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EDUCATIONAL
PHILOSOPHYS
PURPOSE
AND
PERSPECTIVE
WHAT IS
EDUCATIONAL
PHILISOPHY?
In the course of Western civilization men and women debated the things that mattered
most of them.They argued,for example about politics,war and economics with varying
degrees of insight,zeal,and sophistication.In debating what to do about them they always
argued from a pletform of conviction.What was the source of this conviction?
Sometimes,schollars tells us,it was lodged in myth,sometimes in traditon,sometimes in
relegius fith,and sometimes in reason.Almost nothing in the unfloding of human history
occured as sheer accident.Even when the course of events proved their exponents
wrong,action taken along any one of these lines was always supported by what appeared to be
good and convincing justification.
Politics and economics,historians tells us,were controlled by persons of social
positions and authority,for these subjects,even in their infancy,were wrapped in subtleties and
obscurities too complicated for the ken of common men.Military religion the reservation of
theologians,tradition a preserve for scholars,and law,while it might exist in heaven,belonged
on earth in the hands of the strong.
Yet,outside the narrow circle whre courage and cunning counted so much were the socalled ordinary people.They ent about their daily chores with what demands of necessity they
also paid constant heed to the care and upbringing of their children.
We know enough about lives of our ancestors to know how seldom their hope for their
children was inflated,but they were nevertheless solicitous about their training and
education.As often as not this utelage of children in the bosom of the family never counted
for much on a scale of authentic educational decency,but the simplicity and rusticity of its
character is only one side of long chronicle.
The other side,the one catching and holding our attention,is the interest persons in
every society invested in the care and training of those who would become the next
generation of adults.Neither position of authority nor,for that matterr,trained intellegence was
needed to recognize that whatever societys arangement of its priorities,the care and training
of children headed the list.
Often inarticulate and seldom profound,sometimes with but frequently without
design,generation after generation of our forefathers pondered the issue of how to prepare
children for their places in society.Even when they were not fully aware of what they were
doing,they were palnning for education and,in a sense,constructing a philosophy for it.
In the last analyis,whatever from it may take,and however abstruse or sophisticated it
may become,and wherevert it is found in contemporary society,educational philosophy is a
plan for allowing each succeding generation to fulfill it self and take its place in an
increasingly and often confusing world.
Such
enough,nevertheless conccals almost as much as it reveals about the many sides of the
educational enterprise.
It is necessary to pause from time to get our bearings to examine in some detail
varieties of such plans and the fundamental propositions or convietions on which they are
based.A place to begins is with the various purposes either assumed by or assigned to
educational philosohy.
One has a right to ask any academic discipline to explain itself and to tell persons
about to embark on its study what may be excepted from such an expenditure of time and
talent.Over the years wise men and somr not o wise have asked philosophy of justify its
existence,in pporing over an abundance of educational literature we find that the same inquiry
is commonly directed at educ ational philosophy.
Is philosophy,regradless of the human endeavor with which it essays to deal,simply an
academic exercise that while tempting in intricacy and generous in conundrum,adds up
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nothing? Can it be that the time and effort spent by educators,philosophers,and educational
philosophers inquiring into almost every side of foromal an informal education,or
training,and of character building are wasted ,and that,in the final analysis,nothing
convincing or illuminating can be said about the whole matter of preparing future generations
to take their places in society?
Undertaking
to
persuade
persons
of
its
reasonable
and
responsible
treatise
on
education
ever
written.Allong
with
Plato
he acknowledged
that,uneducated,men are the most savage of earth creatures. But he beg an his educational
novel for a novel is what Emile is with the intention of giving his readers a picture of an ideal
education,one designed for the boy Emile,and he never abandoned his original intention.
When we read Emile we find an educational plan full of novelty and innovation.We
find,moreover,that as Emile lives in a country retreat he learns what nature wants to teach
him on one hand and what his own nature says is good and useful on the other.Almost
certainly Rousseau means to attract our attention and elicit our approval,but he never sets
beforehis readers any unalterable course or direction for education for education to follow.He
merely describes what he conciders tobe the ideal and is willing to leave to us the choice of
adopting or rejecting it as our own plan.(5)
Most scholars who have studied Rousseaus Emile agree that his utopian plan either
hard or impossible to imitate except by people of high social rank able to afford tutors for
their children.The most astute of Rousseaus discipline always knew that his educational
story was meant only for illustrations and that before any of the principles buried away in it
could be followed,they would have to work out methods suitable to their own condition.To
come to this conclusion they had only to read the preface to Emile.The greater or less cade
of execution depnds on a thousand circumtances which it is impossible to define except in a
particular application of the method to this country or thtat,to this condition or that; and those
particular applications are no part of my plan.
Bacons New Atlantis.To some extent Francis Bacons (1561-1626) New Atlantis also
belongs to this category of an inspirational philosophy,a utopian plan for the education of
men and women.But Bacon too often ranges beyond educational to scientific and sociological
questions,so it is hard to maintain with any assurance that New Atlantis has any or many of
the credentials of an educational philosphy.
