Special Session #8
– Education continued – Mar. 26, 2010
Special Session #8
Teacher: Monjoronson
Topics: Education
Emotional Intelligence
Enculturation of children
Teaching history meaningfully
Complacency and lack of backbone
The study of philosophy
The inefficiency of our educational systems
Preparation of children for the workforce
Temperament, predisposition and proclivities
Temperament and learning capabilities
Brain function and learning
Mental stimulation, activity, naps, cookies and milk
“Mapping” temperaments, abilities & disabilities for each individual
Learning environments for handicapped individuals
The busyness of children
Providing a sustainable educational environment
Connections with nature
The necessity of direct experience
Children and their electronic devices
How will computers fit into the future of education?
Reality and social ethics of using computers
Religious freedom vs. spiritual expression in schools
Segregation and compartmentalization in education
Bringing back the one-room schoolhouse?
Monjoronson’s Mission
Future updates on Urantia’s progress
Becoming involved in the mission
TR: Daniel Raphael
Moderator: Vicki Vanderheyden
March 26, 2010
Vicki: Dear Father, as we gather today in your presence and are surrounded by the energy you provide us, may you sense our true intention to be of humble service to you, to our Sovereign, Christ Michael, and to our Blessed Magisterial Son. We welcome Monjoronson’s presence today, along with the presence of whomever else desires to assist us, in appreciating and sustaining that which you have so generously bestowed upon us. May all who read these words choose to serve our brothers and sisters in the spirit of loving cooperation. Amen.
Emotional Intelligence
Vicki: Greetings, Monjoronson!
MONJORONSON: Good morning.
Vicki: Today I’d like to continue our conversation on education, in hopes that the responses you provide will help us create a more sustainable future for our children.
MONJORONSON: As do we.
Vicki: My first question is a rather general question, and I was how you would define someone with “emotional intelligence?”
MONJORONSON: I would first refer you to the book, Emotional Intelligence, by Daniel Goleman, which is an excellent piece of work that would provide foundation to your educational endeavors, whether you are teaching early infants or the elderly. All those in-between are very emotionally responsive, though there are individuals who have very little of this, which makes it difficult for them to live in your society. Emotional intelligence is a term used for the wherewithal of living in an emotional society, in a body that is run, many times, solely by emotional energy. It is a way of grasping your environment in your hands, consciously, so that you become aware of your limitations as well as your potentials, through your emotional energies.
Emotional intelligence is primary to your spiritual development, to consciously engage your emotional sphere intelligently, compassionately and consciously. It is the first step towards growing deliberately in the spiritual realm, that aspect of yourself. I would further state that this is primary to the expansion of your capacity to engage the lower levels of morontial mind, during this lifetime. The morontial realm provides you with a great expanse of a virtual entrance to a new realm of existence and thinking. We would recommend to you to read this book—we are not promoting the book, though it may sound like that, but it contains the basic information you would need to assist you in teaching yourself, and teaching and working with others.
Enculturation of children
Vicki: Thank you, and that is a book on my shelf, and a book that I have referred to in the past. I have another question related to last week’s session. I’m not sure we understand what you mean by the “inability of our educational institutions, to enculturate our children into the fabric of our history and culture.” Could you expound upon this a bit so we have a better understanding?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. This is perhaps one of the most important facets of your educational system. Just as the family is the moral school for teaching children social morality and social ethics, so too are your schools, and parents, the vehicles for passing on the culture of your society. This is essential to teach, as otherwise you must reinvent the past every time you make a decision in the present. It is important to teach the history of your civilization, of your culture, of your nation, the reasons why it came into existence, why it had problems, and how it overcame them. It is important to teach the wisdom of success, the wisdom of growth and development and social evolution, so that these lessons of history do not have to be repeated. Your educational system in this country does not do that very well.
History is seen as—no pun intended—an archaic subject to teach that appears to have little value. However, if the lessons of history do not prove useful to the present, then you will make the same mistakes, and I might add that your nation is on the cusp of making several very difficult decisions about its existence. Its past is primary to guiding those decisions, which are made by individuals and by groups. What is most deficient in your culture is the group mind that is aware of the past. Great swaths of your population are completely unaware of the history of your nation, even why it came into existence, and why it fought the egregious demands and requirements of obedience to a monarchy, which itself was long past overdue to be overthrown, to evolve and to grow.
I might go further in that, that your people truly do not understand the right and the need for self-determination, which brought your nation into existence, which gave you your freedoms. Even now, your population is seeking an expansion of its right of self-determination, but does not have the social mind or the wherewithal, the courage of a firm backbone of knowledge of history to do so. I hope my metaphors have not confused you.
Teaching history meaningfully
Vicki: No, they haven’t confused me; what I’m thinking about though, is how we have approached history in education, and from what you are telling us, we are not engaging students in a meaningful way, that really relates their history to their lives now. Is that correct?
