What Do Teachers Do?
Some starting assumptions…
- A student has a nature. A teacher must understand and address the student according to their nature.
- Teachers are to educate, to lead out, to cultivate in their students wisdom and virtue by contemplating with their students truth, goodness, and beauty.
- Teaching is an art. It cannot be approached as a science because that is not its nature.
- There are two basics means of cultivating wisdom and virtue in another human soul: the contemplation of shared models and the shared contemplation of questions.
So, therefore, teachers…
A. Contemplate ideas, seeking first to fill their own souls before believing they can lead other souls, by specifically being able to…
1. See the Universals (or forest) of an idea and…
2. See the Particulars (or trees) of an idea, and can then…
3. Take it apart and put it back together again as an idea.
B. Teach students how to contemplate ideas, both by example and instruction.
C. Embody the ideas that they love and are seeking to lead others to love.
D. Collect models that are true, good, and beautiful (stories, people, and artifacts) for student contemplation, which implies that they are constantly…
1. Observing the world around them, hunting for models, so that they can…
2. Record/collect those models and then…
3. Retrieve those models for specific lessons
E. Invent questions.
F. Teach students the art of asking questions, esp. through the Topics
G. Ask students questions that cause them to think
H. Cultivate a learning environment (a “school” or place of leisure) which would include…
1. A safe place for asking/answering questions
2. Modeling and cultivating clear thought
3. Time and space for contemplation
