Teaching Classical Education in a Data-Driven, Outcome-Based Society

I have been wrestling with this question for several months now as my role shifts from classical teacher to technology coach at my online school. It is an oxymoron, for sure.

In an attempt to sort out this conundrum, I dusted off Leigh Bortins' book The Core. As I scanned the pink highlights, looking for the perfect quote to frame this article in light of classical education, I realized I was trying to "techify" the process. I wanted to get to the answer right away rather than sit down and read through the book for the third or fourth time.

I have things to do and problems to solve. My ADD brain did not want to slow down. School was starting in ten days!

My role as a second grade teacher was steeped in the grammar phase of the trivium. Classical education teaches through the progression of grammar, logic, and rhetoric. Now, as I begin helping teachers of sixth grade and beyond, I am moving into the realms of logic and rhetoric.

Using simple technology tools for memorization, practice, and automaticity is the lowest bar. Even our second grade discussions of literature mostly focused on simple plot and character analysis, with an occasional Venn diagram thrown in for good measure.

Then I found the quote I had been looking for:

"The classical model emphasizes that learning feeds the soul and edifies the person rather than producing employees to work an assembly line. The goal of a classical education is to instill wisdom and virtue in people. We see learning as a continuing conversation that humankind has been engaged in for centuries…"(The Core, p. 5)

I guess I found my quote. But how do I fit that idea into technology?

Of course, that is the heart of the problem. Maybe I have been asking the wrong question.

Instead of asking how to fit classical learning into technology, perhaps I should ask how to fit technology into classical learning.

Here is my lesson; what technology might facilitate it? How can I engage a digital learner in a centuries-old method? How can I embrace technology without losing my integrity or compromising my values?

Those are the questions I want to wrestle with as I step into this new role.

And perhaps there is another lesson here for me.

As I have done with my writing, I never start with AI. I write a raw piece, revise it a bit, and then use a language model to polish it. Of course, I tell the model to never use the dreaded em dash, parallel sentence structure, or triplets.

Wait. I just used triplets, and I love my parallel sentence structure.

Oh well. One out of three ain't bad.