Tag: philosophy

The Habit of Reading: Five Book Recommendations for 2023

It’s January of a new year! And so you are probably inundated with a number of calls to implement new habits, to try new practices, and to start new programs. Hopefully this list of recommended reading for 2023 cuts through the noise and provides you with at least one great read for the upcoming year. C.S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man I begin with a book that rivals in many ways the essay by Dorothy Sayers that got our educational renewal movement started. In fact, C. S. Lewis delivered these lectures (the Riddell Memorial Lectures were a series given over

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The Counsels of the Wise, Part 2: Why Reviving Moral Philosophy Is Not Enough

In The Liberal Arts Tradition: A Philosophy of Christian Classical Education (Version 2.0, Revised Edition), Kevin Clark and Ravi Jain argue for a recovery of the tradition of moral philosophy against the reductionism of the modern social sciences. Their account of the intellectual history that led to the replacement of this classical and Christian paradigm for wisdom in ethics and the humanities, broadly considered, faithfully unpacks the faulty assumptions of this shaky modern and postmodern problem. In this series on replacing Bloom’s taxonomy with Aristotle’s Intellectual Virtues, we have already had occasion to bring the razor edge of their intellectual

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So, You Think You Want to be a Principal…

School Principal Job Description Unclogging toilets and mopping up sewage in the restrooms of your new facility Setting up hundreds of chairs for an event on your own because you know you can’t ask any more of your teachers or volunteers Subbing for Calculus one day and Kindergarten the next, outside of your comfort zone and with unclear lesson plans Kindly mediating an hour and a half long meeting with a teacher and an unhappy set of parents who will likely leave the school Trying to keep track of complicated budgets for various areas of the school, when you’ve got

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Apprenticeship in the Arts, Part 6: The Transcendence and Limitations of Artistry

In this series on apprenticeship in the arts we have laid out a vision for the role of the arts in a fully orbed classical Christian education. We began by situating artistry or craftsmanship within a neo-Aristotelian and distinctly Christian purpose of education: namely, the cultivation of moral, intellectual, and spiritual virtues. Then we explored the analogy between artistry and morality through the basis in habit development, including in our purview the revolution in neurobiology regarding the importance of myelin. We saw that some types of elite performance have more established pathways to excellence, allowing for deliberate practice, while moral

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Embrace the Cross: An Easter Vigil Homily

The beautiful and the grotesque, when considered together are the essence not only of our human existence, but of all created reality. In some ways, aesthetics is in the eye of the beholder. What one considers beautiful differs from what another would hold up as an example of beauty. We share with each other both the beautiful and the grotesque. “Come here and see the beautiful sunset,” one might say to a spouse. “Smell this, has it gone bad?” is yet another phrase shared between husband and wife. The Beautiful and the Grotesque How do we value beauty? What does

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Christianity, a Superior Philosophy: Book Review of Jonathan T. Pennington’s Jesus the Great Philosopher, Part 2

In the previous article in this two-part review of Jonathan Pennington’s book Jesus the Great Philosopher, I spelled out the first two sections of his book dealing with the ancient philosophers (chapters 1 and 2) and then the Old and New Testaments (chapters 3 and 4). Here I will dive into the final three sections on emotions, relationships and the flourishing life. In each of these sections, Pennington provides insights that help us understand better the nature of our roles as teachers to educate formationally the students given into our care. The thesis that emerges through my review is a

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Bloch Sermon on the Mount

A Synthesis of Ancient and Biblical Wisdom: Book Review of Jonathan T. Pennington’s Jesus the Great Philosopher, Part 1

If you attended the Society for Classical Learning conference this past summer in Charleston, South Carolina, you may have attended the plenary session with Jonathan T. Pennington. He presented on “Jesus the Classical Educator.” The presentation was drawn from his new book Jesus the Great Philosopher. I think this is a really important book that classical educators need to read and grapple with. In this and the following post I will review the book and lay out several of the ideas that we well worth your attention. But first, a disclaimer. I am not an unbiased reader. Jonathan is a

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What Bloom’s Left Out: A Comparison with Aristotle’s Intellectual Virtues

In the last three articles in this series, I laid out the good, the bad and the ugly of Bloom’s Taxonomy. After the last two posts it is perhaps worth reaffirming the value of Bloom’s project. While I ultimately believe that Bloom and his colleagues may have done more harm than good, I do affirm the importance of clear objectives in education. The clarity and focus of their project, which raised the issue of teaching objectives in a unique way in the history of education, leaves a real and positive inheritance to the discipline. Moreover, I am convinced that where

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old iron levers

The Problem of Technicism in Conventional Education

Technicism is not simply an over-fascination with technology as a means of stimulating learning out of students, though that problem plagues conventional education as well. Instead, I use the term ‘technicism’ to refer to a broader ideological approach to education that has become captivated by quantitative measurements and the economic evaluation of success. In technicism education has been reduced to something that can be measured in numbers alone. Teachers are made into technicians, who simply pull the levers and push the buttons assigned to them by the ruling technocrats. Technicism focuses on quantities and techniques, rather than quality and values.

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Education is Life: A Philosophy on Education

The study of education is the study of life. At least that’s the way it should be. Too often educational thought seeks precision in the use of the techniques and technology brought into the classroom. Have one’s lesson plans fully articulated all of the learning objectives spelled out in the curriculum? What is the new feature in the student management software? A flurry of activity surrounds the art and craft of teaching, so much so that we might miss the opportunity to observe life occurring right before our eyes.  One of my favorite podcasters, Brian Johnson who put out a

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