LTI’s Educational Approach
We believe that education should begin with virtuous impressions on the heart and be principle-based. Education ought to develop both character and competence for the purpose of living a life of maximum joy. We love the beautiful, seek out the true, wish for the good, and the best do. The study and application of true principles invites individual moral excellence and public virtue; classics in all disciplines best convey principles we of light, truth, and intelligence.
We use the arts to increase our capacity for joy. In the context of the Well-Educated Heart rotation topics, we find abundant examples of beauty and diversity in the cultures, great lives, and natural world across the globe and throughout time. The foundational tools for making impressions on the heart are music, fine art, poetry, story, and nature. We seek to preserve a culture of faith, freedom, and family through our cyclical experience with the rotation topics.
Recognizing that each individual is created by God with unlimited potential, we respect and trust the individual’s autonomy to do the hard work of wrestling with principles and ideas. We offer him or her the transformative opportunity to practice, fail, try again, and succeed. We call this the Liber Cycle. This process develops self-directed learners equipped with the ability and passion to pursue the skills, abilities, and knowledge needed to fulfill their unique missions.
We honor the parent’s role as their child’s primary mentor.
We believe in honoring the natural phases of development. We aim to inspire intrinsic curiosity while also teaching core fundamental principles and fostering a love of learning. Learning is richer and more substantive in a variety of learning environments and when guided by mentors who are passionate and loving in the way they nurture the individual’s genius.
Phases of Learning & LTI Programs
Core Phase (birth to about age 8) The mission of the Core program is to warm the hearts of each child and develop the individual’s foundational understanding of right and wrong, true and false, good and evil, and to assure the child that her or his individual worth is infinite, unchanging, and not dependent upon academic performance. Classes are based on WellEducated Heart principles and utilize a variety of methods for engaging with children including singing songs, viewing and creating art, hearing stories and poems, and playing together with loving supervision. Mentors support the mother and father in their central role in the child’s life.
Love of Learning Phase (about 8-12 years of age) is steeped in classics, projects, curiosity, and ideas. Pursuing a wide range of personal interests leads to growth in competence, diligence, character, and accountability. The mission of the Love of Learning program is to strengthen the whole child, focusing on inspiring character development, curiosity, and a love of learning. Classes invite children to develop abilities, acquire skills, and gain knowledge through hands-on projects, classics, and the arts. Rather than focusing on mastery of any given content, children are encouraged to grow in confidence that they can learn anything. Love of Learners practice the art of applying content from classics in a way that prepares them for scholar phase.
Mentors may work in tandem with parents to meet student ability and skill level. Parents may also seek alternative assignments that are customized to the needs of a child. VMASK is recommended as a diagnostic tool to recognize the next right step.
Scholar Phase (about 12-18 years of age) dives deeply and broadly into complex subjects and personal studies, with an emphasis on obtaining cultural literacy and refining academic skills.
Inspiring mentors help emerging scholars discover and prepare for their individual missions. Scholar phase is the time in which to get the education to match one’s mission.
The Scholar Program aims to grow and develop the character and competence of each student. LTI uses LEMI Scholar Projects™ and other board-approved projects to inspire self-directed learning inside and outside the classroom. At the end of a successful scholar phase, students will be equipped to read like a lawyer, write like an author, compute like a mathematician, speak like an orator, think like a scientist, lead like a statesman, and contribute with a heart for service in their homes and communities.
Mentors may work in tandem with parents to meet student ability and skill level. Parents may also seek alternative assignments that are customized to the needs of a child. VMASK is recommended as a diagnostic tool to recognize the next right step.
Mission Phase (adulthood) is the application of the education obtained in order to help improve and bless the world. In this phase the habits learned and practiced from previous phases continue to expand and enrich one’s ability to live their mission fully.
For more on the Phases of Learning, see Leadership Education: The Phases of Learning by Oliver and Rachel DeMille.
Parent Program
The mission of the Parent Program is to provide parents with the vision, support, mentoring, and relationships necessary for pursuing Leadership Education with an emphasis on heartbased learning in their homes. It also aims to create a community of connected and compassionate families who can prepare foundations of liberty for future generations. Parents are encouraged to progress through the phases of learning themselves as a way to discover, prepare for, and engage in their life mission alongside their efforts to build their families. They participate in a weekly parent class, monthly Mothers and Fathers of Influence discussions, member meetings, retreats, LEMI training, as well as mentor LTI classes.
Methodology
The most effective teaching can take place when mentors approach planning with a clear vision of what she or he would most like individual students to know, feel, and do. With an understanding that feeling preceeds knowing, mentors seek to put their own hearts right and to connect with the hearts of their students. Beginning with the end in mind enables mentors to prioritize content, experiences, and environments in order to maximize student engagement, meaningful connections, and real-life application. Mentors act as facilitators, using formal and informal learning environments, and VMASK to facilitate, coach, and assess a student’s next right step.
Learning Environments
Formal learning environments include:
1. Arts – music, fine art, poetry, story, and nature.
2. Coaching - the process of guiding a student or group of students to find their next right step toward a desired goal.
3. Colloquium - a mentored group discussion of a shared experience (e.g., a book, film, or work of art).
4. Debrief - a discussion following any learning environment which allows students to process emotions, make connections, realize personal insights, and draw conclusions.