MONJORONSON: That is exactly correct. History, again, is as many of your educational subjects are, taught in the linear manner—at this date, such and such happened, and at the next date, such and such happened—those factors are almost irrelevant in the social mind that must be educated to make conscious and deliberate and competent decisions concerning contemporary issues and problems. The good history is taught through playacting, through role taking, and imagining situations being developed. Your historians, your teachers of history, are very deficient in this mode, and it comes from top-down policies for teaching subjects of education, where thoughtful teachers who would wish to teach it differently, are not allowed to do so.
It is our wish that your teachers of history would as diligently teach their subjects—students—the difficulties of historic situations and how they were overcome, how there were failures, and why those failures came into existence, and why successes came into existence. We wish they would teach as diligently as your military leaders teach military history. The lessons of war are well known to tacticians and strategists, and are held in the minds of current military leaders as requirements for becoming those leaders, even of platoons. These lessons of military are exact and they are deadly. If you are the victim or the conqueror, they are deadly.
Your lessons of history are as succinct and can be summarized as easily and as thoughtfully and as philosophically as military tactics are taught. When you teach history this way, you will surely learn the basic elements of a sustainable society and a basic civilization. You will find that there are trends that are destructive to a society, and a civilization, which come about through the slow, ponderous movement of time and the accretion of ill-conceived decisions, faulty decisions, and this is the situation your country and the world has gotten into at the present time. Someone must see through all of this chaff, all of this fog of decision-making, to see clearly, how to weigh the fundamental basic elements of survival, let alone existence and sustainability. History has an eminent place in your education and every thoughtful, intelligent child should be taught history in this manner.
Complacency and lack of backbone
Vicki: Thank you! That certainly gave us a lot to reflect upon. It brings to mind another factor that is working against us from solving our own problems, and that is we tend to not have that backbone to stand up and get involved. We seem to be too involved in our own little lives. Would you agree with that?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. The slow pace of history begs the complacent, the lazy mind, to become “cuddled in its lap,” and this is where the demise of many civilizations and societies have fallen. It requires the thoughtfulness and mindedness of a militarist to manage the slow, long development of an evolving civilization. Few have a mind, [such] as this, and few are as diligent as [a] militarist in war, to pay attention to the signposts of complacency, slothfulness in thinking and living, to bring things into correction. Thank you for the very good question.
The study of philosophy
Vicki: Something somewhat related to this, has to do with philosophy: In our culture today, it appears that we have much more tolerance and respect for the sciences, and less for the study of philosophy. I see philosophy as an avenue through which the mind accesses or bridges the spirit. Is there a need to revive the study of philosophy, in an effort to increase our social and spiritual growth?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely! Our discussions lately have been philosophizing, if you take note. The thinking of a philosophical mind is necessary to temper the hard materialism that is going on in western cultures now. It is fine to have a materialistic life, but it only provides a prop, a support, for the mindedness of a philosophically oriented society, one that is evolving into a spiritized society. You would do well to begin teaching this way of thinking, early in your schools. Eight year olds are fully capable of engaging the rudiments of philosophical discussions.
If you were to eavesdrop in on them on the schoolyard, you would find some who are actually philosophizing at a very deep level, about important topics of their world. These are usually held in abeyance by these children as these are discussions which might be embarrassing to them, to their other contemporaries and they would see themselves as reflecting on adult topics, which they truly feel they know little about.
Philosophical thinking does not have to be the erudite type of discussions you might think of—men sitting on marble steps in togas, with wreaths around their heads—certainly not, for this is an idealized, actually demagogic way of thinking about philosophy, which is not true. A more casual, informal, thoughtful approach to philosophy gives way to thinking, which allows a person to be outside their cultural box more easily, than their peers may allow materially.
The inefficiency of our educational systems
Vicki: Monjoronson, I’d also like to talk a bit more about the inefficiency that you see in our educational systems, and I’d like to bring up one thing that kind of ties to our current discussion here. Some of the holistic, integrated, authentic-type activities that allow children to explore concepts of history as well as philosophy in a living way, are considered by many people running our school systems as an inefficient use of time, especially when attempting to educate large numbers in our public schools. And so I’m thinking what they consider as inefficient is almost directly in conflict with your feelings—or maybe it means something different. Could you explain?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. First of all, ironically I would have to agree that your schools are extremely inefficient when they teach these topics. However, efficiency is not an effective element of educational measurement. Rather, the effectiveness of the educational system is one which is of much more concern to us. Truly, who rocks the cradle forms civilization, and your educators have gotten yards, miles, continents away from the heart of education for a civilization. They are far more concerned about test scores, about hard subjects, rather than forming and building effective citizens for the future, who are integral and supportive of a sustainable society.
Education as it is taught now, by the numbers for measurable “heart,” measurable outcomes, is not a significant contributor to the effectiveness and sustainability of the longevity of a society, let alone a civilization. You have in any society the capacity to form the future leaders of your nation, your culture. Your educational system truly has not measured this qualitative aspect of their educational systems.
