Creating A Learning Environment with Personal Relevance

I. The Challenge

For the past 20 years, I have been teaching full-time. I have taught Jewish Studies to adults, ranging in age from 18 to 75. I have taught Torah, Mishnah, Talmud, Jewish Thought, Prayer, Ethics, and more. I have taught in Israel, the U.S. and England. As a measure of success, I have received letters years later from students telling me of their positive experiences.

The students had certainly absorbed a tremendous amount of information over the years, and for the most part, seemed to derive satisfaction, and even enjoyment, from their learning. However, at the end of each year, I still found myself struggling with an unsettling feeling. It was hard for me to put my finger on it, but something had missed the mark. Something was missing. After spending countless hours in the classroom attempting to convey significant and profound ideas, what had gone wrong? Recently, it has become clearer to me in what area I have regretfully failed my students.

It was a problem of connection, or rather of disconnection.

This problem did not simply appear out of nowhere.

The problem is a result of an approach where education is viewed as a mind-to-mind experience. It is a result of an approach where the ultimate goal is to convey an endless amount of information to the student. This approach does not take into account whether or not the student connects on an emotional level to what is being taught and integrates the ideas into his or her life. It is an approach which is often void of personal meaning and sufficient personal relevance. This approach does not aim to touch the hearts of the students or inspire them.

This is what I sensed was missing in my classroom. The learning had not penetrated into the students’ inner life. Their newfound knowledge had not translated itself into a meaningful transformation in their being or behavior. The information had remained just that, information, and had failed to enter into their lives, hearts and souls.

Together with other educators, I have reflected on this dilemma of disconnection. It seems that almost everyone I speak to is aware of this problem, though I can’t recall the last time it was discussed at a faculty meeting. I ask, “Has the learning in your classroom engendered passion in your students?” “Do you sense that your students are internalizing what they have learned?” “Has their learning become a transformative experience? Or has it remained disconnected?”

My questions are often met with a nod of recognition. Followed by a shrug of the shoulders, as if to say, “What do you want? What can you expect? It’s school, after all.”

In retrospect, I realize that as a student I also felt a sense of disconnection. Now, as a teacher, I find myself perpetuating it.

Disconnection is not a problem that can be solved by the introduction of additional content into the classroom. It is not a problem that can be solved by better-educated teachers or by introducing more interesting lesson plans.

There is another approach to this problem. An approach that does not detract in any way from the intellectual rigor and intensity of serious learning.

We need to make a shift in the present paradigm so that we no longer focus on what is being learned, but rather concentrate on what the learner is doing with the information. And we are not only interested in the mind of the learner, but his or her whole being.

Is the goal of Jewish education to transmit knowledge? Or is the goal to transmit knowledge in order to affect and transform identity? Is Torah really only information?! Or is Torah the vehicle for transformation?!

The goal is to create a connection.

It is my belief that a purely mind-focused approach to education will inevitably lead to states of disconnection for most people. How can we transform education so that it is more than just an intellectual experience? How can we convey the information in a way that it is meaningful and relevant to the students?

II) The Solution – Three Voices of the Soul

There is another approach.

An approach that was, in fact, favored by the Hassidic masters, Rav Kook, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and others. It is an approach that is based on the wisdom of the Kabbalah, on the understanding that there are three primary voices of the soul – the nefesh, the ruach and the neshama. These voices are expressed through the powers of the mind (neshama), the heart (ruach), and the body (nefesh). In order for education to be truly effective, it has to access and harmonize these three voices of the soul of the student. It is an approach of one whole person to another whole person, of mind and heart and body to mind and heart and body. (See Courage to Teach, by Parker Palmer, contemporary leader in educational philosophy. “To chart the inner landscape fully, three important paths must be taken – intellectual, emotional, and spiritual – and none can be ignored.")

According to the Kabbalah, the three primary inner voices of the soul express themselves primarily in three dimensions: the mind, the heart and the body. In Jewish mystical thought, these three spheres of being are referred to as the Neshama (intellectual drive), the Ruach (emotional drive) and the Nefesh (physical drive).

The mind needs to be engaged. The Neshama voice expresses the mind, channeling content and direction of thinking. It continually impels us to elevate and sanctify our thoughts. In our studying, critical and rigorous thinking is involved.

The heart needs to be engaged. The Ruach voice channels the meditations of the “heart,” the emotional world. It urges the uplifting of emotions and character traits. It is the voice that impels deeper relationships of love, compassion and personal meaning. A safe and supportive environment is created in which the student can personally relate to the material studied. An environment free of cynicism, sarcasm or judgment. The Talmud states, “A person only learns from the place that his (or her) heart desires.” This safe environment opens one’s heart to learning, and encourages the participant to actively listen to him or herself as well as to others. The students are invited to find partners and express how they connect to what has been learned.

Unlike the mind, the heart works very slowly. While the mind can be utterly detached from the rest of life; emotional well-being is interwoven with the countless parts of a personality. To alter one part of a being without consideration for the entire self can render chaos to the whole system. Emotional health is fragile. The heart needs time to fully know something, needs time to ruminate, personalize and integrate new ideas. If the mind can grasp a new idea in the flash of an inspiration, the heart needs reflection, meditation, and pausing. In the language of the Mishna (Brachot 5:1), the heart simply needs “to be” with the idea for a period of time. Otherwise, this new mental awareness will remain an isolated, detached entity, not penetrating into the emotional fabric of life.

This is unquestionably one of the biggest psychological challenges in learning. There is a strong drive within us that impels us to move ahead, to see new material, read another book, and go to a new class. There is an intellectual rush every time we have one of these flashes of inspiration and mentally grasp a new thought. We can look back and feel proud of how much we have accomplished. We can express this to someone else. We can quantify our successes. We may “know” it with our mind, but most likely have not yet acquired it in our hearts.

The body also needs to be engaged. The Nefesh voice deals with the physical self, the physical world, and the natural drives. It urges humans not to act animalistically, but rather to take all physical drives and to elevate them, refine them, and express a meaningful life through them. An experiential workshop enables the student to take this mind and heart experience and express it through various media, including: art, creative writing, drama or movement. The goal here is not the performance. Rather the aim is to physically actualize what has heretofore been abstract. This tangible experience serves to concretize what the mind and heart have experienced internally.

Mind, heart and body. In an ideal educational setting, all three of these elements are accessed and harmonized. Each dimension interacts with the others. No aspect of the individual is ignored or denied.

Education needs to respond to, and embrace, all of these levels. The student is not just a mind, but a whole being.

Education needs to affect and touch this whole being; it has to impact each of these dimensions individually and then harmonize these effects.

Only in this way can we achieve connection.