HeightsCast: Forming Men Fully Alive

This week on HeightsCast, we bring to you a lecture from the 2022 Teaching Vocation Conference. In this lecture, Head of Lower School, Mr. Colin Gleason, offers advice on how to prepare for the teaching profession. Although the ultimate preparation for teaching is teaching itself, he nevertheless offers us six verbs—actions—that great teachers do well and that aspiring teachers would do well to work on.

1. A great teacher speaks
   1. Teachers communicate their ideas primarily through words. In order to do this well, the ability to speak publicly is a sine qua non. and to draw out from students ideas of their own
   2. Teaching is more than the delivery of information. A teacher must first win over his students. Speaking well—holding a student's attention like a preacher does his congregation or a singer her audience—is necessary to this end.
   3. Concrete suggestion: tell stories. Even in the maths and sciences, good teaching is animated by good storytelling. Practice with friends and family.
2. A great teacher listens
   1. Teaching does not consist in simply signaling what is on a page. It is a two way street. A teacher is like an orchestral conductor, who moves between score and sound, adjusting as needed.
   2. A common bad habit of teachers is over-taching, that is: talking too much. In order to gauge students' reception, a teacher must be attentive to them in real time.
   3. Teaching is personal, so the teacher should seek to listen not only to the group as a whole, but also to each student as an individual.
   4. Teaching is, at root, assisting parents. A great teacher listen also to parents, who are the primary educators.
   5. Concrete suggestion: find a good mentor. In order to listen well, we need personal guidance and someone, who listens to us.
3. A great teacher sees
   1. Seeing is paramount to the personal approach.
   2. A crippling bad habit: prejudice, that is to judge too soon, before one sees the actual reality of the student before him. Judging quickly blinds a teacher.
   3. One of the beauties of the teaching profession is seeing the growth of a student.
   4. Concrete suggestion: we need to be artists, which, in the first place, means seeing. Teachers mold souls and to do this, they must have the intention of seeing as an artist. In our daily lives, now, in our families and at work, are we attentive to the people around us?
4. A great teacher laughs
   1. A teacher ought to enjoy being with his students, to be caught up in the sense of awe and wonder at the student he serves.
   2. Teachers need to have a sense of humor. Taking oneself too seriously could be a death nail as a teacher.
   3. Although we are grown up, we need not have grown old.
   4. Concrete suggestion: remember the art of play. A teacher should remember that he is still part boy; his job is a joyful one.
5. A great teacher studies
   1. A teacher must be continually learning.
   2. Study fuels the teacher, keeping his mind fresh.
   3. A teacher models study for his students; they see his actions and draw lessons therefrom.
   4. Concrete suggestion: read and study, even apart from any degree programs. What a teacher needs is two-fold: to know his subject well and to love his students even more.
6. A great teacher explores
   1. Education is an adventure, which means that a teacher should be in the trenches alongside his students.
   2. Teaching comes from the person; it is an overflow of his own sense of adventure.
   3. Adventure does not mean haphazard. It takes work to be creative. Spontaneity in the moment is often the fruit of diligent planning before.
   4. Concrete suggestion: exercise prudence in choosing what school you work at. Three aspects to consider in a school:
      1. Cohesive spirit and identity; imagine yourself living that spirit.
      2. Content of the curriculum (especially books taught).
      3. Freedom

There are many mediocre teachers in the world, so if you are going to be a teacher, become a great one. This, of course, does not mean perfection, but rather continual improvement. To be a great teacher is not to have made it, but to be continually on the way. In Mr. Gleason's words, a teacher is like the guide on a white water rafting expedition. Indeed, we are all in the same boat and, not only are we learning, we are laughing.