Yes, we know that qualitative measurements are difficult to support and justify in budgetary considerations, but that is short term, short lived. Truly effective educational systems do both; they allow for the hard measurable progress of students as they grow in mind and spirit, and in their educational acumen. It must as well allow individual students the opportunity to explore the qualitative aspects of living that contribute to a quality life for millions of others around them, as they grow and become contributing members as adults in their society.
If your educational system allows for tremendous variation within individuals to explore their potential, as they are guided from the inside, you will have a much more balanced and effective society. As your society and education exists now, it is incredibly inefficient in that so many students drop out from this staid, archaic crystalline form of education. It is simply too boring for them. It has no enhancements, no enchantment, no mystery, no intrigue to whet their curiosity to look for more.
The quality of life is surely what sustainability is all about for a society, a culture, a civilization. Life is a quantitative aspect, which your educational system is now trying to measure exactly, with a micrometer, and this is vastly foolish; it is historically preparing for a future cataclysm within your society. The aspect of societal cataclysm or disintegration is incredibly enhanced by the ineffectiveness of your educational system. It may become highly efficient, but it will remain highly ineffective as long as the quality of life is ignored in its instructional materials. These are not very well measured by your society, or your educational system.
You would rather teach everyone to become an accountant or an engineer, and let those philosophers and artists all waste to the side. This is most detrimental, for you have individuals with lop-sided behaviors and personalities that are skewed towards that materialism, which is now at the very rotten core of your society. Yes, you have hit on a nerve that we have been striving to tell you about. You have great pains and aches in your society and your culture, which are screaming at you statistically in your demographics, and you pay no attention to this.
There are few of your leaders who truly appreciate the state of cultural deterioration that has been augmented by an inadequate, incapable educational system. I have bashed your educational system tremendously today and in the past. I do appreciate the fact that you do have an educational system, and what is needed is a more effective one, one that teaches families how to become good educators themselves, and this is the very heart of a sustainable educational system, a sustainable society and eventually, a sustainable civilization. Nations must look to this, to enhance their survivability.
Preparation of children for the workforce
Vicki: This brings to mind another area I wish to discuss today, and that has to do with segregation. We could discuss racial segregation, but that’s not necessarily what I’m referring to right now—there’s a tremendous amount of segregation and compartmentalization going on in our educational system in other areas as well. One area is how we segregate our children from the work world, where in generations past, children stood along side their fathers and their mothers, as they worked and they learned. Now it seems that our methods are somewhat artificial in exposing and bringing children into that environment. Can you talk about that?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. Your colleges and professional degree programs already have internships that are required before a person goes on to their last years, and before finishing their degree requirements. These practical experience assignments are important reality checks for students. It is definitely possible to have these practical experiences become more prevalent at lower ages to expose children/young adults to the realities of the continuity of living activities. You are quite correct in stating that the learning experiences, the learning environment within a family, that is also a cottage industry, fully prepares individuals to be knowledgeable, to be good family members and productive workers, as well as eventual managers and owners, who know accounting, bookkeeping, supply/demand, inventory control and so on. It is not past the realm of possibility that your educational system could do this.
You could have, let us say, pre-teen children work for a day once a month in a bakery or a tile factory, or some other manual labor experience. There is a need to expose children to the realities of life, whether it is being a custodian in a hotel, or whether it is a chief chef. Most of your educational systems have pointed to the enamored places and positions of esteem and high regard, whether it is a chef in a hotel restaurant chain, or whether it is the chief financial officer, or a corporate CEO. Most people do not begin at that level, and this reflects a tremendous unreality to young individuals who will eventually enter the workforce.
Reality of life is that most people would begin flipping hamburgers at McDonald’s, as you would say, and that they will learn to clean the restrooms, and sweep the floor and such. These chores may be reprehensible to individuals of great social bearing and wealth, but for those without training, without completion of high school and even primary educational standards, these are primary to making a living. They are a place to begin and then to move on; it gives these young people something to know and to know well, so that they learn about not wanting to return there, or they can discover that they truly do enjoy it, and they want to remain at that level.
Someone must wire, plumb, and build the homes; someone must dig the trenches to emplace the lines for water, electricity, sewage and natural gas; someone must learn how to do this. For some, operating a backhoe would be demeaning; for others it would be a wonderful experience to play with “grownup toys.” So these practical experiences are wonderful, and should be more widespread in your educational system.
Temperament, predisposition and proclivities
Vicki: I’d like to discuss, if we can, something that affects what children choose for their professions, and that is their temperament. The temperament of an individual influences not only how one learns, but how one interfaces with others in the social environment. I noticed that in the Urantia Book, much effort has been taken to describe the temperaments of each of Christ Michael’s Disciples, and interestingly enough, they were very different. Knowing that we as individuals have a unique blend that forms our temperament, are there still some general prototypes within our populations that we should study or understand?
