How Learning Develops Psychological Well-Being
With an increasingly complicated social experience, much attention is being paid to adolescent mental health. But besides the conventional idea of what mental health is, comes a more nuanced idea in mental development and well-being. It is this area that Chestnut State Education Consulting, a Chicago North Shore based education company, is focused on.
A core belief of Chestnut State is that the development of the individual is paramount, not only to progress and achievement, but also to psychological health and overall well-being. Furthermore, they believe that learning can be directly responsible for the improvement of all the aforementioned areas.
The process of learning is crucial and affects a student’s development regarding their self- image, confidence and self-belief, emotional stability, intellectual curiosity, self-esteem, and social-emotional intelligence.
It is this perspective that informs the way Chestnut State works with their students. Whether coaching, advising, or teaching students, this view always sits front and center.
The ups and downs of a school year are more dynamic than ever before. The highs are higher, and the lows are lower. The external noise is exponentially louder, while the internal pressure is greater and competition fiercer. Students are being told who they are (and often that they are not good enough), while they are in a stage of developing their “self.” It is a tremendous amount of weight to manage.
Our mission is to help navigate these turbulent waters. Helping students shut out the external noise while focusing on who they are, as well as finding a system and balance that works for them, is of the utmost importance.
While Chestnut State does not instruct their students to remove themselves from social media, they help navigate the affects of it, putting into place a perspective of the world that is broader, more historical, and more human than the fast-paced manufactured clips of reality students see on a daily basis. One way to do this is through learning.
It may seem obvious, but learning ought to be about much more than merely memorizing facts and information. Learning is about using context to understand who we are, the world we inhabit, and the complex ideas that have shaped humanity. It should be about building social and moral character. Learning has been watered down to almost meaningless information that has no readily identifiable connection to the student. And it is being taught in an ever-increasingly pedantic and distant way.
At Chestnut State, teachers work with students to teach in a way that is connected to their psychological and social development. How they do this: by inserting the student into their own learning. Students are asked to participate in discourse with their teachers to learn not only more about the subject, but about themselves. Every subject illuminates a part of the human condition.
Understanding how those subjects, in turn, are related to them as individuals, increases not only learning and engagement, but their mental well-being as it exercises parts of the mind concerned with perspective, reflection, and introspection.
The historical European liberal arts education was about this exact philosophy: learning a bit of everything to be one with the world, have a better understanding of human history, be educated on matters of art, music, and poetry, and build a strong moral and ethical compass.
Chestnut State is trying to bring this tradition, once central to universities in the United States, to K-12 students. And so far, the results are impressive — students are demonstrating thoughtfulness, curiosity, and imagination. Participating in a different dynamic with their teachers — one of dialogue — they demonstrate an impressive intellectual development. But they also demonstrate psycho-emotional growth.
At the end of the day, their learning is not about academics, but about themselves. And for that, they are better for it.