Also on The Forum

Guidance for Aspiring Teachers with Alvaro de Vicente

Seneca on the Teacher's Job by Tom Cox

The Teacher as Liberal Artist with Dr. Matthew Mehan and Mr. Tom Longano

Cultivating Friendship in the Classroom by Austin Hatch

Aristotle on the Student's Job by Tom Cox

Further Reading

The Art of Teaching by Gilbert Highet

Only the Lover Sings by Josef Pieper

Ben Hogan's Five Lessons: The Modern Fundamentals of Golf by Ben Hogan

A teacher is one who leads while walking backward. Even more, he is one who leads with the humble hope that he will one day be surpassed by those who are following him; for while a teacher may have traveled down the proverbial path a time or two before, he must nevertheless rediscover it with each new student.

In this week's episode we sit down with Mr. Joe Bissex to discuss the importance of humility in the classroom. In the episode, we consider the following questions:

1. What is humility? What is it not?
2. What are some markers of humility?
3. What is the role of a teacher in the classroom?
4. What does it mean for a teacher to point the way?
5. As a teacher, how do you admit failure? Why is it important to do so?
6. What is the connection between generosity and humility in the classroom?

As you'll hear, if a teacher remains humble and sincerely elicits his students' contributions, it does not infrequently happen that what he had missed on his first ten treks, he may—with the fresh insight of a new student—discover on the eleventh. And in this discovery, both teacher and student will have the joy of knowing that both are disciples of the one Teacher, who is the Truth itself, and whose way makes all things new.

Show Highlights

• What is the role of the teacher in the classroom?
• How does a teacher lead?
• Why a teacher should hope his student will one day surpass him
• Humility as rejoicing in the ways one's students will–or already have–surpassed you
• Why it is important for a teacher to humbly recognize his failures
• How sincere questions can lead to the greatest of discoveries
• The need to petition for student's help
• Why a teacher should be open to the changing his mind
• Teaching and the unexpected
• Teaching is modeling a way of thinking, not the mere conveyance of facts
• Why a teacher does not need to have all the answers ahead of time
• Humility in testing: how to assess students in a way that goes beyond fact checking alone
• Joy as the fruit of humility
• The importance of having the generosity to pray for one's students, and the humility to ask one's student's for prayers.

Also on The Forum

Guidance for Aspiring Teachers with Alvaro de Vicente

Seneca on the Teacher's Job by Tom Cox

The Teacher as Liberal Artist with Dr. Matthew Mehan and Mr. Tom Longano

Cultivating Friendship in the Classroom by Austin Hatch

Aristotle on the Student's Job by Tom Cox

While we often speak of the virtues we wish to see in our children, it is perhaps less common that we reflect on the particular virtues that we need to foster in ourselves. In this episode Mr. Tom Royals, 40+ year teaching veteran and Assistant Headmaster of The Heights, discusses the importance of parental prudence and its progeny: meekness, patience, and humility.

In this week's episode, we sit down with long-time Heights father and Assistant Headmaster, Mr. Tom Royals, to speak about the virtues of parenting. From his wealth experience, Mr. Royals shares with us practical advice on the habits to make the home bright and cheerful schools of virtue. Beyond mere theorizing about virtue, Tom's anecdotal approach in this episode gives us concrete insights into how each moment in the home, whether a setback or a success, can be an occasion for growing in virtue.

Parenting may at times be a messy affair, but as we hear from Mr. Royals it is also a joyful one. In his own words, it is a dance. If we want to help our children mature into men and women of character, then we ourselves need to learn to be childlike, which means always beginning again no matter how old we may—always finding new ways to grow in those virtues which make us not only into mature adults, but also keep us young at heart.

Show Highlights

• The virtues that parents of older need to live
• Often talk about virtues needed in keds, but can forget about virtues that we need to foster in ourselves
• The family is the first school: parents cannot abdicate their call to be educators
• It is a journey and a messy affair; no thornless roses here.
• How we can learn to turn all circumstances into occasions for loving God
• Parents cannot hide: kids seeing everything
• The adventure of the evening and the importance of leaving one's anxieties at the door
• Handling the little things of the day
• Kids model our manner and our conduct
• Need to keep resetting the button with children
• The importance of being present and accompanying our children
• The art of fatherhood in three movements: be there, show love and interest to your wife and each child, you're gonna make mistakes: laugh at them.
• Prudence requires you to know your children in their particularity
• Parenting is often preparing for the future; we are parenting future forty year olds
• Prayer and self-knowledge are indispensable
• How do you get children out of themselves?
• The romance of daily life in the home
• Need to be attentive to the time and place of corrections
• Propose, don't impose.