5. Document Study - the process of analyzing, understanding, and dissecting classics.
6. Lecture - an oral presentation by a mentor intended to convey information, preferably used sparingly and in an engaging and inspiring manner.
7. Simulation - a shared experience in a safe environment that mimics the learning involved in high-stakes circumstances; must be followed by a debrief.
8. Speaking - the process of oral persuasion, presentation, and communication.
9. Testing - a setting reserved for older scholars which allows students to demonstrate depth and breadth of abilities, skills, and knowledge acquired.
10. Tutorial - a small group of students discussing a specific topic with a mentor.
11. Writing - the process of thinking, refining, and communicating thoughts.
12. Notebooking – the process of collecting and cataloging individual learning gems.
Informal learning environments include play, work, creative and athletic pursuits, family life, talking with friends, and learning from the example of others.
Mentors should use a variety of learning environments each week adapting these appropriately to applicable phases of learning.
VMASK
VMASK is an acronym for the five Leadership Ladders of Vision, Mission, Abilities, Skills, and Knowledge created by LEMI (Leadership Education Mentoring Institute), a visual representation of an individual’s progression and growth. VMASK allows a mentor to acknowledge and consider each student’s varying experiences, perspectives, aptitude, challenges, preferences, talents, backgrounds, and personality. It can be used as a diagnostic tool to identify and overcome roadblocks to growth and to help determine an individual’s next right step.
Ladder 1: Vision
Vision is the ability to think about or plan the future with imagination and wisdom. Mentors cast vision by helping learners understand who they are, where they are going, why they are going there, what it feels like to be going there, what learners can do, how to move forward, and what the rewards will be for those actions. Mentors help relate and connect content to an individual learner’s life; the “why” makes the “what” relevant.
Ladder 2: Mission
Every individual has inherent worth and a unique contribution to make to the world; this is Mission. Mentors work to lovingly instill this principle into each learner’s heart, mind, and soul. By exposing individuals to greatness in all forms, mentors aim to inspire learners to seek after, realize, and achieve their own life purposes and missions.
Ladder 3: Abilities
Abilities, within the context of the leadership ladders, is defined as character, or the mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual’s nature. Mentors seek to help learners build and develop strong moral character in the patterns in which they interact with others and also how they treat themselves.
Ladder 4: Skills
Skills, within the context of the leadership ladders, is defined as the expertise or talent needed to do something well. Almost any skill can be learned or improved with determination and practice. Mentors coach and instruct learners in the practice and process of gaining competence and excellence in their performance.
Ladder 5: Knowledge
Sometimes a learner’s next right step is simply to obtain the knowledge relevant to his or her vision and mission and the necessary abilities and skills needed to move forward. Language lays the foundation for obtaining knowledge. Knowledge is comprehension of and familiarity with truths, principles, or facts acquired through faith, experience, investigation, perception, or study; it can refer to a theoretical or practical understanding of a subject or branch of learning. Mentors set an example of lifelong learning and encourage others in this pursuit.
Section 4. Curriculum Learning Material
Learning material and content used at LTI is virtuous, lovely, of good-report, and praiseworthy. LTI is infused with classics. We define a classic as a creative work in any discipline that conveys principles of truth, goodness, and beauty. Classics are worthy of returning to and studying repeatedly throughout our lives. All creative work can be classified into four categories based on their content and merit:
Whole works show that good is good, evil is evil, and that ultimately good wins. These works should constitute the bulk of the material used in classes as they confirm true fundamental principles and patterns. Whole works clearly and powerfully demonstrate that an allegiance to forms of truth, goodness, and beauty result in ultimate peace, freedom, and joy.
Broken works show that good is good, evil is evil, and that for the moment evil wins. Both whole and broken works show the results of good and evil forms.
Bent material is based on lies and deception and teaches that good is evil, evil is good, or that there is no good nor evil. A careful, mentored reading of bent books can teach a student to discern subtle, deceptive, and enticing falsehoods. These materials should be used with extreme care at an appropriate age or phase of learning.
Perverse material should never be presented to students. It is depraved, warped, twisted, corrupt, unnatural, addictive, distorted, and destructive.
Forgotten Classics
Children and parents progress through the developmental stages of the heart as they experience the forgotten classics found in the Libraries of Hope website. They are arranged according to the annual rotation schedule and in conjunction with the child’s natural growth through familiar, imaginative, and heroic tales. At LTI, we draw heavily from these books, audios, and resources.
Scholar Projects
Scholar Projects are thematic courses spanning various disciplines, including history, math, science, government, and literature. They are structured sequentially to develop a student’s vision, sense of mission, abilities, skills, and knowledge. Scholar Projects follow a continuum, increasing in difficulty and complexity as a scholar progresses through them. Each scholar project comprises an arc of growth through personal challenges, failures, and victories.
Performance and Culminating Activities
LTI values the process of learning over the measurement of end results. Excellence and outstanding performance should be encouraged and may be awarded through artistic performances, awards, and recognition of student accomplishments. Each core and love of learning class, scholar project or class, and parent class may confer its own awards and recognitions at a student showcase, devotional, parent night, or in class. Family and friends of LTI members are invited to attend performances, showcases, and gatherings to encourage and celebrate the growth of the students.
