So when I say Principle it's not like I'm saying Morals, or Values.
Though, those can be Principles, too.
Principles are not absolutes, though they tend to apply predictably within certain parameters of life and creation.
Principles can be likened to the Rules of a Game. My mentor taught me that a business has to be a Game Worth Playing to survive and thrive.
Principles are at the foundation of systems like math and geometry. They are the rebar that strengthens ideas into concrete establishments - government, finance and war... They are the magnetic maypoles of sublime scientific revelation... They are the underpinnings of astrology and depth psychology, anthropological forensic anatomy....
Principles make use of group-mind from atoms to collective consciousness in human endeavors.
Principles are the things you can rely on when you are unsure of all else.
Principles are time tested, mother approved, logically deduced, observationally informed, experientially interacted with ways of knowing that only self-reflective consciousness can apprehend.
Principles are knowable, utilizable, non-explicit patterns that can only be seen by searching through the chaotic patterns of life until the organizing principles become apparent and everything seems to fall into place.
That's what it's like learning to understand Principles.
That's why I talk about Principles with all my mentees.
The fastest and best way to learn something is marrying experience with the guidance of a mentor who has a clear map to share and knowledge of the terrain being traversed.
Principles are that map.
Purpose is the compass.
Participants are the mentors and peer-group that inform the journey.
Puts Learning on Auto-Pilot
Repetition over time is the key to any learning. Tonight at Jiu Jitsu, I started to see how my months of regular, disciplined practice are paying off in faster reflexes, better recognition of my situation in a grappling match, more precise movements, etc...
It's only from repetition over time that I have gained this new set of skills.
What's unique about the Montessori Method is that it teaches children with a unified curriculum from pre-school through as far as high-school.
What a child learns in the 3-6 age range - principles like height, width, length, volume, etc... - they will continue to come back to in subsequent grades like 2nd grade science class, or trigonometry in later years. The principles don't change, but the child's ability to access them and utilize the specialized knowledge they inform changes drastically.
So, how do I use this in my parenting? Well, I do my best to teach Corrina principles. Sometimes she finds my lectures boring, other times she surprises me by parroting something I said to her months or years ago when she was way too young to understand what I was saying. (I was a philosophy major - it's easy to get carried away ;-)
What I've discovered is that if I give her a book or a game that teaches deep principles without needing to explain them to her abstractly, she absorbs the information through play. Then, in several years, she will return to the material from a higher mind-brain developmental level. She will start to see what I would like to convey to her, but on her own time, on her own terms.
A great book I bought her recently is "Be Here Now" by Ram Dass. If you're not familiar, check it out. It's a classic in the hippie, new-age genre. It also makes some very important principles (from many different cultures and religions) very clear. And it's drawn like a coloring book. So, even though Corrina can't grasp concepts like God and psychological wholeness, she can still color the pages and enjoy the beauty of the pictures.
The words are making an impression on her mind. Even if she doesn't know it. And in 10 year, when she's completed the coloring and she's ready to start looking at the world through idealistic, hippie lenses, she will have this masterully colored book, with a decade personal history, that will speak to her from many levels of her being.
It basically puts her learning of the information in this book on auto-pilot for me. I just let her enjoy what she already loves to do, and trust the process. The Montessori Method is brilliant. I encourage you to try something along these lines with your own principles.
Cheers,
Craig
It's only from repetition over time that I have gained this new set of skills.
What's unique about the Montessori Method is that it teaches children with a unified curriculum from pre-school through as far as high-school.What a child learns in the 3-6 age range - principles like height, width, length, volume, etc... - they will continue to come back to in subsequent grades like 2nd grade science class, or trigonometry in later years. The principles don't change, but the child's ability to access them and utilize the specialized knowledge they inform changes drastically.
