Educating for Wisdom and Compassion
Creating Conditions for Timeless Learning
- John P. Miller - Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, Centre for Teacher Development
-Lourdes Arguelles
Professor of Education and Cultural Studies
Claremont Graduate University
Blending philosophy, research, and three decades of practice, the author offers an engaging discussion of essential principles of timeless learning, including attention, contemplation, connection, participation, responsibility, wholeness, and joy. Educators in today's schools can apply these principles, models, and methods to inform instruction in their own classrooms and teaching practices. Some of the benefits timeless learning can bring include:
- Helping students develop deep joy, wholeness, awe and wonder, and a sense of purpose
- Improving attention, alertness, perception, and memory
- Using meditation and contemplation to help reduce stress, anxiety, heart rate, and blood pressure
"In Educating for Wisdom and Compassion: Creating Conditions for Timeless Learning, John Miller creates the category of timeless learning and describes its qualities and aspects. For someone new to this perspective, the book provides an enormously rich introduction to these insights and offers ready access to a set of detailed and wide ranging resources, including many activities the reader can experience at once. For those who are more knowledgeable, the book offers an opportunity for significant deepening of their understanding about the value and enactment of timeless learning. Educating for Wisdom and Compassion: Creating Conditions for Timeless Learning is clear and direct. It’s a book that provokes reflection, engagement, and a deeper vision."
"Fills a vacuum in the education literature, a vacuum for an approach to teaching and learning anchored in the insights of various wisdom traditions and spiritually-oriented educational innovators. . . .It is a clearly written, concise, and inspired book which will be of great value to many of us in the education field."
"...the vignettes and stories, the suggested practices, the invocation of a fundamentally better way of being and of being in school, the focus on wisdom and compassion as outcomes of education. Much of the material is wonderful, as is the message."
"This is a timely, thoughtful, and very important book. In emphasizing the contemplative mind, it elaborates a key dimension of a new vision of education that is grounded in the wisdom traditions and essential in today’s classrooms. In a sensible, mature, and down-to-earth fashion, this work offers a philosophical context, an intimate understanding of the processes of consciousness, and a wide range of tested practical means to integrate the contemplative mind in the classroom."
"This is a timely and valuable resource for educators concerned with integrating a spiritual perspective in their work...The book is written in a very reader friendly manner, using no or very little terminology unfamiliar to most readers."
"What this book offers that this country and others could benefit from is a different version of what our children need...The book’s major strength is the stimulation of a different point of view in a climate that may need some remediation. The quotes and anecdotes are very good."
"In this engaging book, John Miller has effectively distilled the essence of holistic education, providing parents, teachers and researchers with a solid foundation for understanding its key ideals and characteristic practices. Miller explains how a pedagogy rooted in caring, compassion, mindfulness and meaning truly makes a difference in in our lives. I will recommend this book to my students as a core reading on holistic education."
"At a time of high-stakes testing and increasing emphasis on standards, Education for Wisdom and Compassion presents the value of a more holistic education. Author John P. Miller argues that a holistic approach allows students to gain a greater sense of purpose; reduce stress; and improve memory, alertness, and attention. Through meditation, contemplation, and reflection, Miller shows how students can find joy in learning and develop true wisdom."
"Like a precious opal, examination from multiple angles and perspectives reveals the beauty of this magnificent work."
"Well-conceived and brilliantly brought to life, this valuable introduction will be useful to teachers, parents, administrators, and researchers interested in holistic education for diverse students of all ages."
