Bringing joy to the classroom is not only a healthy spirituality, it is also good pedagogy. We explore three questions: What is joy? Why foster joy in our classrooms? How do we bring joy into our classrooms? 

What is joy?
What do we understand by joy? Fr. Ron Rolheiser has insights in this in Meditation on Joy and Living in Joy is Hard Work.

Fr. Henri Nouwen in Here and Now wrote:

Joy is essential to spiritual life. Whatever we may think or say about God, when we are not joyful, our thoughts and words cannot bear fruit. Jesus reveals to us God’s love so that his joy may become ours and that our joy may become complete. Joy is the experience of knowing that you are unconditionally loved and that nothing — sickness, failure, emotional distress, oppression, war, or even death — can take that love away.

Joy…