Tag: habit training

Goal Setting and Habits: Starting the New Year SMARTer

It is the start of 2024 and I return once more to the topic of habits. There is an ancient tradition associating habits with virtues. It was Aristotle, for instance, who wrote that “moral virtue comes about as a result of habit” (Nichomachean Ethics 2:1 or 1103a15-b25, trans. W. D. Ross). At the beginning of each new year it is worthwhile to take stock of the virtues we would most like to cultivate and then set out a course of action for how we plan to grow in that virtue. It takes a certain amount of creativity and advance planning

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New Year’s Resolutions, Goal Setting and Education

The idea of New Year’s resolutions elicits strong reactions from some people. “If you want to change, why wait until the New Year to start?” the cynical say. Others perhaps remember the failure of last year with some measure of shame and regret. Still others are fired up about the success and dream-fulfillment that lie ahead, given their newfound will-power and determination. According to some statistics almost half of American adults participate in New Year’s resolutions, and most relate to improving one’s health (see 19 Surprising New Year’s Resolution Statistics (2024 Updated) (insideoutmastery.com)). Unfortunately, only 9% stick with their resolutions,

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Charlotte Mason, the Educational Philosopher

In researching Charlotte Mason’s life for my forthcoming book on her with Classical Academic Press (preorder Charlotte Mason: A Liberal Education for all!), the latest in the Giants in the History of Education series (register for my live webinar with Classical Academic Press!) I was struck by Mason’s insistence on the importance of educational philosophy. This stands in contrast to many of the other “giants” in this series (Plato, Aristotle, Augustine, Milton, C.S. Lewis), who were not educational philosophers first and foremost, but philosophers and theologians simply, who also happened to address education specifically. None of these thinkers felt the

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Building Culture: The Architecture of a Successful Classroom

Previously I explored how we can create culture in our classrooms to foster growth in habits through the installation of rich values that inspire students to reach for personal excellence. Since then, I have had many opportunities to further my thinking and interact with even more perspectives to equip teachers to lead their students towards success. In this article, we will develop a framework for the classroom centered around the idea that each class is a team. This framework revolves around two general concepts: strong relationships and strategic routines. These might seem either obvious or overly general. But we shall

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Creating Culture: The Ultimate Habit Training Tool

The lily of the valley (Convallaria majalis) is such a lovely plant. By all appearances it is a delicate flowering plant. Dunbar refers to “the Lily of the Valley | With its soft, retiring ways.” in his poem “Lily of the Valley” (1913). Despite its appearance and reputation, the heartiness of the plant is one of its most striking features. All through the winter, its stalks remain green, awaiting the merest hint of Spring to begin unfurling its twin leaves. A stem reaches up in late Spring displaying a vertical row of white flowers, which will transform into tiny red

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“Education is a Life”: Igniting a Love for Learning in the Classroom

“’Education is an atmosphere, a discipline, a life’––is perhaps the most complete and adequate definition of education we possess. It is a great thing to have said it; and our wiser posterity may see in that ‘profound and exquisite remark’ the fruition of a lifetime of critical effort (Charlotte Mason, Parents and Children, p. 33). In this series, I have been exploring Charlotte Mason’s notion that education should be approached through a trifold lens of atmosphere, discipline, and life. Stemming from her view of children as persons, Mason argues that we are limited to three and only three tools to

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The Counsels of the Wise, Part 1: Foundations of Christian Prudence

We began this series with a proposal to replace Bloom’s Taxonomy of educational objectives with Aristotle’s five intellectual virtues. While Bloom and his fellow university examiners aimed to create clarity in teaching goals through a common language, their taxonomy of cognitive domain objectives may have done more harm than good. In rejecting the traditional paradigm of the liberal arts and sciences, they privileged the bare intellect and isolated acts of the mind as if they were the whole of education.  When we compare these bite-sized pieces of “analysis” and “comprehension” to the artistry of grammar and rhetoric, for instance, we

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The Pathway to Mastery: Apprenticeship in the Classroom

A new book landed on my desk around the beginning of the school year. Robert Greene’s Mastery (New York: Viking, 2012) touches on a number of points that are worthy of exploration and consideration. It reads like a mix of historical biography and self help by a writer who is a master of his craft. I first came across Robert Greene when I listened to his 48 Laws of Power (New York: Viking, 1998) as an audiobook. At that point I largely dismissed Greene as a relevant voice in my life due to how Machiavellian his self-help advice came across.

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On Deep Reading

In an age of misleading news articles, vicious discourse, and exponential ignorance, it is a curious fact that the skill of reading continues to take the backseat to other “practical” areas of study. Society, it seems, would rather have students master Microsoft Excel or how to program computers than they would become lectiophiles. Reading is discarded as an antiquated art, a skill for a bygone area, whose value is akin to a penny: sentimentalized yet basically obsolete. At the same time, no one explicitly endorses the excision of reading from the curriculum as they would the penny from U.S. currency.

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Irrigating Deserts in Schools: The Redemption of Emotion in an Age of Feeling

In a world of sensationalistic news, propaganda, and emotions running in overdrive, our students need specialized training in how to navigate life’s challenges with wisdom. Dorothy Sayers and C.S. Lewis, two favorites in the classical education renewal movement, offered different, but related, educational solutions to respond to emotive and misleading propaganda. Dorothy Sayers, known for her essay The Lost Tools of Learning (1947), advocated for a return to liberal arts education. With a special emphasis on the language arts of the Trivium, Sayers believed that the best remedy against sensationalistic news headlines was to equip the intellect with the right

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