‘To defend a nation, you need an army; to defend a civilization you need education’
– Jonathan Sacks
EUROPE: TAIL OF THE EURASIAN LANDMASS, SHAPED BY GERMAN AND KELTIC HABITS, ROMAN AND GREEK CULTURE AND NOT TO FORGET THE IMPRESSIVE IMPACT OF JUDEO-CHRISTIAN THINKING ON THE MANY SPHERES OF LIFE.
Through Colonialism Europe expanded its impact on many present day societies worldwide and stood at the cradle of what we call the present global, so called ‘Free World’.
Imposing its so-called Civilization in a dominant way Colonialism, exploited Continents and provided the various ideologies needed for this. These exported ideologies, or –isms, like Colonialism, Humanism, Nihilism, Communism, Fascism and today’s Materialism are crucial and dominant in shaping and taking over cultures and mankind’s behavior. Think about today’s enormous impact of the global digital world. Will it bring real development and freedom or create new types of slavery?
Education, as Jonathan Sacks mentioned, has been a major force in shaping these –isms and the ongoing development. Are we aware of the –isms behind our educational system, today? Are we aware of its direction or lack of it? Do we know where we are going ?
Within Eastern European countries there is a struggle to overcome the legacy of homo sovieticus. What about homo consumus and the homo secularus in the western world? How will modern man look like? What will be is his and her values.
Each of these ideologies lead to failing systems of thinking and practice, that robbed people from experiencing freedom at a deeper level and led to various crisis.
Aware of many negative faces behind each of these -isms, Dr Michael Schluter, developed an alternative, based on the core-value of the Judeo-Christian inheritance, ‘to love God and your neighbour as yourself’ as a vital necessity for today’s society. Hecalled it ‘Relational Thinking’.
See: http://relationalthinking.net
Today the Relational Thinking Network challenges us to rethink and evaluate the virtues and values in our present postmodern society; how do we shape our social practice? What should be reframed?
Education has been and can be crucial in communicating values of its society.
What does this mean for Education?
In what degree is the present educational system designed to answer the needs of the future demands on education?
Learning first of all is a free art and choice. We learn most about those things we want and decide to learn. The digital revolution supplies this content and possibility. Young people all over the world share that they learn more outside the school than inside. In the whole digital arena the young generation is much further than the former generation. Where ever in history did we experience such dynamics of learning and developing? But what about the leading ideology?
If educational systems want to take their responsibility in these questions, how will we shape it? Today’s ruling and dominating curriculum and design within schools are based in developments from the 16th -19th century. Are they fit for the future? Ideas about education formed in the past have shaped the range of choices which topics we can study and for what professions we can prepare ourselves. But these topics, subjects and professions are quickly changing.
Many schools use overburdened school organizations due to an approach that fitted in the past, but not in the future. Many teachers suffer from burn out. How can an overburdened school inspire the younger generation to learn?
Today many educational systems wrestle with their identity, pressure of the expectations of the various stakeholders like government, inspection, media, parents and other 3rd parties.
Within the Dutch situation leading figures and institutes are aware of the deeper [relational] needs within the educational systems. These last decades Professor Luc Stevens emphasized the importance of ‘pedagogy’ as a central value in our educational approach. Most Dutch Primary schooling adopted his translation of the self-determination theory: Relatedness – Autonomy –
Competence. http://nivoz.nl
The Relational School Project
People, all over the world are social beings. They build value and give meaning to live through relationship with their parents and educators. It’s within this network of relationship we develop all our capacity, also in future generations.
Within the UK Rob Loe, recently started the Relational School Project, received as a timed response to present developments within the British context. http://relationalschools.org
This year the college for school leaders, MijnID.nu, will introduce the Relational School Project within the Dutch situation. http://mijnid.nu & http://relationalschools.nl
Scientific studies emphasize the importance of promoting the relational dynamics within the organizations. But very few practical answers are given how to tackle this underlying factor in a deep, transforming way.
The Relational Thinking Network provides the Relational Proximity Model as a way to investigate and measure the qualities of our relationships. The Relational School Project, invites schools to investigate and to invest in all its relationships.
Because:
- it’s based on the primarily basic need of live, to learn from one another.
- it triggers the intrinsic motivation of educators
- it improves the quality of schools, as relational networks in a natural way
- relational schools sustainable improve the quality of their communities.