{"id":3676,"date":"2010-09-06t06:30:33","date_gmt":"2010-09-06t11:30:33","guid":{"rendered":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/?p=3676"},"modified":"2010-09-07t12:18:38","modified_gmt":"2010-09-07t17:18:38","slug":"new-cft-guide-on-contemplative-pedagogy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"\/\/www.imrbdigital.com\/2010\/09\/new-cft-guide-on-contemplative-pedagogy\/","title":{"rendered":"new cft guide on contemplative pedagogy"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a>as part of the cft’s ongoing work on contemplative pedagogy<\/a>, including a contemplative pedagogy “working group”<\/a> open to faculty and graduate students, we’ve developed a new contemplative pedagogy teaching guide<\/a>. the guide includes a discussion of contemplation’s role in teaching and a variety of contemplative activities for the classroom, including guided meditation, listening, beholding, journaling, and silence. the guide also links to local and national resources on contemplative pedagogy.<\/p>\n here’s an excerpt:<\/p>\n contemplative pedagogy involves teaching methods designed to cultivate deepened awareness, concentration, and insight.\u00a0 contemplation fosters additional ways of knowing that complement the rational methods of traditional liberal arts education.\u00a0 as tobin hart suggests, \u201cinviting the contemplative simply includes the natural human capacity for knowing through silence, looking inward, pondering deeply, beholding, witnessing the contents of our consciousness\u2026.\u00a0 these approaches cultivate an inner technology of knowing\u2026.\u201d\u00a0 this cultivation is the aim of contemplative pedagogy, teaching that includes methods \u201cdesigned to quiet and shift the habitual chatter of the mind to cultivate a capacity for deepened awareness, concentration, and insight.\u201d \u00a0such methods include journals, music, art, poetry, dialogue, questions, and guided meditation.<\/p>\n in the classroom, these forms of inquiry are not employed as religious practices but as pedagogical techniques for learning through refined attention or mindfulness.\u00a0 research confirms that these contemplative forms of inquiry can offset the constant distractions of our multi-tasking, multi-media culture.\u00a0 thus, creative teaching methods that integrate the ancient practice of contemplation innovatively met the particular needs of today\u2019s students.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n