Thursday, February 1, 2007 at 2:02am
Education of the soul
Column: Our Place in the Universe
This past weekend I was part of a continuing education seminar on contemporary issues. The thing that struck me the most about this group of older professionals who were choosing to continue their education was their hunger for the spiritual, their thirst for communication.
I told them the story of the five blind men who were examining an elephant. One, standing by the head, held the trunk and thought it was a snake. The man by the tail thought he held a rope. Touching one of the legs, one blind man thought it was stout and heavy like a tree. The man in the middle felt a tough, leathery wall, while another felt sure he stood in front of a large fan.
All of them were right in some way; yet all of them were completely wrong. The only way to see the whole picture was to get together and discuss it. One student added another dimension. He asked: What if someone came into the room and overheard this discussion, had not seen the elephant, and therefore had no idea what the men were discussing. There is a possibility his "new eyes" would add a viewpoint utterly unrelated, and yet somehow still connected.
Is this similar to how we are looking at "no child left behind"? Can this feeling be akin to the child with a learning disability, or a foreign student totally displaced and therefore overlooked or underappreciated for the contribution or value he or she adds to the classroom or discussion group? Are we even offering our teachers a chance to begin this discussion?
I began my part of the class with the quote I used last week by Thomas Moore: "Education of the soul leads to the enchantment of the world and the attunement of self." Is that part of our teaching method? A sharing of self, and an uncovering of self, is the most basic form of knowledge. Can we take the chance to teach based on the fundamental adage "Know thyself"?
Thomas Moore goes on to say: "Education is an 'eduction,' a drawing out of one's own genius, nature and heart. The manifestation of one's essence, the unfolding of one's capacities, the revelation of one's heretofore hidden possibilities — these are the goals of study from the point of view of the person. From another side, study amplifies the speech and song of the world so that it's more palpably present."
Here we have no discussion of credentials or scientific evidence of what works in education. Teaching, as learning, does not take place in an isolated manner, but through interdependent relationships. To teach is to try to define a space where truth happens. To teach is to acknowledge a reality that we are a part of, not apart from, this truth. As who we are interacts with the knowledge that we would impart, it is enhanced or diminished by our own self-knowledge.
Anthropologist Margaret Mead says that every culture has a creation story, a belonging story, a story of the origin and nature of the world and their role in it. These accounts are the initial teachings of a people, often defining good and evil, fears and fulfillments. Using intuition, music, poetry and myth, our ancestors are rooted in an interconnected story that has unfolded from the time of the first stars and is continuing into the future. It is a story of our belonging and also of our legacy.
Yet what has moved humankind out of the caveman era into the space age? It has not been cold, hard facts, but revelatory experiences, leaps of intuition and of faith, which have led to the world's great discoveries of awareness. I am reminded of Albert Einstein's quote: "The intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift."
One of the books this class is reading is Parker Palmer's "The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner Landscape of a Teacher's Life." In it I found the same imagery I have discovered in my earth literacy studies: We will find our true creativity when we have gotten in touch with the creative energy of the web of life. Palmer says good teachers "are able to weave a complex web of connections among themselves, their subjects, and their students. ... The connection made [is] not in their methods but in their hearts."
— — —
Anne E. Ulvestad is a free-lance writer residing in Maryland. She has her masters in earth literacy, and is available for public lectures and group presentations and rituals on Spirituality and the Environment. Anne can be reached at {email anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com}anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com{/email}. © copyright 2007 by Anne E. Ulvestad
I told them the story of the five blind men who were examining an elephant. One, standing by the head, held the trunk and thought it was a snake. The man by the tail thought he held a rope. Touching one of the legs, one blind man thought it was stout and heavy like a tree. The man in the middle felt a tough, leathery wall, while another felt sure he stood in front of a large fan.
All of them were right in some way; yet all of them were completely wrong. The only way to see the whole picture was to get together and discuss it. One student added another dimension. He asked: What if someone came into the room and overheard this discussion, had not seen the elephant, and therefore had no idea what the men were discussing. There is a possibility his "new eyes" would add a viewpoint utterly unrelated, and yet somehow still connected.
Is this similar to how we are looking at "no child left behind"? Can this feeling be akin to the child with a learning disability, or a foreign student totally displaced and therefore overlooked or underappreciated for the contribution or value he or she adds to the classroom or discussion group? Are we even offering our teachers a chance to begin this discussion?
I began my part of the class with the quote I used last week by Thomas Moore: "Education of the soul leads to the enchantment of the world and the attunement of self." Is that part of our teaching method? A sharing of self, and an uncovering of self, is the most basic form of knowledge. Can we take the chance to teach based on the fundamental adage "Know thyself"?
Thomas Moore goes on to say: "Education is an 'eduction,' a drawing out of one's own genius, nature and heart. The manifestation of one's essence, the unfolding of one's capacities, the revelation of one's heretofore hidden possibilities — these are the goals of study from the point of view of the person. From another side, study amplifies the speech and song of the world so that it's more palpably present."
Here we have no discussion of credentials or scientific evidence of what works in education. Teaching, as learning, does not take place in an isolated manner, but through interdependent relationships. To teach is to try to define a space where truth happens. To teach is to acknowledge a reality that we are a part of, not apart from, this truth. As who we are interacts with the knowledge that we would impart, it is enhanced or diminished by our own self-knowledge.
Anthropologist Margaret Mead says that every culture has a creation story, a belonging story, a story of the origin and nature of the world and their role in it. These accounts are the initial teachings of a people, often defining good and evil, fears and fulfillments. Using intuition, music, poetry and myth, our ancestors are rooted in an interconnected story that has unfolded from the time of the first stars and is continuing into the future. It is a story of our belonging and also of our legacy.
Yet what has moved humankind out of the caveman era into the space age? It has not been cold, hard facts, but revelatory experiences, leaps of intuition and of faith, which have led to the world's great discoveries of awareness. I am reminded of Albert Einstein's quote: "The intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift."
One of the books this class is reading is Parker Palmer's "The Courage to Teach: Exploring the Inner Landscape of a Teacher's Life." In it I found the same imagery I have discovered in my earth literacy studies: We will find our true creativity when we have gotten in touch with the creative energy of the web of life. Palmer says good teachers "are able to weave a complex web of connections among themselves, their subjects, and their students. ... The connection made [is] not in their methods but in their hearts."
— — —
Anne E. Ulvestad is a free-lance writer residing in Maryland. She has her masters in earth literacy, and is available for public lectures and group presentations and rituals on Spirituality and the Environment. Anne can be reached at {email anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com}anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com{/email}. © copyright 2007 by Anne E. Ulvestad