MONJORONSON: Yes, most definitely. This whole topic of temperament and predisposition is sufficiently important as to become a realm of study and of counseling for children and for young adults, as they grow up and look towards placement in their society, whether it is a job or a social setting. Understanding and having this wisdom for each individual is important for their quality of life, for their happiness, for their right placement. It is important to the point where it helps prevent misplacement of individuals, to prevent alienation from a social group, from rejection, from being isolated. It is important to assist the individual to become successful earlier than later, through personal experience. Yes, there are temperament prototypes and stereotypes, which are accurate, and there are at least a dozen to two dozens of these typical temperaments of your species. There are many variations, however.
Training and temperament is a general category, within that category are personal preferences, proclivities and predispositions. It does not make much difference where these come from, but these do accompany each individual as they come into adulthood, and are usually evidenced early on in their life, sometimes as early as two or three months of age. It is important that this be a part of the qualitative measurement process for each individual. You educate your children much as a farmer raises thousands of eggs, into chicks, into pullets, and then into fryers and egg laying hens and roosters. You give as much thought to this process as you would for raising a particular variety of bovine.
Education is far more sophisticated than this, and for a successful sustainable society, culture and nation, it is extremely important to spend far more resources on understanding the individual, who will eventually become the adult, the parent and leaders of your nation and your societies. You must begin investing in your educational system, as though you were going to build microprocessors for various computers. The same thoughtful input will give you thoughtful, careful, historically relevant and successful output.
Temperament and learning capabilities
Vicki: Thank you. So basically, when I look at this as an educator, I say well, we not only need to identify and understand one’s temperament, but then we need to understand how one of that temperament learns best. Would you agree?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. Just as there are certain temperaments of individuals, there are certain particular learning capabilities, and these too, must be known. You will eventually follow the progress of your children as carefully as you have followed the pedigrees of your purebred horses and dogs. Each individual will have these qualitative and quantitative measurements encoded in their records, which will be easily read by anyone, much as your medical records are now becoming digitized and standardized. So too will the learning capabilities, temperaments of children be given the same attention.
Brain function and learning
Vicki: Monjoronson, I’d like to talk a little bit about a function of our physical mechanism, the brain, here and how it relates to learning, and get some validation from you in this area. Psychologists are saying nowadays that when learning, our brains require periods of active engagement, alternating with quieter periods of diffusion, so that we can absorb information and our experiences properly. Do you agree with this?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. Your psychologists are learning the wonderful facets of an eager mind. I might explore this with you further, that the temperaments are related to various capacities within the human mind. These will become more and more mapped and there will eventually become a synapse, a workable junction developing between education and learning psychologists. It has existed in the past, it will develop even more, and you will find more psychological and physiological links between these areas.
It is important that the “maps” of the student’s individual mind be known. Children who have Down Syndrome are well known for their capabilities and deficiencies. Their areas of expertise within these little people are well known and used to their great advantage. Were your psychologists and educators able to give the same attention to the broader capability of normal and enhanced mind function, your educational system would expand tremendously in its capability to become more effective.
Mental stimulation, activity, naps, cookies and milk
Vicki: I asked this question because I think it informs us in how we plan activity for children. If they need a period of active engagement, and then a period following it where a diffusing activity allows them to absorb, then that is something that we can plan for, and so I considered this a rather important question.
MONJORONSON: You might also consider that the thoughtful curriculum or day-planning for young children below public school age has a wonderful regimen of mental stimulation, physical activity, naps, cookies and milk. It is recommended for adults as well.
Vicki: Ahh… how interesting! And thank you for that. I think many older children and adults will appreciate that one. (Monjoronson laughing.)
“Mapping” temperament, abilities and disabilities for each individual
I’d also like to touch on the “handicap” that you expressed of our children not being able to read at an early age. I understand that this really has environmental implications, in that these children need to be engaged in a print rich environment, with lots of pre-reading activities. But then, I’m also thinking about those other children that we are finding have a genetic predisposition to a reading disability. In our society we often call this dyslexia. What are your impressions of this disorder called dyslexia?
MONJORONSON: We have discussed this in the past, and I refer you to those past transcripts. Rayson has spoken of this in the past as well. This reading disability is one of several, and this will become part of the “map” of each individual who is a student. As I said, it is important that this map of each child be explored, noted, recorded and tested frequently, as some of these disabilities disappear, and sometimes disabilities do come into existence later. It is—I will not address this particular disability, but refer to it as one among many, which need to be known, so that the individual student can meet with success among their peers, and if they are not able to meet with success, they can learn to accept the fact of their disability, and do a “work around” situation/program in their education.
The vast majority of your students are “normal” and there are many exceptions. You will find similarities within the exceptions. It is as well important to treat children as accepted and appreciated, acknowledging their disabilities from the norm, and to group them only in groups where it is necessary to teach them effectively. In some circumstances grouping individuals with these disabilities only causes havoc and greatly distresses the larger groups, and this should be warded against.
Learning environments for handicapped individuals
Vicki: Thank you, and I think that that somewhat addressed another question that I have, and that had to do with those handicapped children that we are attempting to “main stream,” into regular classrooms, or “general education classrooms.” It’s a challenge, and I think the reason for it is that we do not want to isolate handicapped children, from the rest of their peers, and vice versa. They need each other for growth and development, and yet it is quite challenging, and at times very interruptive, to the learning environment. Do you have anything more to share about this?