So, how do I use this in my parenting? Well, I do my best to teach Corrina principles. Sometimes she finds my lectures boring, other times she surprises me by parroting something I said to her months or years ago when she was way too young to understand what I was saying. (I was a philosophy major - it's easy to get carried away ;-)
What I've discovered is that if I give her a book or a game that teaches deep principles without needing to explain them to her abstractly, she absorbs the information through play. Then, in several years, she will return to the material from a higher mind-brain developmental level. She will start to see what I would like to convey to her, but on her own time, on her own terms.
A great book I bought her recently is "Be Here Now" by Ram Dass. If you're not familiar, check it out. It's a classic in the hippie, new-age genre. It also makes some very important principles (from many different cultures and religions) very clear. And it's drawn like a coloring book. So, even though Corrina can't grasp concepts like God and psychological wholeness, she can still color the pages and enjoy the beauty of the pictures.The words are making an impression on her mind. Even if she doesn't know it. And in 10 year, when she's completed the coloring and she's ready to start looking at the world through idealistic, hippie lenses, she will have this masterully colored book, with a decade personal history, that will speak to her from many levels of her being.
It basically puts her learning of the information in this book on auto-pilot for me. I just let her enjoy what she already loves to do, and trust the process. The Montessori Method is brilliant. I encourage you to try something along these lines with your own principles.Cheers,
Craig
"Every day is a good day if I learn something new."
There are some who walk the earth in a state of gratitude.
They see life as an opportunity to learn.
They say, "Every day is a good day if I learn something new."
There's a great amount of wisdom and emotional equilibrium in maintaining this attitude with life.
Once we put forces into motion they must manifest. And the best forces to put in motion are the ones we are educated about. Forces set in motion in unconsciousness and ignorance are typically the ones that hurt us most, becuase they rise up when we least expect it.
The failures of endeavors consciously undertaken are grist for the mill of our self-actualization.
When we can learn from our experiences, they all become positive - eventually. They all lead us closer to our vision, and it's our vision that informs the positive outlook we forge. Perhaps this is why vision is a valuable, attractive attribute. Women sense a man of vision is more durable than a man who is only living for today's meal.
So, those who view life as a wonderful opportunity to learn take a keen interest in every learning opportunity and learning environment they encounter. They let no opportunity whisk past them, when their curiosity pounces like a cat. Life is lived openly because mistakes and growth are seen as one, and growth is cherished as a core value in our culture. Growth is the natural state of our being, and culminates in Enlightened awareness.
And this is the basis of the Enlightened Child Curriculum.
They see life as an opportunity to learn.
They say, "Every day is a good day if I learn something new."
There's a great amount of wisdom and emotional equilibrium in maintaining this attitude with life.
Once we put forces into motion they must manifest. And the best forces to put in motion are the ones we are educated about. Forces set in motion in unconsciousness and ignorance are typically the ones that hurt us most, becuase they rise up when we least expect it.
The failures of endeavors consciously undertaken are grist for the mill of our self-actualization.
When we can learn from our experiences, they all become positive - eventually. They all lead us closer to our vision, and it's our vision that informs the positive outlook we forge. Perhaps this is why vision is a valuable, attractive attribute. Women sense a man of vision is more durable than a man who is only living for today's meal.
So, those who view life as a wonderful opportunity to learn take a keen interest in every learning opportunity and learning environment they encounter. They let no opportunity whisk past them, when their curiosity pounces like a cat. Life is lived openly because mistakes and growth are seen as one, and growth is cherished as a core value in our culture. Growth is the natural state of our being, and culminates in Enlightened awareness.
And this is the basis of the Enlightened Child Curriculum.
Concept: Montessori Method - Children teach themselves
"A child's work is to create the person she will become."
Maria Montessori pioneered a method of education that, even 100 years later, is still far ahead of the times.
The backdrop for her developments was provincial Italy at the turn of the last century. Passionate and determined by nature, she became the first female doctor in Italy in 1896.
Working with the impoverished and "retarded" youth of Rome's ghettos, she realized, "that mental deficiency presented chiefly a pedagogical, rather than mainly a medical, problem." She concluded that, "children build themselves from what they find in their environment."
