Tammy’s Reviews > Mind to Mind: An Essay Towards a Philosophy of Education > Status Update

People are searching for a sound theory of education. The mind thrives thought and one thought leads to another. Sensory and muscular activites support intellectual and physical development. Journals (and I will add politicians) scoff at education coming only from books because people need to make a living. If we have never bothered to think about what education is or why we do it, it is hard to answer this question.

Chapter 1 - Karen offers brief background information about CM’s work with the PNEU and the PUS movement to orient readers who are not familiar with her work. She mentions Appendix I for people who would like a peek at the twenty principles. Karen lets us know that CM covers the most important principles in this volume and begins with children are born persons and how even poor children can thrive narrating books.

Her final words are especially poignant. The preface is written within months before she died. I wonder how much she suspected that she was nearing the end of her race. She apologizes for any repetitiveness in her final words. It would take up so much of her precious time to edit out the repetitions and she quotes Paul who was in a similar situation and it will trouble her to take it out than to keep. Philippians 3:1

For 30 years, she has witnessed children who have prospered in good life and good literature grow up to be happy citizens. She has found a few salient principles that are deceptively simple and easily overlooked. She encourages schools to try them on and see what happens. It like bathing in the Jordan. Life is changed forever. Her statements are not untested opinions for they havebeen tested for 3 decades.

Preface: CM opens with the case made for knowledge by children in a school located in a coal mining village. They live in poverty and yet knowledge woke them up. We know that religion, love, and vocation can awaken a person. She believes that knowledge has the same ability to awaken a person to delightful living. Grades, pleasing lessons, and other schoolish devises cannot match knowledge fed to an awakened person.

The chapter divisions are the same. Besides abridging for our benefit, she added some helpful content: subheadings for each chapter and a few paragraphs that provide major themes addressed. Karen’s goal, as always, is for clear, concise information, rich in metaphors that this generations of readings can relate to.

I love the epigraph and dedication. Karen does not mention another audience: teachers who are often overworked and underpaid. Even those of us who love literature and want to love poetry are confused by the cultural references, even if we love rabbits trails and knowing more, appreciate writing that is to the point. This book is a bridge for those who want her words, but abridged rather than secondary sources.