Also on The Forum

• Parents as Primary Educators
• Decisive Parenting
• Parenting: Patience or Optimism?
• Respectful Dominion: Colin Gleason on Discipline
• Family Culture with Mr. Alvaro de Vicente

Headmaster Alvaro de Vicente helps us examine our own perception, a parents and teachers, of our boys. If we view them as budding protectors, we'll treat them one way; if we see them as future "compliers," it will be another. But what happens when we want to see them as protectors but treat them as compliers subconsciously? Alvaro helps parents and teachers form a vision of boys befitting their nature, and offers a road map to make that vision a reality in the lives and identities of the boys now in the process of becoming the men we need.

In the first talk of the 2022 Teaching Vocation Conference, Rich Moss describes some of the joys and travails of teaching, as he seeks to answer the question, "why teach?" In short, because we are called to it, because we love reality, because we love teaching, and because we love our students.

This week, we sit down with Dr. Lionel Yaceczko to discuss his new book on the fourth century Roman grammarian, Ausonius of Bordeaux. In looking at his life, we dive deeper into various aspects of classical education. As Ausonius lived through an important period of religious, political, and cultural change, considering his life also affords us the opportunity to think about how the advent of Christianity affected (and continues to affect) classical education.

With Christmas fast approaching, perhaps this discussion may serve to remind us that teaching is pointing and that its ultimate purpose is to point us to the Teacher.

Show Highlights

• Who is Ausonius and why should educators study him?
• The life and times of a Roman teacher, beaurocrat, and Christian convert
• What Ausonius's life can teach about classical education
• What is a Quaestor?
• What is a grammaticus? A rhetor?
• Education in Late Antiquity
• The most egalitarian form of elitism? How the liberal arts can liberate
• The importance of memorization in education
• How the advent of Christianity changed classical education
• A new canon for education: introducing Sacred Scripture to the liberal arts
• May I be so bold? Rhetoric and persuasion in Late Antiquity
• What is a litterator? On the stages of education before the grammaticus: Abecedarium, elementa, and the road to the masterpieces
• On the importance of study for teachers, and teaching for researchers
• Augustine and the vir perfectus as vir sapiens in the service of the Word
• From philologoi to theologoi: how Revelation changes everything

Suggested Reading

Ausonius Grammaticus: The Christening of Philology in the Late Roman West by Lionel Yaceczko

Power and Persuasion in Late Antiquity: Towards a Christian Empire by Peter Brown

The World of Late Antiquity by Peter Brown

The Regensburg Address by Pope Benedict XVI

Also on the Forum

Defining the Liberal Arts

What's in a Name? Shedding Light on the Dark Ages

History the Way it Was… and the Way It Should Be

Continuing with the theme of mentoring, this week Mr. David Maxham discusses how we, as parents and teachers, can better mentor struggling students by taking a step back and focusing on the basics. He offers three practical guideposts for these wonderful guys to strive for as they take steps toward becoming the man they were made to be. We remain, as always, optimistic.

After establishing a relationship of trust with your mentees, Mr. Maxham recommends helping our boys structure their days around the following three key moments:

1. Waking up in the morning
2. Midday break
3. Going to sleep at night

Anchoring resolutions to these three moments, Mr. Maxham explains, helps the boys to achieve their goals. As half the battle in achieving a goal lies in being mindful of it, attaching them to parts of the day that occur without fail can be a strategy for success.

A good place to start when building the foundation could be: a morning offering after waking up, a brief moment of recollection at midday, and an examination of conscience before going to bed at night. As the boys develop more goals, having this framework in place will be a helpful support.

