This week [April 3-4] a promoter of “place-based education” is coming to Harrisonburg to meet with current and future teachers. On Tuesday he’ll also give a keynote address that’s open to the public, as WMRA’s Christopher Clymer Kurtz reports.
Author David Sobel is on the education teaching faculty at Antioch University New England, in New Hampshire. When he meets with select Rockingham County Public School teachers and visits education classes at James Madison University, he’ll discuss making education relevant for students.
SOBEL: I encourage school districts to connect their curriculum and students more deeply to their local, natural environments and local cultural resources, so historical societies and veterinary clinics and other organizations that have potential to enhance what goes on in schools.
His keynote address, open to the public, will promote the benefits of teaching within a community’s context.
SOBEL: Academic achievement should be one of the goals, but developing local, disposition to be good citizens, to behave in environmentally responsible ways and become more socially, emotionally mature, should be goals of the school.
Sobel’s address Tuesday follows a 6:00 place-based education resource fair. He speaks at 7:30 in room 159 of the JMU Integrated Science and Technology building, and more information is here.