Although her methods were criticized for being too detached, rigorous, and even harsh for the youth, they did seem to facilitate a more genuine, natural experience. She was often heard saying, "I studied my children, and they taught me how to teach them." Montessori was the first to view education in this manner.
She pioneered other attributes of what seems to be modern education today. She suggested that teachers see themselves as social engineers, and enhanced the scientific qualities of education.
The main concepts of Montessori Method include:
1.) The Prepared Environment - Unlike a typical classroom where students are subjected to the lesson plans a teacher has prepared for the entire class, regardless of each student's aptitude or interest level, a well-prepared Montessori classroom is designed for children to learn independently, at their own pace, through exploration of the activities that are most engaging to them according to the developmental needs each day.
2.) Materials - Each stage of a child's development requires different learning experiences, each stage building on the last. To ensure each child has mastered the lessons needed for the next level, Montessori materials are designed to be inviting and engaging, isolating the concept a child is to learn. Using patterns in color, shape, size, texture, etc... these materials assist the child in discerning each conceptual building block on their own, enhancing the confidence of the child delighting in personal accomplishment every time the material is mastered. Often, a child may return to the same materials at a higher developmental level to discover that the concepts they are now absorbing were alluded to years earlier in the more basic materials.
3.) Normalization - This word might be better explained as "Naturalization" or "Flow" in today's parlance. Here's what she says about, "the most important single result of our whole work."
"Only "normalised" children, aided by their environment, show in their subsequent development those wonderful powers that we describe: spontaneous discipline, continuous and happy work, social sentiments of help and sympathy for others. . . . An interesting piece of work, freely chosen, which has the virtue of inducing concentration rather than fatigue, adds to the child's energies and mental capacities, and leads him to self-mastery. . . . One is tempted to say that the children are performing spiritual exercises, having found the path of self-perfectionment and of ascent to the inner heights of the soul." (Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind
, 1949)
A Recipe for Enlightenment?
Sounds like a strong candidate for the foundation of an educational curriculum designed to streamline and strengthen a child's development toward Enlightened states of consciousness. Since the flow state experience is always available to us, even in our pre-rational years, it is important to emphasize your child's awareness of and affinity for this experience. The deeper the visceral memory of a spiritual state of consciousness is embedded from an early age, the stronger it will attract our children to return to it as life becomes increasingly complex.
My own daughter, Corrina, attended Montessori (AMI) from the age of 2-6. Her mom, Jen, is currently in training to become a Montessori primary (age 3-6) teacher. This year the school is training an elementary teacher, so Corrina is attending the local public school for 1st grade.
Personally, I'm grateful that she has the contrasting experiences to help her appreciate and value her Montessori training. She is consistently receiving awards for "best student," "most improved reader" (she's reading at a 4th grade level and writing long stories with illustrations in her journal). Teachers at the school constantly ask us where she went to kindergarten. Next year we plan to enroll her for the 2nd and 3rd grade elementary program.
Ultimately, wherever your child attends school, studying the Montessori Method will have a great impact on your understanding of your child's developmental needs, and how to best help your child grow according to his or her true nature.
For more information, check out these resources:
Maria Montessori pioneered a method of education that, even 100 years later, is still far ahead of the times.
The backdrop for her developments was provincial Italy at the turn of the last century. Passionate and determined by nature, she became the first female doctor in Italy in 1896.
Working with the impoverished and "retarded" youth of Rome's ghettos, she realized, "that mental deficiency presented chiefly a pedagogical, rather than mainly a medical, problem." She concluded that, "children build themselves from what they find in their environment."
Although her methods were criticized for being too detached, rigorous, and even harsh for the youth, they did seem to facilitate a more genuine, natural experience. She was often heard saying, "I studied my children, and they taught me how to teach them." Montessori was the first to view education in this manner.
She pioneered other attributes of what seems to be modern education today. She suggested that teachers see themselves as social engineers, and enhanced the scientific qualities of education.