Moreover, as parents, we can help our sons develop these habits by practicing them both ourselves and together as a family. A quick morning offering at breakfast or a brief moment of family prayer in the evening are excellent ideas. And asking our children to pray for us is a great way to not only help them pray, but also to help each of us, who, as we all know, need all the grace we can get. Although there are many things that a six year old boy may not be able to help his parents with, he can pray for them; and that is worth the whole world.

• Where to begin with a mentee who is struggling
• The dangers of overwhelming mentees with too much
• How to help your mentee develop goals
• The importance of framing questions with the right language
• How you son can put a structure in place to get to the root of problems
• Why parents and educators need to have long-term vision
• Habits are not things that you just turn on and off
• Keep it simple: the three key moments in the day and how to anchor resolutions to them
• How many goals should a mentee work on at once?
• How parents can coach their sons in the foundations
• Ask your children to pray for you

• How to Help Your Son When He Struggles Academically: Part I
• How to Help Your Son When He Struggles Academically: Part II
• Baby Steps: Heights Mentors Goals for Mentees in the New Year
• Why do Boys Need Mentors?
• Finding Mentors After Graduation: Pat Kilner on Find Your Six

Please include links to books: To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton

In this week's episode, we sit down with Pat Kilner, a graduate of The Heights, former Heights teacher, Heights dad, and now Chairman of the Board of Directors to discuss his new book, Find Your Six: Stop Lead Generating and Start Building Influence. Whether you are in college or high school, a young professional or a seasoned veteran, this week's conversation centers on something that is crucial for everyone: mentorship.

This mentorship is something that we sometimes take for granted as Heights students, but what happens after The Heights, when your mentor is no longer hunting you down after 3rd period for a check in? How do you find good counsel then, on foreign turf and starting from ground zero?

Drawing on both his personal experience and formal research for the book, Pat encourages us to find and foster relationships with influencers. As the conversation continues, Pat explains that influencers are really nothing other than great mentors and that perhaps more than anything else, it is finding good mentors that will help one be successful both in his professional career and in his personal life. To this end, he offers advice to college students and young professionals about how to find possible mentors, secure meetings, and approach that first conversation with sincere curiosity and a desire to learn from the wisdom that the other has to offer.

In the end, Pat shares that these relationships should grow into life-long friendships of mutual benefit. The aim is not to pull mere facts and data points, as one does from google, but to develop an authentic relationship with someone who is a living source of wisdom and to whom one can turn throughout the course of his life. Moreover, once we have benefitted from this wisdom, it's our turn to pass it on. Way leads on to way and the tradition continues.

Show Highlights

• The importance of mentoring both at the Heights and beyond
• Is it necessary to be excited about what you are doing on a daily basis?
• Why treating people as commodities is not only bad ethics, but also bad business
• How to find mentors and influencers
• Three characteristics to look for in a mentor: longevity, implicit trust, ownership mentality
• What is needed in a mentor is wisdom, not mere data points
• Reframing the college years: what would look like if by the end of college, you had acquired 4-6 deep mentorship relationships?
• What are good ways for college students to find mentors?
• How mentors can help you find mentors in new places.
• Why students should ask their professors out to lunch or coffee
• What is means to form your own "personal board of directors"
• How to find mentors, even if you are unsure of your professional path
• Why parents ought to let their children take ownership of their school work early on
• How to approach the art of the meeting
• What can parents get from the book?
• How do influencers and mentors relate to vocation?

Recommended Reading

Find Your Six: Stop Lead Generating and Start Building Influence

Also on The Forum

Mentor's Compass

Why Boys Need Mentors

The Odyssey, Mentors, and Humanitas

How to Guide Conversations with a Mentee

In this episode of HeightsCast, we feature the speech delivered by Headmaster, Alvaro de Vicente, to attendants of The Heights School's 2021 Fall Open House.