MONJORONSON: Yes, most certainly. It is important for the self-worth of these children, to appreciate that they are socially equal to others, that they are accepted, that they are a part of the larger group. However, there is a necessary function to segregation, one from a learning standpoint, and the other from a position of disruption of the learning environment. We want them to learn that they are socially worthy to be with others, but that their disability in some instances requires them to be within their own group, so that the others can learn adequately too. When those who are disabled disrupt the larger group, then it becomes a counter-productive activity. Do you understand?
The busyness of children
Vicki: Yes, very much so, and thank you for sharing that. That might give us a little bit better direction.
I want to move on to the “busyness” of children, and talk about some of the things I see parents doing, and how things have changed from when I was a child. When I was a child, I lived in a neighborhood that was surrounded by other children, and we spent a lot of our time playing out our own fantasies and creating games with our own sets of rules. Nowadays, this is almost non-existent for many children. Instead, they are often engaged in more of adult-directed activities. How does this impact their growth?
MONJORONSON: Negatively! It is important that children practice role-playing in their early years. What you experience is much like the philosophical training, which we spoke about earlier, that children do need time away to pretend that they are adults, to practice their role-playing to learn how to cope with the problems of being an adult, even before they are an adult. These are necessary for the individual to shortstop many adult problems that will occur in their older age as adults. Preventing this, or throwing children into activities that are too advanced for them, is very detrimental to the emotional and social stability and integration of that individual.
When you have many adults who have been deprived of this, you end up with adults who, I would say, have generalized infantile social difficulties or disabilities, that had they been given the opportunity to fantasize, to pretend, to practice at role playing, that these problems would have disappeared long ago. These always remain latent, just as you know that crawling and pulling one’s self up to chairs is prerequisite for walking, and that skipping is prerequisite to learning advancement, you would know that these social requirements need to be completed early on in life, rather than deferred.
The trouble with becoming an adult is that you are too old, you are in your peer group, you are already raising your own children, and therefore you do not go through these early social learning situations, and furthermore, your own children are often deprived of those experiences as well. So you have a redundant cycling problem within your society. There is much to be learned from simple societies, whether it is in the aborigines in the hinterlands of continents, or whether it is in the early social groups such as the Quakers and the Amish.
These cultures see the benefit of simple living, that they allow children to be children, and children learn through imitating and if they are not able to imitate or observe exactly, they will invent solutions themselves, in their own little work groups and little social groups. This is very important to a sustainable society.
I do not feel badly about mentioning sustainability over and over again, as this truly is the topic of my mission, to help bring this world and all its societies into the era of light and life, an era when my work will be complete, and I can return once more to my brethren in Paradise and Havona. I am enjoying my stay while I am here, and my goal is to assist your world in to reaching the days of light and life — the other way of stating this era is an era of sustainable peace, sustainable economies, a sustainable global society, and so on.
To attend to and reach the days of light and life is a topic I will hearken to repeatedly, for it sets the standards for all the work that we do. Of course, your evolving spirituality is connected to your evolving emotionality, and your evolving social-self as a social organism. So, I hope you do not get tired of the refrain that I will give you continually.
Providing a sustainable educational environment
Vicki: Thank you, and to be quite honest, I think that’s the purpose of these questions, is to inform us in ways that we can create and co-create a sustainable environment here, so I am always appreciative of these references.
MONJORONSON: Thank you.
Vicki: We’ve talked about the busyness of our culture again, and I guess I’m concerned about engaging children in too much activity. This not only relates back to the need for self-directed activity, but it also relates back to my question about periods of activity, alternating with periods of quiet diffusion. What I’m seeing is that in our society, we tend to overload children with activity after activity after activity, and of course this is my opinion, but I’m wondering how you feel about this busyness we impose upon children?
MONJORONSON: It is an artificial evidence of living, of being alive. Living is the times when you are sleeping; living is the time when you are reflecting; living is the time when you are in repose, and even when you are in groups, sometimes very stable groups are at peace and at ease among themselves, saying nothing. But there is an enjoyment among the group actually doing nothing, but enjoying each other’s presence. Busyness goes along with your linearity of your society and the materialism. Everything is connected to doing something, to producing something that is evident, and you can hold in your hands, or see on a paper or measure.
The quality of life oftentimes is not measurable; I wouldn’t say it is immeasurable, but it is usually not measured. And these quiet times are necessary for the augmentation of the growth of mind, and the growth of your social capability. There have been many, many studies of college students, as you know, where they measure the learning experience of these individuals under stress, under lack of sleep and under times of repose, as opposed to those times when they are so active and so busy and so driven. They have found that, in fact, the individual who does study when they are rested and quits when they need rest, is far more prepared for the tests, for writing essays, and so on, than those who work feverishly through the night.
