It’s time that we returned to the great questions of human growth and learning:
- How can we help each child reach his or her true potential?
- How can we inspire each child and adolescent to discover his or her inner passion to learn?
- How can we honor the unique journey of each individual through life?
- How can we inspire our students to develop into mature adults?
If educators lose touch with these questions in their mad dash to boost test scores, then culture as we know it may truly cease to exist some day. [The hope is] that such a day never comes, and that we instead regard the optimal and natural development of children and adolescents as our most sacred duty as educators and our ultimate legacy to humanity.
~ Thomas Armstrong
Dear Springhouse community,
I have been reading some new material on holistic and eco-centric human development recently. One of my dear mentors is a retired professor in human development, and he introduced me some time ago to models that address the whole human being and situate human beings in the web of life, not over it. I have returned to some of the books he recommended years ago and I am finding them very affirming of the work we are doing at Springhouse.
Many years ago, I remember talking with the mentor I mentioned above on the phone as I drove to lead a community dance with about 100 12-13 year olds at a Unitarian conference. I was dreading it, and I called my mentor for support. I shared my trepidation with him for a few minutes, then waited to hear what kind of wisdom he had to offer me. He responded by asking me a question that has stuck with me over decades. He asked, “What was middle school like for you, Jenny?” After a moment or two, I responded, “Not good.” It was actually one of the most painful and confusing times in my life. My mentor suggested that my dread related to working with middle schoolers might have something to do with my own experiences in middle school. He wondered if there might be more healing for me there. The answer almost immediately for me was yes, there was definitely more healing for me there.
Many mentors and communities have taught me that my inner life, or my personal development, informs the shape of the life I live. Those middle schoolers were a mirror for me, reminding me that there were things in my inner life that had not been tended to–particularly the developmental tasks of early adolescence. As a 11-13 year old, I did not have the support I needed to explore things like my sexuality, my connection to the Earth, and play, and more. This impacted me, and it affected the work I did with others.
In graduate school, I studied many traditional frameworks for human development: Erikson, Piaget, Freud, Skinner, and others. It wasn’t until later that I discovered others like Bill Plotkin, Terri O’Fallon, and scholars like Thomas Armstrong, who not only holistically addressed what it means to be human, but also spoke to the connection between humans, and between humans and the Earth. These eco-centric, holistic frameworks do include some of the developmental tasks that more traditional scholars include, but there are also additions to these more holistic models.
For example, early childhood is focused on building a secure foundation in ways that prepare them for not only physical and emotional development, but spiritual development too. Healthy development in this stage is critical for later stages of spiritual and ecological maturity. The key theme of this early stage of development is love and safety, which create the foundation for a person’s spiritual journey later on in their lives. This stage invites us to consider the bond between infants and young children and their caregivers, the capacity to feel welcomed and at home in the world, and developing trust in their bodies and senses. In Plotkin’s model, the primary development task for this stage is the preservation of wonder and innocence. What a different world we would live in if we took better care of the wonder and innocence of our young children.
Later stages of childhood give us the opportunity to learn the enchantment of the natural world, as well as the intricate cultural ways of our people. This stage, when it is well-supported, creates the conditions for a child to learn to ask “Who am I, really?” and to feel the early stirrings of longing and mystery. In Plotkin’s model this stage is called the “Explorer in the Garden.” The garden metaphor is used as it represents a cultivated but protected space, where wildness and care coexist. It is a space where the inner life of the child can stretch, play, and begin to awaken, without the harshness of full exposure. It is both safe and alive—a place for wonder.
The key task of adolescence is to develop a healthy, flexible social identity (ego) capable of belonging, cooperating, and contributing within the human community — while keeping alive an ember of authenticity and wonder. Adolescence teaches us to balance personal authenticity with social acceptance, allowing us to be in the world with integrity, another prerequisite of spiritual maturity in adulthood. The transition from this stage is indicated by adequate development of our adolescent personality and a readiness to descend into the mysteries of psyche and nature. Some of the key developmental tasks of this stage include crafting a social self, exploring roles and values, developing emotional intelligence, and testing limits and norms.
I will go into adult development in my next letter, but for now, I invite those who are reading this to consider your relationship with these stages of development. Our personal development informs the lives we choose to lead and has an impact on those around us. Recently, I was in an interview with an accrediting body, and they asked me how we support the development of our staff at Springhouse. I was grateful that they asked me this question, as the development of the staff is of the utmost importance to me, and critical to our educational design.
We have a comprehensive staff development program which starts with a commitment to cultivate our own unique personhood in body, soul, and self awareness. In a dominant culture where cultivating personhood is not the norm, choosing to tend to our personal development is a vulnerable choice. As staff members, we seek to surround ourselves with the people, mentorship, and practices we need to support our personal development. For example, staff members join support programs, seek out therapeutic or spiritual direction from a guide or mentor, consistently take care of their bodies and spiritual life, and engage in activities that grow their self awareness like journaling, therapeutic services, or other means. Cultivating personhood includes being aware of and tending to the developmental tasks in earlier stages of life that have not been met. This is difficult, liberatory, and powerful work that not only affects the individual lives of staff members, but our community and beyond.
At Springhouse, we support eco-centric, vitality-centered human development from early childhood through adulthood. That is the primary purpose of our school design and curriculum and we are grateful for scholars such as the one quoted above who move us toward a discourse on human development rather than academic achievement. It’s time.
We have a K-12 program where we support the eco-centric development of children and teens. Our online community just launched with opportunities to support adult development. We look forward to having unique opportunities for adults to cultivate their personhood, and wholeheartedly invite you, and our Springhouse families to join us on that journey.
Gratefully and with hope,
Jenny
