Contemplative Practices in Higher Education - by Daniel P Barbezat & Mirabai Bush (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

Contemplative pedagogy 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.

From the Back Cover

Praise for Contemplative Practices in Higher Education

"Contemplative Practices in Higher Education represents an instant classic in a growing movement that promises to bring greater depth, resonance, and engagement to college students' learning experience. Dan Barbezat and Mirabai Bush document a stunning array of contemplative applications, revealing a robust and innovative field of pedagogy."

--Daniel Goleman, author, Emotional Intelligence

"In this book, Dan and Mirabai do an excellent job in demonstrating how these transformative contemplative practices can be sensitively introduced to academia. I didn't develop contemplative practices until I was middle aged. I wish I had had such practices in my college days."

--Ram Dass, teacher and author, Be Here Now

"An inspiring report from the frontlines of academe by two quiet revolutionaries. A must-read for anyone who cares about the future of college teaching and who seeks a vision of what it could be."

-- Jerome T. Murphy, research professor and dean emeritus, Harvard Graduate School of Education

"This engaging and informative reflection on the uses of introspective and contemplative practices in higher education reveals a quiet revolution whose time has come. Barbezat and Bush have brought us a path-breaking book that speaks from and to mindful educators intent on helping students focus their attention and resist distractions, find more of themselves in their academic work, and bring more of themselves into the task of crafting lives of meaning, purpose, and compassion."

--Diana Chapman Walsh, president emerita, Wellesley College

About the Author

Daniel P. Barbezat is professor of economics at Amherst College and executive director of the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society. He has been a visiting professor at Northwestern University and Yale University and has taught in the summer program at Harvard University.

Mirabai Bush is senior fellow and founding director of the Center for Contemplative Mind in Society, a nonprofit organization that encourages contemplative awareness in American life in order to create a more just, compassionate, and reflective society.