Yes, there is a need for a balance, just as we were speaking of the young children in learning situations, where they pretend, there is a time for reflecting, a time to actively, consciously reflect on what has been done, and what has been not done, and how might that be different. Times of reflection are needed as a “conscious activity”—put that in quotes—for your curriculum, during the day, beginning in early times for young children, and into pre-adolescent eras, and later on as a formal time of that activity.
This truly is simply acknowledging that which individuals do already, but authorizing this time of inactivity, this time of reflection, as a time for productive thinking. Sometimes individuals will come away from a time of reflective thinking with just a yawn, as they have not been busy thinking, or reflecting on their experiences, whereas others will be very productive and so there is allowance for this as well.
Connections with nature
Vicki: I’m going to change the direction here a bit. I’d like to talk about children, of course, but in a different perspective. It appears that many children, especially those living in the inner cities today, have become disengaged with nature, and I’ve observed where they have actually expressed fear when placed in a natural setting, such as walking in the woods. My concern is that they are not developing an appreciation, or a connection with the natural surroundings of beings and animals that is necessary for us to sustain our whole planet. Can you address this?
MONJORONSON: Yes. Walking in parks and going to zoos are adequate to educate children that these places of forests and animals exist, but it does not fully prepare them for living as one among many, in a natural setting. The true, thoughtful naturalist would be another Henry David Thoreau, finding themselves among nature, as just one of hundreds of species in a local area, and appreciate the fact that they are not alone, even without other people around them. What you are speaking about really has to do with the awareness of connection; connection to the earth, connection to other animals, connection to the biosphere as a contributor or a detrimental element of that biosphere.
This is an important facet of learning to be a whole person. It is an aspect of being a holistic student of life, one who is aware of all that is around them, and is curious about that which they do not see, and which is not apparent. Unfortunately, there are literally millions of children in inner cities around the world who have no idea that they are part of a biosphere, and that they contribute to it in one way or another. This assists in teaching individuals that they are truly connected as one among many, and many who are connected to the one. This is important spiritual experience as well as a natural one that they need to have in their repertoire of memories and experiences. This tells you, as you have described it, gives you evidence of the imbalance of your world, your world population and how people are so tremendously unprepared to become a conscious part of the whole, of the one, and be responsible in that regard.
The necessity of direct experience
Vicki: And my own comment would be that we can teach this in schools in the inner cities, but unless children experience it in a natural setting, that it really has little meaning to them. Would you agree with that?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. Talking about something is much different than actually experiencing it. It is the experience that is primary to learning; otherwise it is just another academic experience. It is one thing to talk about the birth of a zebra; it is another thing to watch it. It is one thing to talk about the birth of a calf; it is quite another to attend to the birth of a calf or another animal. It is an experience that you will never forget. And living on your world is one that you will never forget through the duration of your future life. The more you experience reality on your world, the more that you will have to take with you into the afterlife and reflect on as learning experiences for that era.
Children and their electronic devices
Vicki: Thank you. It really speaks to how I view education, and that is experiential; not the pouring of information into the minds of children, but allowing them, what I call holistic, authentic experiences, where they engage.
I’m going to move on to another topic, related to children, and this has to do with all of their electronic devices; these include computers, cell phones, sound systems and gaming toys. Our scientists are beginning to measure both positive and negative effects in the use of these devices, because our children are attracted to these, and often are using these continuously. I do understand that it is our role as parents and adults, to monitor the amount of use of these devices, but I guess what I’m wondering is just what is the degree of safety here, so I’m asking you, from the standpoint of health, could you offer us some advice on the safety of these devices for our children?
MONJORONSON: Yes, I would be most glad to. Aside from the effects of electronic radiation, the most detrimental aspect of these devices is the development of obsessive/compulsive behaviors, where the individual becomes just one more transistor in the regimen of this device, where they repeat and experience over and over and over again, as though this repetition would make them part of the machine, and the machine part of them. It is an artificial way of living and experiencing. It is not altogether detrimental to these children as long as it is known when the learning curve has been maximized, and the child is withdrawn from that activity.
You will find in the elderly, that these games are in fact, very helpful to train the mind and keep it active, that it acts as a preventative to dementia in the elderly. For children, however, these devices often form habitual patterns of repetition, which are detrimental, and which takes the child away from the reality of their biosphere, as we were just discussing. This is an unreality of life and it is artificial. It keeps the individual from experiencing real life that they will need to know and go through. Again, the harmfulness occurs when the learning curve has been maximized and where it becomes habitual or obsessive/compulsive. The child needs to be withdrawn from that, when that evidence occurs. Thank you.
How will computers fit into the future of education?
Vicki: I’d like to talk a bit more about computers. I see computers really opening opportunity for us in terms of where and when learning actually occurs. My question would be, how do you see computers affecting how and where we educate in the future?
