Teaching is fundamentally an act of respect. Every time a student chooses to spend their irreplaceable time with our content, they're making an investment that deserves a meaningful return. This philosophy, developed through years of teaching and refined through research & centers on a simple truth: education should prepare people not just to know things, but to contribute meaningfully to their communities, their professions, and their own lives.
The CORE Framework emerged from a recognition that education needed to be more intentional about the user experience. (Yes, I said user experience), because that's what students are experiencing when they engage with our teaching. The framework rests on four pillars:
Being concise doesn't mean dumbing things down. As explored in "Respecting a Learner's Resources" (CORE Framework, 2024h), it means recognizing that students' time is currency. Once spent, it's gone forever. Conciseness involves stripping away the unnecessary while preserving what challenges and transforms.
Consider the sailing instructor who must teach nautical terminology. As described in "The Power of Language in Learning" (CORE Framework, 2024g), introducing terms like "starboard" and "jibing" isn't jargon for jargon's sake; it's essential vocabulary that could save lives. The key is introducing new language purposefully, tied directly to application.
Organization goes beyond neat PowerPoints and clear syllabi. Sometimes, as "When CORE Need Not Be Too CORE" (CORE Framework, 2025b) explains, the most organized approach involves strategic disruption. Interleaving: mixing different problem types within practice sessions. This might feel chaotic to students initially, but it's actually a higher form of organization designed for long-term retention (Rohrer & Taylor, 2007).
Think of yourself as a curator, not just an instructor. "Are You A Curator?" (CORE Framework, 2025a) argues that like museum curators who transform random artifacts into meaningful exhibitions, educators must select, organize, and contextualize information to create coherent learning journeys. Without this curation, education becomes "a disorganized mess" full of wonderful fragments but lacking pathways to understanding.
Relevance isn't about making everything "fun" or immediately applicable. It's about what "Transparency Speeches" (CORE Framework, 2025d) calls "Value with a capital V", helping students understand not just what they're learning but why it matters for their future selves and the people they'll serve.
Physical therapy students grinding through anatomy aren't just memorizing muscles; they're preparing to restore movement to stroke patients.
As "SBAR is CORE" (CORE Framework, 2025c) demonstrates, learning structured communication protocols isn't bureaucracy, it's preparing to save lives through clear handoffs. When we make these connections explicit, struggle becomes purposeful.
Engagement isn't about being the "cool professor" or turning lectures into entertainment. As "Manage Your Energy NOT Your Time" (CORE Framework, 2024e) reveals, true engagement happens when activities challenge students at the sweet spot between their current abilities and their potential—what Csikszentmihalyi (1990) calls "flow."
This might mean incorporating humor, as discussed in "The Value of Appropriate Humor in Education" (CORE Framework, 2024i) and "What's So Funny?" (CORE Framework, 2025e), but only when it serves learning rather than distracting from it. It definitely means varying instructional methods, incorporating peer learning, and creating opportunities for students to generate meaning rather than just consume information.
While CORE provides the framework, the teaching philosophy extends into several crucial dimensions:
"Creating a Culture of Trust and Safety with Students" (CORE Framework, 2024b) reveals a critical insight: traditional course evaluations fail because they exist in isolation, not as part of continuous improvement cycles. The philosophy demands creating multiple, reinforcing feedback loops:
Student-to-Instructor Feedback: When students see their feedback leading to real changes—as detailed in the "Is It Safe? Is It Worth It?" matrix from Shedletzky (2023), they become more invested in providing quality input. This creates a virtuous cycle: better feedback leads to better teaching, which leads to more engaged students who provide even better feedback.
Peer-to-Peer Learning: "Beliefs as Operating Systems" (CORE Framework, 2024a) shows how synergistic mindsets, combining growth mindset with stress-can-be-enhancing beliefs, create compound effects. When students support each other's learning, success breeds success.
Instructor Modeling: "Embracing Vulnerability" (CORE Framework, 2024c) describes how sharing failures openly, like Samsung's Openness Medal initiative, normalizes struggle and encourages risk-taking. When instructors model continuous learning, students adopt the same mindset, creating an upward spiral of intellectual courage.
