Here are 5 basic resources on Mimetic Instruction.
1. Read anything by Plato.
2. There was an essay written in 1880 by Charles Alexander McMurry called How to Conduct the Recitation which covers the basic concepts of Mimetic Instruction. I have a copy of this essay in a book by J. Wesley Null and Diane Ravitch titled Forgotten Heroes of American Education. I am not sure if you can find a copy online or not, but it is worth a try.
3. But there is a deeper logic to Mimetic Instruction, which is the purpose of the The CiRCE Institute Apprenticeship. It arises from the nature of things and is governed by a single idea, namely, imitation. At its heart, Mimetic Instruction is summed up in the words of Jesus “Follow me.”
4. Another essay I have found particularly enlightening was written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and is titled The Education of Children. The opening sentence embodies the essential order of Mimetic Instruction when it states, “In the education of children, love is first to be instilled, and out of love, obedience is to be educed.”
5. One final source that comes to mind is a talk that Andrew Kern, president of the CiRCE Institute, does on Adam naming the animals from Genesis 2. This powerfully illustrates the process of Mimetic Instruction. You might look for it as an audio product from the CiRCE store.
Cheers.
In creating the universe he conferred upon it a created rationality different from, yet dependent on, his own uncreated Rationality, and thus gave it an intrinsic lawfulness of its own which is neither self-susistent nor self-explanatory but which endures before God as the truth and goodness of created reality upheld by his eternal Word. It was into this created rationality (or logos) that the Word (or Logos) of God entered, assimilating it to himself in the incarnation, in order to become Word of God to man through the medium of human word and rationality and in order to provide from the side of man for an appropriate response in truth and goodness toward God. –T. F. Torrance, Reality and Evangelical Theology
This quote has been on my mind as something to think about, yet I seem to continually set it aside. It is fairly dense, but it taps into the nature of the logos. St. Athanasius said something along the same lines in paragraph 17 of On the Incarnation.
The marvellous truth is, that being the Word, so far from being Himself contained by anything, He actually contained all things Himself. In creation He is present everywhere, yet is distinct in being from it; ordering, directing, giving life to all, containing all, yet is He Himself the Uncontained, existing solely in His Father. As with the whole, so also is it with the part. . . . His body was for Him not a limitation, but an instrument, so that He was both in it and in all things, and outside all things, resting in the Father alone.
“Perhaps the classroom should be neither teacher-centered nor student-centered but subject-centered.” –Parker Palmer, The Courage to Teach
Actually, the classroom should not be subject-centered either. We should push this one step further, though in the same direction, and argue for a classroom that is truth-centered, one that is logos-centered.
“Poetry which excites us to artificial feelings makes us callous to real ones.” –S. T. Coleridge, from Anima Poetae
Coleridge discloses how we can grow numb to and lose sight of our real senses. Nearly everything around us appeals to our uncultivated infant senses, leading us eventually to believe that these are the real senses we ought to attend when in fact they are merely probings of our unchecked appetite.
The problem is that we grow confused and disoriented to what the real senses are. We end up believing that our infant senses are the real thing and never mature into the fullness of our true virtue.
The NYT ran an article questioning the use of technology and education software in the classroom. Apparently, the Department of Education has provided research showing that a particular math software currently used by approximately 600,000 students nationwide does not measure up. Furthermore, the issue is far from settled as to whether technology actually improves or advances student learning.
About 3 weeks ago, I noticed this strange looking pink thing on the ground next to the rabbit pen. Gavriel, my daughter, was up early that morning with me and had let Buttermilk out of her box. But what she didn’t realize, and what I was realizing as I looked at this object, was that Buttermilk was in the middle of giving birth.
We found all the pups (6 total), and placed them back into the nesting box. Three pups did not make it, but three are now looking like rabbits. It is very exciting watching my daughters raise, breed, and care for their rabbits. We are up to 3 bucks, 2 does, and 3 babies. I am told the other doe is now expecting as well.
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The word rhetoric bears an unfortunate stigma today. It is the general perception that rhetoric amounts to little more than a bundle of self-interests wrapped with a thin layer of truth. We may glimpse at the cause for this perception by first reflecting upon the relation of images to reality.
Richard Kearney writes in the Wake of the Imagination,
The culture of the Book is being replaced, it would seem, by a culture of the Image. Some even claim we are entering an era when reading may become an anachronism, little more than a nostalgic luxury.
The contemporary eye is no longer innocent. What we see is almost invariably informed by prefabricated images. There is, of course, a fundamental difference between the image of today and of former times: now the image precedes the reality it is supposed to represent. Or to put it in another way, reality has become a pale reflection of the image.
I stumbled upon this video about the current college bubble. The first three minutes sum up the situation quite succinctly. The whole documentary is lengthy, but worth the time for anyone interested in education or the future of colleges.
Wrangling 