MONJORONSON: I would be most glad to. You will find computers offer a multi-cultural venue for education, where children in remote areas of remote continents, can be connected through satellites and have electricity through photovoltaic devices for charging batteries. This actually will raise the education level of your global population very rapidly, particularly to those remote areas where indigenous people live. It aids these groups in becoming enculturated to a global culture; it assists in individual’s learning skills and attaining levels of achievement through degree earning, and so on, where they would not otherwise be able to do so. They become accredited members of a professional society.
You have what is called FaceBook, and this provides a wonderful arena of social interaction, that is a new form of social behaving and ethics. However, it is just another venue, but it will assist in some ways in your face-to-face social interaction with others, individuals and groups, but is no substitute. You will find these computer learning environments wonderful adjuncts to learning, but no substitute for face-to-face experiences. You will soon learn that these devices have limitations, and it is important that you understand these limitations for learning, quickly and rapidly so that you do not expose large numbers of your population to unproductive or ineffective learning situations that do not augment or reflect the reality of your social life, and social ethics and social morality.
Reality and social ethics of using computers
It is important as well, that the violence that your race and your nation has an infatuation with, not be supported or assisted to spread. This is very debilitating to young people and those who are susceptible to anti-social behavior and psychotic developments will find this venue fascinating, but highly detrimental to your larger society. So beware of the benefits and the hazards of these learning environments. Thank you.
Religious freedom vs. spiritual expression in schools
Vicki: That was very informative. Monjoronson, this next question is a personal one, and it is something I struggle with: as spirituality becomes more a part of my life, I struggle with this. And so I’m going to begin here: Individuals running our public sector, have become quite rigid about allowing any kind of spiritual expression. I understand that the intent is to protect religious freedom, and I support that. However, when I look at children, who we are attempting to raise more spiritually, and who will want to express their spirituality, I find a tremendous struggle with this, a disparity, since a large part of their life is spent in school. Could you help me reconcile this?
MONJORONSON: I will strive to do so. What you are seeing is another bit of evidence about the naiveté, the innocence, the youthfulness and lack of maturity and social evolution in your society, your nation and your global culture. You see what is needed, but your culture, which is reflected in your educational system, has not really gotten there yet. It is only now struggling to overcome the differences of church and state, whereas it is talking about church as religion; you are talking about competing authorities, which have no place in education. Religion is a personal choice for a religious authority, when one adopts that is their choice.
To foster religious education in public schools is not a positive or productive thing to pursue, as it causes a conflict of authority. However, it has not begun to sift and sort the more mature and evolved level of recognizing that there is an esprit, a spirit to the universe, which does not speak to religion, but that there is science, and there spirit; that there is something about the universe which is unreal, which is unscientific, which is not measurable, but yet seems to under gird the whole operation of all that exists. This spiritual enterprise of the universe is a reality that no matter how many decades and centuries pass cannot be washed away or ignored, or stated that it does not exist. You can state that religions do not exist, that they do go away, that they do not have any authority, but you cannot do so for the spiritual element of the universe.
This, dear one, is a matter of time and evolving maturity and thoughtfulness, for a troubled educational system in this country and other countries. Your educational system will not become holistic and effective until it recognizes that there are some aspects of the universe which are unknowable, mysterious and which causes you great curiosity, and of course this is a wonderful facet that must not be swept away from your educational forum.
Segregation and compartmentalization in education
Vicki: Thank you. That was helpful, because it really did delineate between religion and spirituality for me, and its role. I see the beginning of some reconciliation here in my thoughts.
I’d like to go back; I missed one area of discussion that I wanted to talk about. It has to do with segregation and compartmentalization of our educational system, and as I said before, I see that we do this in many areas. One area that I’d like to talk about is gender. I see that oftentimes we segregate in certain activities, and even in certain schools. So my question is: How do you view this practice, whether it’s an all-boy, or all-girl school, or all-boy or all-girl activities?
MONJORONSON: There are of course, positive aspects to teaching only boys at one time, and only girls at one time, but there are certain behaviors and ways of behaving where they need to be separated. However, the compartmentalizing that you have and segregating that you have spoken about, is another aspect of the linearity of education and of thinking. Compartmentalizing and using logic are very, very immediately productive, but they do not always reflect the reality that you live in. Life truly is a continuum. If you were to segregate, you would see that there are little boys and little girls, and that there are adult men and adult women—and some are in-between for teens, which is very confusing to everybody! You would find that in actuality there is a continuum as these children grow into adulthood, and this reflects the reality that you live in.
Both of these ways of viewing the universe, the world, the social sphere that individuals live in, both need to be taught; that simply using this compartmentalization, this linearity, lends itself to judgment, to inaccurate discernment, leads to thinking in ways which do not reflect reality of where you live. Extreme cases of this are prejudice and bigotry, that you are not one of us, because of your skin color; that you are not one of us because you come from a different clan or tribe, that therefore we can kill you, and it is justifiable; or we can segregate you, or we can capture you and use you as a slave. These are old, archaic ways of behaving, but they are still used in people’s thinking and treatment of others. This compartmentalization and linearity lends to inaccurate thinking, that there is separation from others, whereas in reality, there is no separation at all, but continuity and ultimately oneness. Your question is soundly based as it leads one into a larger way of thinking about your world, your culture, and your place in it. Anything that causes separation is artificial and does not reflect the true continuum of humanity, of which you are one and among.
