The Power and Promise of Humane Education
Above All, Be Kind: Raising a Humane Child in Challenging Times
Claude and Medea: The Hellburn Dogs
So, You Love Animals: An Action-Packed, Fun-Filled Book to Help Kids Help Animals
Last fall I came across this quote in Harper’s magazine from Mark Slouk:
“Why is every crisis in American education cast as an economic threat and never a civic one?”
Great question. The lens through which we look at schooling will determine the kind of schooling we offer our children, and if our goal continues to be staying competitive in the global marketplace we will continue to focus on those skills that lead to such productivity, regardless of whether such a competitive edge serves the needs of a world in the midst of many crises. Why isn’t our highest priority to provide our children with an education that enables them to be fully engaged truth-seekers and truth-finders who are creative, courageous, compassionate and wise.
The world is changing so fast. Even if we were to cling to an economic goal for schooling, we would still do better to provide youth with critical and creative thinking skills and adapt our classes to our ever-changing world. Our children have facts at their fingertips, but they do not have a means for obtaining critical and creative thinking skills unless they have parents and teachers who cultivate these with rigor. So on two counts we are falling short.
Critical and creative thinking are the great tools of the mind, but our children need the passion of their hearts in order to commit their lives to doing good in the world and embodying their deepest values faithfully.
Zoe Weil
Author of The Power and Promise of Humane Education and Above All, Be Kind: Raising a Humane Child in Challenging Times
Image courtesy of krossbow via Creative Commons.
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Filed under: creativity, critical thinking, education, humane education, systemic change | Tagged: American education, better world, changemakers, creative thinking, crises, critical thinking, educational reform, global challenges, passion, schooling, systemic change, teaching | Comments Off
In the July issue of The Sun magazine, in the “Readers Write” section on pretending, Susannah Mackintosh writes this:
As a humane educator, I’m always walking a delicate balance between exposing youth to global problems that are often horrific and igniting their commitment to use their one precious life to make a difference. Recently, after teaching 6th and 7th graders for several mornings, I wondered if our society in general is creating a kind of apathy among most kids such that they do not feel that it matters much what they do. They know so much. Before I taught about child labor, for example, they were well aware that their shoes and clothes might have been produced in sweatshops by kids their own age. And most of them weren’t inclined to change their habits or choices.
The other morning I took a walk along the rocky beach by our house. I sat on a rock for awhile watching what I thought was a seal sunning herself on a rock with a crow standing by her. But after a very long time with only the crow moving, and not the seal, I decided that I was watching a crow by a rock atop a rock, rather than a seal. But then the seal moved, and I realized that I’d been right the first time, only now I realized there was no crow. The movement of the “crow” had actually been the movement of the seal’s head, which was darker than her body. Are you with me?
There are some who argue that education is virtually always synonymous with indoctrination, and those who hold this position certainly have evidence to support it. The U.S. government removed native children from their homes, put them in boarding schools, forbade them from speaking their own languages, and indoctrinated them with very specific values and beliefs. These practices continue today with children from indigenous families around the world who lose their languages and cultures as they head off to boarding schools that aim to help prepare them for a very different future than village living. The Dairy Council has been producing “educational materials” for schools and indoctrinating several generations with the belief that we need dairy products for our health, which is patently false. Corporations in general utilize schools to indoctrinate students and influence them to prefer their products over others and to become productive workers within a global, corporate culture.
Last Friday night I was traveling to Minneapolis for the Their Lives, Our Voices conference. I had a tight connection in Detroit, and the forecast called for thunderstorms in both Detroit and Minneapolis. I was worried. But it was beautiful in Bangor, so I began to feel more confident about everything staying on schedule. Then a fuel sensor was broken on the plane, and we were delayed out of Bangor for an hour. We arrived in Detroit 25 minutes before my next plane was scheduled to take off.
Why do I ever forget to go outside? No, that’s not quite right. How is it that I ever feel too lazy, tired, busy, or stressed to go outside for an hour and take a walk through the woods, climb a small mountain, or stroll by the ocean? There will always be a million things to do, a mountain of work. There will always be stressors. I will likely always think of reasons why not to. And every time that I allow that persistent voice that says “Go! Now!” to convince me to drag myself outside, I am so grateful. My best ideas happen in the natural world. My creativity is sparked; my soul is soothed. I am reinvigorated for the work at hand. I am energized, even if my body tires. My reverence is reawakened, and I know just what it is I’m spending my life trying to protect – this unfathomable, remarkable, gorgeous world we were all born into.
The other night I was driving my sensei home from our Aikido practice, and I should have seen it as foreshadowing that a tree frog hopped across his road in front of us. I slammed on the brakes, got out, and moved the tree frog off the road. When I got home, the sound was almost deafening. Between the Woodcock’s mating call in the field in front of our house, to the cacophony from the peepers, to the buzzing of the June bugs, to the trilling of the tree frogs, it was quite the outdoor concert.
IHE offers online courses for educators, activists, parents & concerned citizens seeking the tools, knowledge & motivation to align their actions with their deepest values & to become more effective leaders and changemakers. Sign up now for an upcoming session. 