The main concepts of Montessori Method include:
1.) The Prepared Environment - Unlike a typical classroom where students are subjected to the lesson plans a teacher has prepared for the entire class, regardless of each student's aptitude or interest level, a well-prepared Montessori classroom is designed for children to learn independently, at their own pace, through exploration of the activities that are most engaging to them according to the developmental needs each day.
2.) Materials - Each stage of a child's development requires different learning experiences, each stage building on the last. To ensure each child has mastered the lessons needed for the next level, Montessori materials are designed to be inviting and engaging, isolating the concept a child is to learn. Using patterns in color, shape, size, texture, etc... these materials assist the child in discerning each conceptual building block on their own, enhancing the confidence of the child delighting in personal accomplishment every time the material is mastered. Often, a child may return to the same materials at a higher developmental level to discover that the concepts they are now absorbing were alluded to years earlier in the more basic materials.
3.) Normalization - This word might be better explained as "Naturalization" or "Flow" in today's parlance. Here's what she says about, "the most important single result of our whole work."
"Only "normalised" children, aided by their environment, show in their subsequent development those wonderful powers that we describe: spontaneous discipline, continuous and happy work, social sentiments of help and sympathy for others. . . . An interesting piece of work, freely chosen, which has the virtue of inducing concentration rather than fatigue, adds to the child's energies and mental capacities, and leads him to self-mastery. . . . One is tempted to say that the children are performing spiritual exercises, having found the path of self-perfectionment and of ascent to the inner heights of the soul." (Maria Montessori, The Absorbent Mind
, 1949)A Recipe for Enlightenment?
Sounds like a strong candidate for the foundation of an educational curriculum designed to streamline and strengthen a child's development toward Enlightened states of consciousness. Since the flow state experience is always available to us, even in our pre-rational years, it is important to emphasize your child's awareness of and affinity for this experience. The deeper the visceral memory of a spiritual state of consciousness is embedded from an early age, the stronger it will attract our children to return to it as life becomes increasingly complex.
My own daughter, Corrina, attended Montessori (AMI) from the age of 2-6. Her mom, Jen, is currently in training to become a Montessori primary (age 3-6) teacher. This year the school is training an elementary teacher, so Corrina is attending the local public school for 1st grade.
Personally, I'm grateful that she has the contrasting experiences to help her appreciate and value her Montessori training. She is consistently receiving awards for "best student," "most improved reader" (she's reading at a 4th grade level and writing long stories with illustrations in her journal). Teachers at the school constantly ask us where she went to kindergarten. Next year we plan to enroll her for the 2nd and 3rd grade elementary program.
Ultimately, wherever your child attends school, studying the Montessori Method will have a great impact on your understanding of your child's developmental needs, and how to best help your child grow according to his or her true nature.
For more information, check out these resources:
- http://www.maitrilearning.com/downloads.html -
- Secret of Childhood
- especially recommended for parents. A history of what and how Montessori learned about the unique nature of the child, the problems that can arise when the child's nature is not properly nurtured, and the repercussions that proper and improper nurturing of the child have on society.
Enlightened Child - About the Philosophy
Enlightened Child is a philosophy of education.
This blog is part of a life-long mission to illuminate the brightest minds, connect the deepest hearts, and ensure sustainable stewardship of the earth's resources.
While raising my (now 7 year old) daughter, I often come across information that I swiftly incorporate into her development. This is the place I will share what I discover, and invite you to participate in the conversation with your own discoveries.
Enjoy,
Craig Filek
Craig@EnlightenedChild.com
This blog is part of a life-long mission to illuminate the brightest minds, connect the deepest hearts, and ensure sustainable stewardship of the earth's resources.
While raising my (now 7 year old) daughter, I often come across information that I swiftly incorporate into her development. This is the place I will share what I discover, and invite you to participate in the conversation with your own discoveries.
Enjoy,
Craig Filek
Craig@EnlightenedChild.com
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