Educating in the Spirit: Evidence-Based and Theological Foundations for High Impact Educational Systems

This book is an attempt to address two struggles for ""theistic educators"" (e.g., those who approach their educational vocation from a religious perspective), whether they are working in secular or faith-based institutions. The first struggle is that, while numerous guidelines on teaching excellence have been compiled, the resulting checklists can contain more than a hundred criteria to consider. This book therefore identifies the evidence-based guidelines that are likely to have the highest impact on student achievement, thereby empowering educators to focus their efforts in more substantial ways. The second struggle is related to the lack of resources, which can help educators to view and approach their vocation from a theistic perspective. While there are texts that discuss the relationship of spirituality and/or theology to education, few to date have sought to bring evidence-based educational literature into dialogue with the western Christian tradition and thereby develop a ""bottom-up"" theology of education. This book addresses this historical and theological gap. Overall, this book is therefore intended to not only provide theistic educators with high-impact guidelines that can significantly improve the quality of education in their school systems, but it also strives to do so from a thoroughly theistic perspective. ""If teaching is a dance, partnering with the divine to transform teacher and learner alike, Eric Kyle is a master choreographer. With analytic rigor, conceptual clarity, and strategic vision, he lays out the dance steps of effective and spiritually formative education for teachers, students, and administrators. If you can hear the music within the sacred vocation of teaching, this book is for you."" --Frank Rogers Jr., Muriel Bernice Roberts Professor of Spiritual Formation and Narrative Pedagogy, Claremont School of Theology ""The author succeeds in synthesizing a wealth of existing information on effective teaching and learning into a framework that is easy-to-utilize and is supported by research evidence. Realistic examples are included to help ensure a positive impact on student learning and is useful for new as well as seasoned educators. What makes this book truly unique is the focus on a theistic perspective as a foundation for effective teaching."" --Vicky Morgan, Associate Dean Faculty Development, College of Saint Mary Eric Kyle works in the fields of education and spiritual formation, and is the author of the books Living Spiritual Praxis: Foundations for Spiritual Formation Program Development; Sacred Systems: Exploring Personal Transformation in the Western Christian Tradition; and Spiritual Being & Becoming: Western Christian and Modern Scientific Views of Human Nature for Spiritual Formation.