"The Mentor Mindset" (CORE Framework, 2025f) and "The Art of Exceptional Mentorship" (CORE Framework, 2025g) present a critical framework: effective teaching isn't choosing between being demanding or supportive; it's being both. This means providing what Yeager et al. (2014) call "WISE feedback": combining warmth, clear standards, belief in students' capability, and specific guidance for improvement.
As explored in "How the Navy SEALs Can Help You Build an Awesome Faculty" (CORE Framework, 2024d), trust matters more than individual performance. A brilliant student who undermines classmates damages the learning ecosystem more than they contribute through individual achievement.
"Faculty Attitudes – The Power of Ecosystem Dynamics" (CORE Framework, 2024c) distinguishes between "ecosystem" and "egosystem" approaches. In an ecosystem classroom:
This ecosystem thinking creates positive feedback loops at every level. As "Tall Poppy Syndrome in Academia" (CORE Framework, 2024j) warns, environments that cut down high achievers create negative spirals of mediocrity. But when success is celebrated and shared, excellence becomes contagious.
"Everything Starts with a Question" (CORE Framework, 2024d) and "The Power of Authentic Questions" (CORE Framework, 2024f) establish questioning as fundamental to learning. But not all questions are equal. "The Curiosity Code" (CORE Framework, 2025h) distinguishes between questions that close down thinking and those that open it up.
The formula presented in "The Formula for Better Outcomes" (CORE Framework, 2025i) crystallizes this: "The power of your outcomes is determined by the quality of the questions that you ask yourself multiplied by the frequency that you ask, raised by the power of the integrity of your answers." This creates a feedback loop where better questions lead to deeper insights, which enable even better questions.
"Navigating Education in the AI Era" (CORE Framework, 2025j) and "When Disruption Becomes Design" (CORE Framework, 2025k) offer crucial perspectives on technology integration. "Bridging the Technological Divide in Education" (CORE Framework, 2024k) acknowledges that many educators are "digital immigrants" to their students' technological world, but this gap can be bridged through intentional design.
The key is using technology to amplify rather than replace human connection. AI can handle repetitive tasks, freeing educators for mentorship. But as these posts emphasize, the human elements (empathy, ethical reasoning, creativity) remain irreplaceable.
"How the CORE Framework Supports Universal Design in Education" (CORE Framework, 2024l) and "In-Person Intensives – A CORE Framework Approach" (CORE Framework, 2024m) demonstrate how to build feedback loops into course design:
"Cultivating an Inquiry Mindset" (CORE Framework, 2025l) and "Transparent Culture & Trust Within Academia" (CORE Framework, 2024n) emphasize that intellectual risk-taking requires psychological safety. Create this through:
"Beliefs as Operating Systems" (CORE Framework, 2024a) reveals how combining complementary beliefs creates exponential effects. Don't just teach content—help students install empowering mental models:
These synergistic beliefs create positive feedback loops where success in one area reinforces success in others.
"Serving The Overlooked Stakeholders in Higher Education" (CORE Framework, 2024o) reminds us that education's impact ripples outward. Make these connections explicit through transparency speeches that link current struggle to future service. When students understand their learning serves others, motivation becomes self-sustaining.
This philosophy isn't just feel-good rhetoric—it's grounded in robust research. "Beyond the Lecture: How Carl Wieman Rewired Science Education" (CORE Framework, 2025m) shows how active learning doubles performance while cutting failure rates. "Bridging the CORE Framework with Design Thinking" (CORE Framework, 2024p) connects these principles to broader innovation frameworks.
"CORE Compatible Theories and Frameworks" (CORE Framework, 2024q) and "CORE-Enhancing Retention, Comprehension, Synthesis, & Application" (CORE Framework, 2024r) demonstrate alignment with:
"Building on Wisdom" (CORE Framework, 2025n) traces these ideas through thought leaders from Carol Dweck to Viktor Frankl, showing how the philosophy synthesizes decades of research and practice.
