Contemplative Practices in Higher Education: Powerful Methods to Transform Teaching and Learning

Contemplative pedagogy is more than a trendy new teaching technique. It is a way for instructors to:

• empower students to integrate their own experience into the theoretical material they are being taught in order to deepen their understanding;
• help students to develop sophisticated problem-solving skills;
• support students’ sense of connection to and compassion for others; and
• engender inquiries into students’ most profound questions.

Contemplative practices are used in just about every discipline—from physics to economics to history—and are found in every type of institution. Each year more and more faculty, education reformers, and leaders of teaching and learning centers seek out best practices in contemplative teaching, and now can find them here, brought to you by two of the foremost leaders and innovators on the subject.

This book presents background information and ideas for the practical application of contemplative practices across the academic curriculum from the physical sciences to the humanities and arts. Examples of contemplative techniques included in the book are mindfulness, meditation, yoga, deep listening, contemplative reading and writing, and pilgrimage, including site visits and field trips.