Description

In this episode of The Christopher Perrin Show, Christopher Perrin welcomes John Mays to tell the story of his vocation as a teacher, writer, and founder of Novare Science. Mays traces his winding path from electrical engineering and recording-studio work to public school teaching, graduate study in physics, classical education, and two decades at Regents School of Austin. Along the way, he explains how wide reading in literature, history, philosophy, and theology shaped his approach to science education. The conversation turns to the emergence of Novare Science, beginning with Mays’s frustration over the “cram, pass, forget” cycle and his search for a mastery-based model that would help students retain, understand, and love what they learned. Mays describes four major integrations that make science education classical: mathematics, history, epistemology, and language. He also recounts the long entrepreneurial labor of writing, designing, printing, selling, and revising an eleven-book science curriculum over seventeen years. The episode closes with Mays’s encouragement to science teachers: teach not merely with routine and assignments, but with wonder, beauty, and a vision of creation as God’s loving self-disclosure—themes he develops further in his ClassicalU courses, including Teaching Science Classically: 10 Essential Principles, The Science Mastery Workshop, Science and the Symphony of Creation, and Cultivating Wonder Throughout the School. 

Episode Outline

• John Mays’s winding path through engineering, recording, teaching, physics, classical education, and curriculum writing
• Discovering classical education and teaching physics at Regents School of Austin
• The two questions behind Novare: how to teach science classically and how to overcome “cram, pass, forget”
• Mastery-based learning through cumulative assessments, weekly review, practice, and long-term retention
• The four classical integrations in science: mathematics, history, epistemology, and language
• The first Novare books and the growth from classroom materials into a full science curriculum
• Novare Science, Centripetal Press, and the eventual partnership with Classical Academic Press
• Textbook beauty, classroom wonder, and Mays’s encouragement to science teachers

Key Topics & Takeaways

• A Winding Vocation: Mays’s story moves through engineering, recording, public teaching, graduate physics, classical education, and curriculum writing. Each stage helped prepare him for the work that became Novare Science.
• The “Cram, Pass, Forget” Problem: Mays saw that students often crammed for tests, passed them, and forgot nearly everything soon after. He came to regard this as a serious failure of academic formation.
• Mastery and Long-Term Retention: Mays developed cumulative assessments, weekly review guides, and practice habits so students could retain what they learned. Mastery made learning more durable and satisfying.
• Classical Science Education: Mays describes classical science as integrating mathematics, history, epistemology, and language so students learn science as part of a larger, ordered vision of reality.
• Masterable and Beautiful Textbooks: Oversized textbooks can communicate that a subject cannot truly be learned. A humane science text should be carefully written, aesthetically inviting, and realistically masterable.
• Wonder at Creation: The best science teaching helps students see the grandeur, beauty, and order of creation rather than merely preparing for the next assignment or test.

Questions & Discussion

• What makes a vocation different from a career path?
  Consider John Mays’s movement through engineering, recording, teaching, graduate study, and curriculum writing. How did each stage prepare him for the work that eventually became Novare Science?
• How does the “cram, pass, forget” cycle show up in your own school or learning experience?
  Reflect on classes where students pass assessments but do not retain what they learned. What classroom practices might unintentionally encourage short-term cramming rather than mastery?
• What would it mean to teach for mastery rather than coverage?
  Discuss the difference between racing through a large textbook and helping students retain a smaller, better-chosen body of knowledge. What would have to change in quizzes, homework, review, and expectations?
• How do mathematics, history, epistemology, and language make science education more classical?
  Consider how each element deepens students’ understanding of science. Which of these is easiest to include, and which is most often neglected?
• What role should beauty and wonder play in science education?
  Discuss Mays’s encouragement to show students the grandeur, beauty, and order of creation. What practices help students raise their eyes beyond routine assignments?

Suggested Reading & Resources

• Novare Science
• Centripetal Press
• Student Lab Report Handbook
• Teaching Science So That Students Learn Science by John Mays
• From Wonder to Mastery
• Accelerated Studies in Physics and Chemistry
• Introductory Physics
• General Biology 
• Classical Academic Press
• ClassicalU Course: Teaching Science Classically: 10 Essential Principles
• ClassicalU Course: The Science Mastery Workshop
• ClassicalU Course: Science and the Symphony of Creation
• ClassicalU Course: Cultivating Wonder Throughout the School