"Understanding Truth: Navigating to Absolute Reality" (CORE Framework, 2024s) reminds us that education must help students distinguish between personal, social, and objective truths. This requires teaching not just content but critical thinking and scientific reasoning.
"Responsibility and The Power of Clear Communication" (CORE Framework, 2024t) places the burden of clarity on educators, not students. When comprehension fails, we must examine our teaching, not blame the learner.
"Complex Systems Theory & C.O.R.E." (CORE Framework, 2024u) acknowledges that learning environments are complex adaptive systems. Small changes can have large effects, making continuous monitoring and adjustment essential.
This philosophy embraces apparent contradictions because learning itself is paradoxical. We make things clear while introducing productive confusion. We respect time while demanding struggle. We organize carefully while strategically disrupting. We leverage technology while preserving humanity.
Most importantly, we recognize that great teaching creates positive feedback loops at every level:
When these loops align, education transforms from information transfer to human development. Students don't just learn content; they develop the intellectual courage, collaborative skills, and ethical grounding to contribute meaningfully to the world.
The CORE Framework provides the foundation, but the philosophy extends beyond any single framework. It's about recognizing education as fundamentally human work that requires both scientific rigor and artistic intuition, both challenging standards and compassionate support.
When we get this balance right, we create educational experiences worthy of our students' irreplaceable time and to prepare them to create experiences worthy of others' time in turn. That's the ultimate positive feedback loop: students becoming educators in their own fields, carrying forward not just knowledge but wisdom about how humans truly learn and grow.
Bjork, R. A., & Bjork, E. L. (2011). Making things hard on yourself, but in a good way: Creating desirable difficulties to enhance learning. In M. A. Gernsbacher et al. (Eds.), Psychology and the real world (pp. 56–64). Worth Publishers.
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CORE Framework. (2024b, August 12). Creating a culture of trust and safety with students. https://coreframework.org
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CORE Framework. (2024n, August 17). Transparent culture & trust within academia. https://coreframework.org
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CORE Framework. (2024r, August 10). CORE-enhancing retention, comprehension, synthesis, & application. https://coreframework.org
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CORE Framework. (2024t, September 4). Responsibility and the power of clear communication. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2024u, August 12). Complex systems theory & C.O.R.E.. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2024c, August 15). Embracing vulnerability: Turning failure into a pathway to success. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2024d, August 12). How the Navy SEALs can help you build an awesome faculty. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2024g, August 16). How improv comedy made me a better educator. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025a, August 22). Are you a curator?. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025b, August 25). When CORE need not be too CORE. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025c, May 15). SBAR is CORE. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025d, August 18). Transparency speeches. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025e, September 8). What's so funny?. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025f, August 13). The mentor mindset. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025g, March 3). The art of exceptional mentorship. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025h, August 14). The curiosity code. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025i, August 7). The formula for better outcomes. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025j, September 8). Navigating education in the AI era. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025k, May 30). When disruption becomes design: The impact of AI on higher ed. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025l, August 7). Cultivating an inquiry mindset. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025m, April 11). Beyond the lecture: How Carl Wieman rewired science education. https://coreframework.org
CORE Framework. (2025n, August 25). Building on wisdom. https://coreframework.org
Csikszentmihalyi, M. (1990). Flow: The psychology of optimal experience. Harper & Row.
Rohrer, D., & Taylor, K. (2007). The shuffling of mathematics problems improves learning. Instructional Science, 35(6), 481–498.
Shedletzky, S. (2023). Speak-up culture: When leaders truly listen, people step up. Page Two Books.
Yeager, D. S., Purdie-Vaughns, V., Garcia, J., Apfel, N., Brzustoski, P., Master, A., Hessert, W. T., Williams, M. E., & Cohen, G. L. (2014). Breaking the cycle of mistrust: Wise interventions to provide critical feedback across the racial divide. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 143(2), 804–824.
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AI Collaboration Disclosure
Many articles on the CORE Framework blog have been created with the support of generative AI tools, which are used to structure and synthesize research findings. However, the ideas, conclusions, and critical interpretations expressed herein are entirely original and reflect the author's unique perspective, experience, and academic judgment.
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