Gateway to the Dao-Field: Essays for the Awakening Educator By Avraham Cohen

Gateway to the Dao-Field: Essays for the Awakening Educator By Av ...

Chapter 2:

The Shadowy Edges of the Path: Shifting Power From the Teacher to the Students

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This seems to be a radical difference from what occurs in many classrooms where drudgery and boredom seem to be the norm. He asks:

Schools for what?

To learn the commonly agreed-upon skills and knowledge of the ongoing culture… to learn it joyfully… .

To learn how to ring creative changes on all that is currently agreed upon.

To learn delight, not aggression; sharing, not eager acquisition; uniqueness, not narrow competition.

To learn heightened awareness… increased empathy for other people (a new kind of citizenship education).

To learn how to enter and enjoy varying states of consciousness, in preparation for a life of change.

To learn how to explore and enjoy the infinite possibilities in relations between people… .

To learn how to learn. (pp. 132–133)

Leonard’s response to the question about what schools are for rang the bell of change.

A. S. Neill (1960) developed a school for children that ran on principles of democracy and the belief that with appropriate structure, encouragement, and freedom within carefully designed limits, children would do what was in their best interests and would recover their curiosity and joy for learning. He wrote, “I hold that the aim of life is to find happiness, which means to find interest. Education should be a preparation for life” (p. 24).

Indeed, education is life, and educational environments and educators ought to try to draw out happiness.

I will highlight just one aspect of Carl Rogers’ (1980) views about education. He says:

A facilitative learning environment is provided. In meetings of the class or of the school as a whole, an atmosphere of realness, of caring, and of understanding listening is evident.