Knowing and Doing and What It Means to Be Human
What Dietrich Bonhoeffer can tell us about the true aim of classical education
Dostoyevsky on Modern Education and The Ideal Type
Here’s a quote from The Brothers Karamozov (translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky) that encapsulates well what David Hicks points out as being one of the main faults of “modern education” as well as the modern/atheist attempt to dismiss Christ as the Ideal Type. Father Paissy is giving Aloysha advice as he leaves the …
Dostoyevsky on Modern Education and The Ideal Type Read More »
Cultivating the Affections
This article was originally published in The Journal, the magazine of the Society for Classical Learning. Our job would be easy if all we had to do was transfer knowledge. If a student really were like an empty bucket that merely needed to be filled in order to be “educated”, then the hardest part of …
Why Language Sets Us Free
Recently, I was sitting in on a teacher training session at a Christian inner-city high school in which an “expert” on SIOP Lesson Plans had been brought in to teach the faculty how to create effective lesson plans. I don’t know what SIOP stands for, but it was something that the Michigan Department of Education …
Answering the First Questions Right
In Norms and Nobility, David Hicks talks about the difference between normative and analytical questions. Normative questions are questions that reveal the nature of things, especially human nature. These are questions that have to do with the meaning of existence, man’s absolute rights and duties, the best way to live, and what is good and …
Asking the Right Questions First
The kinds of questions we ask are important. I am sure that you know this already, but it is hard to emphasize this enough. Inquiry is at the heart and soul of classical education. As David Hicks points out in Norms and Nobility: “Classical education is not, preeminently, of a specific time or place. It …
A Nation at Risk
I’ll have more to say on this soon, but I am honored and pleased to welcome Peter Vandebrake to the CiRCE writer’s bloc. This marks his first post, and you’ll be hearing a great deal more from him as he has joined the CiRCE team as our Leadership Consultant. Over to Peter (as I said, …