Flourishing In The Holistic Classroom

In a time of unprecedented changes globally, Flourishing in the Holistic Classroom offers an educational model that is dynamic, organic, and adaptive. The book offers key principles, dispositions, and practices that holistic educators draw from to create learning environments in which their students can flourish. This book describes learning that is based on a balance of inner and outer ways of knowing, with an emphasis on the inner life or soul of the learner. This is illustrated through accounts of running an arts camp using the inquiry process and experiences with teacher candidates. A key principle of holistic education is connection, which is explored through experiential examples such as connections between learners and each other, the teacher, and their subject of study. The role that mindfulness practice and teacher presence plays in the classroom, as well as working with fear and vulnerability are addressed through detailed narratives. The breadth of the author’s experience including being an early years teacher, a director of programs and exhibits in a children’s museum, and working with pre-service teachers is woven throughout the book. Reflections from former teacher candidates highlight the influence that holistic pedagogy has on learners. The book concludes with an invitation to the reader to embrace a holistic, integrative approach to education, which creates fertile ground for student flourishing. Flourishing in the Holistic Classroom is intended to support teachers, administrators, academics, pre-service teachers and graduate students. Praise for Flourishing in the Holistic Classroom: "Heartfelt, authentic, soulful! Lisa Marie Tucker’s Flourishing in the Holistic Classroom is a gift to all educators. Drawing on her lengthy career as an educator in various roles, Lisa draws on her personal and professional experiences. Her use of the nautilus shell creates a profound holistic image that connects heart, mind and spirit where personal cosmologies are valued. Her work is timely as we emerge from challenging times and seek to (re)situate and (re)connect ourselves to each other and our planet in a post-pandemic world. Her lived journey resonates and inspires, as we, the reader, moves through each chapter. Drawing on the wisdom of ancestral roots, Lisa explores what makes us human in profound ways." Marni Binder Associate Director, Academic Leadership Associate Professor, Ryerson University "I loved this book! Flourishing in the Holistic Classroom by Lisa Tucker is a must-read for any teacher who is looking to make education meaningful, engaging, and relevant to students’ lives. It is highly readable and full of practical examples and applications for teachers at all grade levels. It is also a wonderfully inspiring text for professors working in teacher preparation programs. I felt like I was having a conversation with a master teacher - one who truly understands the really important qualities that teachers can cultivate in their lives and work. I appreciated the way substantive theory was integrated seamlessly into her own personal narrative. Using stories, she brings her Nautilus model of holistic teaching to life, creating an intimacy with the reader that engages your mind and spirit." Sam Crowell Professor Emeritus, California State University Founder, MA in Holistic and Integrative Education Author, Emergent Teaching: A Path of Significance, Creativity and Transformation "Lisa Invites us to imagine, enact and embody wholeheartedly our life as more than surviving - she wants us to flourish in the classroom as learners, no matter if we are wearing a teacher or student hat. To do this we think of ourselves as a whole person whereby heart, mind, body and spirit are embraced. This is what holistic education is. In this book we are taken on a journey and as Lisa says 'teaching is a complex profession and in order for true exploration and deep learning to occur, a healthy, caring, and sustainable learning community must be developed'." Dr Narelle Lemon Associate Professor and Associate Dean of Education Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia

This book provides perspectives and insights across the educational system for how we might move toward living out this wish in all schools. The chapters provide perspectives on fundamental questions that have been guiding recent research on wellbeing in schools: How do school communities flourish together? How does supporting educator wellbeing connect to teaching, learning, leading in schools? What characteristics, qualities and strategies support the wellbeing of the whole school community? This book is unique in that it answers these questions from the perspectives of teachers, students, administrators in K-12 schools, as well as from university and the wider community. Importantly, these chapters provide a repertoire of varied answers to the question that underpins this shift in research toward a positive organizational perspective: How can we leverage what works well to grow more, to instill in each community member a sense of their value and capacity to contribute? These chapters serve as examples, invitations, and inspiration for readers to notice in their own contexts ways they can grow wellbeing through a focused attention on building appreciative, strengths-based, positive approaches to teaching, learning, and leading in all schools.

