One of my teachers at school used to joke about slow students. “You’re going to be here with a white beard one day” he’d say. I don’t quite have a white beard yet but I am certainly not done in the classroom. Learning, once you catch the bug, is pretty hard to stop doing. We are all life-longer learners. In fact, the longer we think of ourselves as learners, the better. I’d rather be still asking difficult questions when I finally get a white beard than think I know it all already. If you want to keep learning here are some tips: Read something you don’t understand. This sounds nuts,…
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For the Love of Dot: On Being An Intellectual Capitalist
Civilization is, in large part, indebted to its elders who built a vast mountain of intellectual and practical capital. We all rely on it to some degree. In my studies I am utterly indebted to previous work. And there is a ton of it. Though I have only scratched the surface I am aware of the vast capital of those who went before me. I could barely utter a coherent thought if it wasn’t for the hard work of thinkers who blazed the trail. And none of them did it without start up funds from their teachers. The trouble with capital is that you can quickly run out. Dorthy Sayers…
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Language Assumes Realism
One purpose of language is to explain reality. We know this, Ian Markham argues, because we seek to use language across linguistic divides, from one language or culture to another: “the purpose of language is to explicate reality: and translation can only happen if this is assumed…Communication and related activities involved in communication, such as translation, are only intelligible if one assumes that language constructs emerged as an attempt to explain reality.” Language is developed over time in communities and is developed, in part, in order to make sense of reality: “We all live in communities. Language provides the framework in which we interpret the world.” Each linguistic group develops…
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Education: A Treadmill and a Trail Run
For some, education is like running on a treadmill. It is a measurable project, a process, the forming of a rational person, an equipping for industry, an economic machine, a societal organizer. Others see education as a trail run. It is a narrative, a life forming cultural story, an experience about what it is to be in the world, a discovery of passion, of love, of wonder. Most of us think education includes both. We want our children to learn form, to have trained minds, ready for work. And, at the same time, we want them to experience life, to live out a meaningful existence. But let’s face it, we…
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Postmodern Integration part 2
As you might have noticed, I have been attempting to explore answers to a perennial question – how the Christian faith is integrated with learning. My interest is sparked not only by the fact that I have children who presently attend a Christian school, but also because of my own experience (okay, and it’s also my MA thesis). In some ways I am seeking to understand what I think to be true in principle – that there is nothing that is not under the sovereign rule of God and that includes every avenue of learning possible – math, science, literature, philosophy etc. Today I want to look at a postmodern…
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Science and Religion: Dembski’s Proposal
Ian Barbour has died. He was 90. Barbour’s life was spent attempting to solve one important problem – how science and religion relate to one another. He wrote: If science and religion were totally independent, the possibility of conflict would be avoided, but the possibility of constructive dialogue and mutual enrichment would also be ruled out. We do not experience life as neatly divided into separate compartments; we experience it in wholeness and interconnectedness before we develop particular disciplines to study different aspects of it. There are also biblical grounds for the conviction that God is Lord of our total lives and of nature, rather than of a separate ‘religious’…
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Faith Learning Integration: Christian Traditions
In my last post I summarized various philosophies of education. I promised to say something about Christian education. The main question for Christian education is: How do Christians integrate faith and learning? This question is about the integral relationships between the content of one’s faith and human knowledge found in particular disciplines. There are various schools of thought roughly related to distinctive doctrines held by various denominations. Richard Hughes explains how each relates faith to learning: The Reformed Model stresses the sovereignty of God. Since God is sovereign over every part of human experience God is related to every part of human experience by virtue of his authority over it.…
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Why Philosophy Makes a Difference at School
When considering what school is best for one’s children (or even when one does not have a choice and is merely analyzing the school that one’s children are going to attend) one should not only ask what is being taught, but why it is being taught. In other words, one should have a rough idea of the philosophy of a school. A very helpful book is Philosophy and Education by George Knight from which I draw on for a summary of the various schools of thought. Traditional educational theories set the stage for what follows. There are three main theories stressing ideas, the world and human nature. Idealism stresses ideas,…