Bringing back the one-room schoolhouse?
Vicki: It brings to mind when there was a time in our history, where we had one-room schoolhouses, where children of all ages and abilities and genders were taught in one-room, usually by one teacher, and though at that time that was pretty limiting, children did have the experience of teaching one another. Nowadays, maybe with more immediate access to resources and to people, I’m wondering if this is a viable option again. Do you see this as a possible application in the future for education?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. This is truly an extension of the family learning environment, or multi-family, extended family learning environment. What has happened in your culture, your educational system is the extreme segmentation and compartmentalization of specialties. And you are now trying to get back to the integrated base, where children who are disabled become a part of the larger group. In the one-room schoolhouse situation you described, everyone in the room becomes acquainted with those who are disabled, and those who are brilliant; those who are crippled physically and mentally, and those who have exceptional skills, mentally, physically and socially, and so these one-room schoolhouses reflect the reality of your larger society, and this is where your educational system is trying to get back to.
Having older children, who are experienced and capable, teach those who are younger and less capable. This resembles the educational system that you will experience in the afterlife as a morontial being, going through hundreds and hundreds of levels of education. Those who know, teach. Those who do not know are taught, and so on, so that always you are the student, become the teacher, who is still the student.
There is so much to learn in the universe, and in your society. The one-room schoolhouse provides an environment where you learn to cooperate, coordinate, get along, produce, become effective, or become disengaged, disenchanted and disenfranchised and sometimes in the worst cases, you are exiled by the group. This is a rarity in those larger one-room schoolhouse situations, though it seems to be an extension that is accepted in your current compartmentalized, linear educational system.
You want to use the very best of the one-room schoolhouse as a continuing educational situation, and sending the children apart for specialized training that they need. They learn the wholeness of their society, and they learn to overcome their handicaps, and they also learn how to fully develop their potentials with other individuals, who can create competition for them, which is a positive aspect on occasion.
Vicki: Thank you. With that question, I would like to end this session and truly thank you, Monjoronson, because I feel we have covered some ground here that will direct us toward a much more sustainable educational institution. We’ve covered many, many areas today. The depth of your answers and the wisdom behind them, is going to help all of us, tremendously, as we map this out.
Monjoronson’s Mission
MONJORONSON: You can appreciate my own excitement for the decades and centuries ahead, as I am with your children, grandchildren and ultimately your many, many grandchildren in generations in the future. I will be here, providing the same kind of wisdom, guidance and practical assistance that you are receiving today, but I will be able to enjoy seeing the fruits of my efforts and those of our—yours and my—seraphic assistants.
Future updates on Urantia’s progress
Vicki: And can I ask, will we be able to get a little window into this situation, once we leave earth?
MONJORONSON: Most definitely. You will be tuned into the universe broadcasts, which will have a byline from this planet, speaking about the progress that is there. This is a broadcast of different proportions than you are used to, it is a multi-channel, interactive sort of broadcast, where you can see what is going on from where you came from.
Vicki: Okay, that’s something to look forward to; that’s comforting—thank you. And I think that concludes my questions at this time.
Becoming involved in the mission
MONJORONSON: I look forward to the coming weeks and months. As you have seen, we have a huge canvas in front of us, and we have used our pencil to outline the vistas, horizons and those topics, which are near by. As we move forward in our work together, we will begin to actually fill in the blanks of this outline that we have sketched. As this one was for education, we will as well have one for peace, for economies, for healthcare, for family design and dynamics, and so on. These are the fundamentals of a sustainable civilization, and we have need to cover them all.
What I am speaking about is actually “doing” something in your society, together. Now we must, in ways, go forward, though we will continue here. We must go forward in other venues, to begin the work of designing a sustainable society, beginning at the local level, with an eye on the grand level as well. I will guide you through this, as will our attending Melchizedeks, who are most adept at teaching, administering to these programs. Each of you who hear this and who read this, will in some way in the future of your life be contacted by us, and be used by us if you are willing, to participate in this work. There is literally no end to the positions that need to be filled, and the work that needs to be done. The practicality of managing an evolving civilization is tremendous, and of course we have tremendous resources to assist you.
I give you thanks for attending to these sessions, to listening, to reading, to contemplating, to reflecting on what we have told and shared with you, and we ask you to be thoughtful and supportive of these programs, to the capacity that you are able. Nothing less and nothing more is expected than that, which you are fully capable of. Know that in addition to this, that you are loved! That you are appreciated and accepted where you are, that you truly are a member of a larger society, one which has bounds far past this planet. That you are in a family who supports you and cares for you, that there are literally millions and billions of beings who are unseen to you, who assist you in coming into the new era of your personal life, and the era of your planet. And we give thanks for that, and we give thanks for your attention. Good day.
