversity.” This kind of indirect learning is what Randy calls a “ head fake ”. Randy says that there are two kinds of head fakes—literal ones, like when a...
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Chapter 27: The Promised Land
...it to chase their dreams. He sees Alice as a prime example of the “ head fake ,” because students think they’re using Alice to make movies or create video games, but...
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...to write software—everybody loves telling stories, and, in Randy’s mind, Caitlin wins the “All-Time Best Head-Fake Award.”
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Chapter 61: The Dreams Will Come to You
...told the audience that the talk was about achieving childhood dreams, but there was a head fake —the talk isn’t “about how to achieve your dreams. It’s about how to lead your...
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Lastly, Randy goes to a slide that reads, “Have you figured out the second head fake ?” Randy then tells them—“The talk wasn’t just for this in the room.” It was...
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