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Its great to see that there is now a page about Holistic Education on Wiki. Just doing the work of the first page is a big step forward. Who wrote it? Its at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holistic_education#Key_Historical_Contributors There are many points that could/ought be picked up. Here are two;
1) Holistic Education struggles with the issue of identity. These include the sub-questions of 'who is doing it?' and 'what is it?' - 'It' meaning theory and practice, and preferably both.
On the question of 'who is doing it?' there is a difference between the full-time specialists and the part-time 'visitors'. There are those who dedicate their lives specifically to Holistic Education, Jack Miller and Ron Miller are the two best-known examples. There are also two other groups who are relevant; the 'visitors' and secondly those who are'made relevant' through practitioners and theorists bringing their insights into practice and theory.
Firstly there are a number of people who periodically are 'visitors' who make fairly direct contributions to the field. By 'visitors' I mean those who come in to the central, focused concerns of Holistic Education theory and practice and make useful and sometimes brilliant contributions. Nel Noddings might be said to be an inspiring visitor to the field - as well as a global figure in the fields of 'caring' and of the philosophy of education generally.
Secondly there are a range of practioners and theorists not least those who lived and worked prior to the 'invention' of the term 'holism' in 1926. The work of examining the even first 100 of such people has barely begun. Each of us would have our own list. At the top of mine would be Abraham Joshua Heschel, Ibn Arabi, Reuven Feuerstein, Reg Bolton (practitioner & theorist of the use of circus skills with children),
2 ) On the question of 'what is it?' I find the examples given in the article interesting and useful but insufficient. Without critiqueing what is in the article I want to share what I came up with after thinking about the question for 15 years! ‘What does it mean to practice or teach holistically?’ My best answer to date is that; the holistically minded practitioner is trying to do each particular thing, theoretical and practical, with consciousness of connections with, and between, all pertinent contexts - environmental context, social justice context etc. - right up to - and most essentially - with some sense of the Whole.
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