Local Parent Teaches Middle Schoolers Lessons in Wisdom at Georgia State

In 2003, Sandy Springs dad Michael Prolman contemplated the kind of wisdom that he wants to pass on to his two daughters. 

"I thought what if something happens to me before I was able to pass my wisdom on to my children," explained Prolman. “So I created a place [a website] where they could go to see what Daddy would say. And I decided that this information was good for other people too.” 

Prolman created an “Introduction to Wisdom” course and taught it to middle school students at First Montessori School of Atlanta in 2011. [The school has changed its name to Springmont.] On Saturday, he starts .

“It’s based on my beliefs that middle school and high school kids can be systematically trained to be wise,” Prolman said.

His course teaches students to make wise decisions using logic, math, experience and intuition. His goal is to help students develop different ways of recognizing their strengths and when to apply wisdom.

Prolman uses proverbs to teach students about life experience. See his website for examples at www.lifewisdom.com.

“I take this a step further and train kids in what I call the eye of the hurricane. It has very intense winds but the middle is very calm,” he said.

“You need to be 'the eye' to make a wise decision,” Prolman continued. “A lot of times there is a lot going on around you. I train kids how to relax very quickly and then train them [in using different] matrices.”

The website for the Wisdom Research Network at the University of Chicago says that the power of wisdom was overlooked for years but is now more accepted by scholars. A post by Prolman describing his course is on the site under “recent news.”