Transcendental Learning discusses the work of five figures associated with transcendentalism concerning their views on education. Alcott, Emerson, Fuller, Peabody and Thoreau all taught at one time and held definite views about education. The book explores these conceptions with chapters on each of the five individuals and then focuses the main features of transcendental learning and its legacy today. A central thesis of the book is that transcendental learning is essentially holistic in nature and provides rich educational vision that is in many ways a tonic to today’s factory like approach to schooling. In contrast to the narrow vision of education that is promoted by governments and the media, the Transcendentalists offer a redemptive vision of education that includes: -educating the whole child-body, mind, and soul, -happiness as a goal of education. -educating students so they see the interconnectedness of nature, -recognizing the inner wisdom of the child as something to be honored and nurtured, - a blueprint for environmental education through the work of Thoreau, - an inspiring vision for educating women of all ages through the work of Margaret Fuller, - an experimental approach to pedagogy that continually seeks for more effective ways of educating children, - a recognition of the importance of the presence of teacher and encouraging teachers to be aware and conscious of their own behavior. -a vision of multicultural and bilingual education through the work of Elizabeth Peabody The Transcendentalists, particularly Emerson and Thoreau, sewed the seeds for the environmental movement and for non-violent change. Their work eventually influenced Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. and it continues to resonate today in the thinking of Aung Sang Suu Kyi and the Dalai Lama. The Transcendentalists’ vision of education is worth examining as well given the dissatisfaction with the current educational scene. Endorsements: "A Transcendental Education provides a powerfully hopeful, integrative, and holistic vision that can help guide education out of its current vacuum. The book is thoughtfully explicated, expertly synthesized and completely relevant for anyone interesting in helping education find itself. Like the transcendentalists themselves, this is both down-to-earth and soaring in its potential implications." Tobin Hart author of "The Secret Spiritual World of Children" and "From Information to Transformation: Education for the Evolution of Consciousness." "The secret to a vital, renewed America lies in the life and writings of the Transcendentalist community of Concord, Massachusetts in the 19th century. Jack Miller, who I know has been devoted to a new, living form of education throughout his career, has written a book that could inspire a revolution in teaching. It goes against the tide, as do Emerson and Thoreau. But it offers a blueprint and a hope for our children." Thomas Moore, author of "Care of the Soul." "A timely account of great thinking on genuine education. Reading this, today's beleaguered teachers should experience a renewal of spirit and commitment." Nel Noddings, author of "Happiness and Education."

Learning often begins with an experience in the body. Our body can tighten or feel expansive depending on different learning contexts. This experience of learning in the body is crucial to holistic education. This book explores embodied learning from several perspectives. This first section explores how psychology can inform us about embodied learning; for example, the work of Carl Jung and Wilhelm Reich devoted much of their thinking to how energy manifests itself in the body. Meditation and movement are also examined as ways of embodied learning; for example, Dalcroze, a form of movement education, is presented within the context of whole person education. The book also presents schools where embodied learning is nurtured. Waldorf education is discussed as well as a public school in Toronto where the body is central to holistic education. The book also presents visions of embodied learning. John Miller presents a holistic vision of teacher education and Tobin Hart, who has written extensively in this field, writes about the embodied mind. Embodied learning is an emerging area of inquiry in holistic education and this book presents a variety of perspectives and practices that should be helpful to both scholars and practitioners.

This collection brings together approaches to the teacher education and preparation curriculum that may be described as holistic. It also discusses teacher education curricula that are reconstructionist and reconceptualist in nature, seeking to shift the trajectory of society through teacher education. The book serves as an introductory text for the field of holistic curriculum studies, and will open it up to a wider audience.

Forward by Nel Noddings This book includes papers written by teachers and how they engage holistic education in their classrooms. The papers come from a course taught by Jack Miller at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto entitled The Holistic Curriculum. This is a rich and diverse collection of papers showing how holistic education can be brought into public education despite the pressures of testing and other accountability measures. Although most of the teachers teach in public schools there are also examples from teachers working in private and post secondary settings. This book can inspire other teachers who are looking for ways to teach the whole person in a more connected manner. There are very few texts in the field of holistic education that include the voices and practices of teachers, particularly those working in public schools. Many of the examples of holistic education in practice come from Waldorf, Montessori, Reggio Emilia and alternative schools. A unique feature of this book is the many different voices of teachers describing their work in the classroom; they talk about their successes, the challenges and even a few failures.

This memoir describes the journey of John (Jack) Miller. The book explores how his personal journey is related to the work he has done in holistic education, contemplative education, and spirituality in education. In holistic education the personal and professional are connected. Professor Miller’s journey includes events, books, teachers, and the many factors in his life that have contributed to his work, which includes more than 20 books and extensive travel around the world. An example of the relationship between the personal and the professional is that Jack began meditating in 1974 and this practice has provided the foundation for much of his teaching and writing. Professor Miller’s book, The Holistic Curriculum, first published in 1988 along with the publication of the Holistic Education Review have been seen as the beginning of holistic education as a field of study. Since his journey has been connected with so many other holistic educators, this book can serve as one perspective on how the field has unfolded over the past 35 years. Besides this historical perspective the book includes a chapter on his meditation practice as well his beliefs. There is also a chapter on his teaching and how he attempts to embody holistic education in his classroom. Praise for A Holistic Educator's Journey: "Rarely does a field-builder allow us the opportunity to journey into the life-long journey leading to the formation of the work. With bold transparency, Miller shares his enormously rich professional and personal journey of seven decades with an open hand. He shows us the terrane of his inner and outer life." Lisa Miller, Author The Spiritual Child Teachers College, Columbia University "Whether in the classroom, writing books, keynoting, or being a friend, Jack Miller’s life journey exemplifies his multi-dimensional embracing of “the way of nature” and accepting of the mysterious. Always acknowledging the Indigenous roots of holistic education, he managed to bring parts of the Indigenous worldview into schools in ways that accommodated all cultures. This book gives testimony to his great contribution to understanding why we must return to our interconnected way of being." Four Arrows, Author Sitting Bull’s Words for a World in Crises

In Holistic Learning and Spirituality in Education, scholars from around the globe address the theory, practice, and poetics of holistic education. Some of the topics explored include educating the soul; partnership education; nourishing adolescents' spirituality; education and the modern assault on being human; the Eros of teaching; personal creativity as soul work; pedagogies of compassion; and meditation, masculinity, and meaningful life.