Greetings!

Welcome to the first installment of a monthly newsletter I have affectionately titled Notes from a Headmaster. The purpose of this newsletter is simple: to offer personal reflections on classical education, highlight some of the events and moments of learning from an ordinary school day, and conclude with a quotation for further reflection.  

More importantly, this newsletter is one (I hope) of many opportunities to strengthen the partnership between you, the parents, and the educator community at the new Missouri City Aristoi Classical Academy.

I firmly believe that true education begins and ends in the home. I’m grateful that you’ve allowed our school to come alongside you in this noble and profound work of educating these scholars.

Reflection: Building a Home for the Soul

As many of you know, I am also new to the Aristoi community this year and already one of my favorite events is our daily Communitas. “Communitas” is the Latin root word for our English word “Community.” It literally means, “society, fellowship,” and includes the felt sense of community, the experience of being in relationship with other people.

Communitas has been such a crucial component of our fledgling school culture. The program consists of the following elements:

• Pledge of Allegiances to the American and Texas flags.
• A moment of silence
• Singing 
• For the fall semester we are singing America the Beautiful
• Recitation 
• We are memorizing and reciting Bilbo’s poem, Roads Go Ever Ever On.
• Morning Welcome
• A brief reflection on a school virtue and/or belief through story.

I think of Communitas as a microcosm of the school: we assert our patriotism, we practice silence, we sing together, we recite poetry together, and we contemplate universal questions that orient us to a life full of beauty and meaning.

During the morning welcome for the first few weeks of school, I’ve reviewed the foundational virtues of our school. You may have seen the yellow poster on the walls. The virtues are arranged in the form of a building—the Greek Parthenon, to be exact—and I’ve reminded students that the acquisition of virtue is like building a home for our souls.

We begin with Humility and Charity as our foundations; Honesty, Wisdom, Justice, Courage, Temperance, and Respect form the pillars; and Magnanimity is the roof, the crowning achievement in building our home for the soul.

One of the refrains you’ll hear in classical education circles is that formation is the heart of our mission. Students are not brains on a stick, nor are they hard drives where we download information. Children are incarnate human beings who love, hate, and grieve in all the same ways as adults. They become physically exhausted and energized like adults as well.

If we desire for students to live a happy, flourishing life, then we must train their affections and their physical bodies as much as we focus on their academics.

Our school virtues provide a robust, pre-made vocabulary for aiding us in that endeavor.

Temperance reminds us that we should physically exercise self-control; Justice reminds us that we should seek harmony in our soul and in our relationships with others; Wisdom reminds us that we must learn how to use the knowledge we’ve acquired for the good of others; Honesty reminds us that we must face reality—the good, the bad, and the ugly—if we hope to live well; and Magnanimity reminds us that all our actions should be oriented to what is noblest.

Yet, telling a student they should be virtuous isn’t enough. They need a story, an image of how to live. They need to be inspired through a felt sense of meaning and purpose. Fairy tales, fables, and historical figures provide all the fodder they need. Our job, as parents and educators, is simply to ensure that they are steeped in those stories.

Children, like adults, struggle to love and to think abstractly. They will learn to love the idea of “the Good” only when they learn to love a good person—a man or woman who models for them the virtues in all their glory. This person could be a parent, a teacher, King Alfred the Great, or Gandalf, anyone to whom they can relate and aspire to imitate.

The virtues, after all, are more than just a checklist of good deeds. They orient us to a way of being in the world.

During the morning welcome, as I’ve introduced each of the virtues, I’ve tried to tell it in the form of a story. Our stories have included everything from Frog & Toad and Grimm’s fairy tales, to fables about eagles, sparrows, lions, and mice, to The Lord of the Rings and Plato.

I encourage you to ask your students about these virtues. And don’t just ask “What is humility?” Ask them to tell you a story. It’ll make for great conversation.

Around Campus

A few exciting events have happened this week in the classroom. Kindergarten (and yours truly) played with a couple (dead) octopi, 3rd grade made and exploded volcanoes, and 4th grade held an extended socratic dialogue about The Magician’s Nephew which made me wonder about whether “curiosity” is good or bad. I’m still waiting for an answer to that.

This kind of hands-on learning in discussion with their peers and teachers has become and, I hope, will remain a hallmark of the teaching methods at our fledgling campus. Everywhere I go, I hear singing, recitations, and all the sounds that accompany learning. 

The Final Word

In honor of the recent passing of Wendell Berry, a writer who has been and remains an inspirational figure in my own life, I’d like to conclude with one of his poems. If you are unfamiliar with Wendell Berry, I recommend reading a brief review of his life at First Things, which also includes a meditation on the following poem.

The Want of Peace

All goes back to the earth,

and so I do not desire

pride of excess or power,

but the contentments made

by men who have had little:

the fisherman’s silence

receiving the river’s grace,

the gardener’s musing on rows.

I lack the peace of simple things.

I am never wholly in place.

I find no peace or grace.

We sell the world to buy fire,

our way lighted by burning men,

and that has bent my mind

and made me think of darkness

and wish for the dumb life of roots. 

Sincerely,

Nicholas Dalbey

Headmaster - Missouri City

Aristoi Classical Academy