1. Classics, not Textbooks
Great ideas are most effectively learned directly from the greatest thinkers, historians, artists, philosophers and prophets, and their original works. Great works inspire greatness, just as mediocre or poor works usually inspire mediocre and poor achievement.
2. Mentors, not Professors
The professor/expert tells the students, invites them to conform to certain ideas and standards, and grades or otherwise rewards/punishes them for their various levels of conformity. In contrast, the mentor finds out the student’s goals, interests, talents, weaknesses, strengths and purpose, and then helps him develop and carry out a plan to prepare for his unique mission.
3. Inspire, not Require
There are really only two ways to teach—you can inspire the student to voluntarily and enthusiastically choose to do the hard work necessary to get a great education, or you can attempt to require it of them. Instead of asking, “what can I do to make these students perform?” the great teacher says, “I haven’t yet become truly inspirational. What do I need to do so that these students will want to do the hard work to get a superb education?”
4. Structure Time, not Content
Great mentors help their students establish and follow a consistent schedule, but they don’t micromanage the content. Great teachers and schools encourage students to pursue their interests and passions during their study time.
5. Quality, not Conformity
With the student feeling inspired and working hard to get a great education, the mentor should give appropriate feedback and help. But the feedback should ideally not take the form of common “grading”, but rather personalized feedback, commenting on the particular strengths of a work, including clarity of expression, original thought, technical precision, correlation of principles and ideas, effectiveness of argumentation or other reader appeal, etc.
6. Simplicity, not Complexity
The more complex the curriculum, the more reliant the student becomes on experts, and the more likely the student is to get caught up in the Requirement/Conformity trap. Great teachers train great thinkers, and great leaders, by keeping it simple: students study the greatest minds and characters in history in every field, write about and discuss what is learned in numerous settings, and apply what is learned in various ways under the tutelage of a mentor.
7. YOU, not Them
If you think these principles are about improving your child’s or student’s education, you will never have the power to inspire them to do the hard work of self-education.
Focus on your education, and invite them along for the ride. Read the classics in all fields, find mentors who inspire and demand quality, structure your days to include study time for yourself, and become a person who inspires great education. A parent or teacher doesn’t have to be an “expert” to inspire great education (the classics provide the expertise), but he does he does have to be setting the example.