Grace and Courtesy

I want to take a moment to encourage our teachers all around the country and world.  Often times, we have to do the work of encouraging each other, as (at least in America) it often feels like teachers are not respected to the same extent to the crucial nature of our occupation. Whether you are a Montessori teacher or not, your work matters tremendously. Your call is to teach others to learn, but more than that, you are a care provider. You take up the role of nurturing the minds and well-beings of a generation that will come after you, and this means you may not see the full fruit of your labor. Yet you do the work anyway. There is some deep love you must have towards the art of learning and sharing. It is not intrinsic to all human beings, though learning certainly is. So thank you. Thank you for caring for children who are not your own, yet you have made them your own. Thank you for taking the time to unravel how an idea works so that you can stitch it back together winsomely, p...

I have a habit of reading multiple books at once. Hopefully I'm not alone in this. As I have just gotten off of a wonderful vacation, I took a good chunk of that time to read. And as you might imagine, my reading list is right at the intersection of  Race, Religion, and education (I couldn't think of another "r" word that means the same as education). Some of these books are what I'm currently reading, so I don't have a review on it per-se. But hopefully they are helpful. Race How to be an Antiracist  by Ibram X. Kendi My Grandmother's Hands: Racialized trauma and the pathways to mending our hearts and bodies  by Resmaa Menakem Jesus and the Disinherited by Howard Thurman (which could also be in the religion category, but ah well) Education The Tao of Montessori: Reflections on Compassionate teaching by Catherine McTamaney Citizen of the World by Maria Montessori Religion   Jesus Knowing God by J.I. Packer The Little book of Christian Living by John Ca...

 I know I should be going into the new year with a forward gaze, but I am amazed at what has happened in the world (and in my life!) the past few months. Let me share with you.  I began this blog and podcast with the intention of combining many different interests into one intersecting conversation. I am a Christian and I view my life through that lens. That is to say, I strive that everything I do would be done to give glory to God in light of His great love towards me and the world, chiefly shown through the death burial and resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ our Lord. (That was a long sentence.) Under that umbrella, I am a Black man whose career is education. I believe that educating young people has a way of changing the course of their future. I have chosen to adopt Montessori pedagogy as the means through which I educate children. While I've been in education for 10 years, I've been on this specific journey of Montessori philosophy for the last 4 years. I've gone fr...

 One of the things that drew me to Montessori Education is that built within the philosophy there is a deep respect for children. By respect, I mean that the child is not seen merely as an empty vessel that the teacher is meant to fill up with knowledge. Rather, children are seen as the human beings they are. There is something humbling about intentionally maintaining the dignity towards someone who depends on others for support. But I have not merely described children in that statement; I am describing everyone. Adults may come under the guise of believing we are independent in a solitary way. Yet, we depend on children to further humanity. As a Montessori teacher (or a parent, or any adult really), we have the great privilege of being a bridge to the world we inhabit so that our children may take up their task of making that world better. So when I am giving a lesson on the binomial cube, or helping a child change into clean clothes after their "accident", I do so knowing ...