In any case,scholars allege,Bacon was engaged in demonstrating the worth of
induction as a way of accumulating dependable knowledge more than in trying to design a
place for a way of disseminating it.According to Bacon,discovery,reached through inductive
rather than deductive methods ,was to a huge cooperative social effort; and he was supremely
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confident that knowledge was more dependably supported by starting with particular cases in
experience and drawing general conclusion from them by beginning with general
propositions,first principles,or syllogistic conclusions and then applying them to the
particulars of human experience.
Summerhill.Coming closer to contemporary times,the book by A.S.Neill (18831973),Summerhill : A Radical Approach to Child Rearing.appears to fulfill the specifications
of an inspirational plan,although it has marked deficiencies as an educational
philosophy.Neill,moreover dismissed methods of teaching because we do not consider that
teaching itself matters very much.
Philosophys Inspirational Purpose Today. Although educational philosophy has
adopted,and sometimes promotes,an inspirational purpose,there is little point in dwelling on
this purpose for it is neither popular nor preffered among educational philosophers today.In
the long run,too little is to be gained by simply setting forth an ideal,or what is assumed tobe
an ideal,and then leaving the matter of its beaing adopted either to good will of persons or to
chance in events.
Few educational philosophers are content merely to state their case and put trust in its
inner logic and natural appeal for adoption.As class,educational philosophers want to be
influential and to have their plans paid heed,so they refuse to engage in what is only an
antiseptic exercise.More exactly,the see probably more clearly than their utopian probably
more clearly than their utopian predecessors,the relationship between theory and
practice,between the ideal and actual.They refuse to allow themselves to be simply
interisting,exciting,and perhaps,innovative in pronouncement but inconsequential in practice.
To stay too long with or to develop too much affection for philosophy as an
inspirational enterprise would give additonal ammunition to critics who dispense aith all
philosophy as only an exercise in toying with language,which in the end neither wants nor is
able to affect the course of real life. (6)
Educational Philosophys Analytical Purpose
Every educational philosopher,regradless of allegiance to one or another philosophy,is
prepared to be critical and anlytical in separating principle and policy into their component
parts and holding them up for serutiny of their meining,their valadity and their effifacy.Every
systematic educational philosophy also takes pardonable pride in its penetrating analysis of
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the constituents of educational philosophy before melding them into a comprehensive code
relative to eduscatonal ends and means.
We need read only samples from Platos dialouges,for example,to hear Socrates ask
question of famous Sophists,never to be entirely satisfied with their answers.He always
wanted more.He wanted defenitions of justice,truth,temperancs e,and prudence rendered
precisely.He wanted thickets of linguistic confusion cleared away and complex ideas clarified
so meaning could shine through.Socrates detractors charged him with quibles over words,and
they said he wasted time chasing the elusive god of certitude when he should have been
helping them find solutions to the practical problems of life in the town of Athens.
They missed Socrates point : He was as eager as they to attend to everyday affairs,but
he wanted to stand on a dependable groud of truth before turning his hand to action.Platos
work may stand as the finest example of analysis in philosophical discourse.But every book
ever written on educationl philosophy,from the best to the wrost ,has employed analysis as a
method of sorting out the good from the bad,the dependable from the undependable,the true
from the false,and the prudent from the imprudent.Some philosophers have shown more
talent than orthers in exercising critical judgement and using methods of analysis,but none
has ever abandoned either in drawing on the data of human experience to find signs pointing
in the direction education should take.
Linguistic Analysis an Logical Empiricism.Yet,paying attention to analytic technique
as the common currency of philosophic exchange will not lead us to a clear understanding of
what is currently called educational philosophys analytic purpose.It is better to depend on the
assertions of exponents of the analytic school (either linguistic analysts or logical empiricists)
of educational philosophy : Analysis,they say with almost one voice,is educational
philosophys sole purpose.(8)
As a method,analysis is a way of looking at educational issues and nothing more.It
entertains neither pretentions abaout establishing goals for education,about saying what
should be thaught and how,nor enthuasiasm for telling education,about saying what should be
thaught and how,nor enthusiasm for telling educational institutions how to meet critical social
issues face to face.After stating disclaimers as precisely as possible,analysts go on to embrace
one principle commissions: to clarify the language used to express thought in order to be as
accurate as possible about education.Although it is probably unfair to charge analysts with
British application of
analysis to education.
Perspective Purpose of Educational Philosophy
Educational philosophers who see prescription as the principal purpose of their
discipline begin,in the most instances,with the assumptions that the universe is characterized
by order : All reality,including human ocings,its into a grand cosmic design.Acting
intelligently,men and women use their talent to discover the nature of this design and then try
to conduct their lives in ways consistent with it.Physical and social reality have differences
that cannot be neglected,and these differences account for the rise of discrete sciences and
divergent philosophies.In the last analysis,allowing for human freedom to accept or reject
what reason prescribes,these differences do not mean that one kind of reality is subject to the
law of nature and another is not.The bussiness of philosophy is to interpret all reality and to
bring these interpretations to level of daily life.
The role of philosophers,and philosophy, is easy enough to recite,and in this
connection to the commission for all philosophy,whatever its special branch of
inquiry(speculative,normative or applied) is the same. So,we see,the purpose of educational
philosophy in this interpretation is fairly clear and straight forward: to prescibe educataional
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ends and means.What is more difficult,as philosophers of all system and preferences have
learned over the centuries,is to find the fundamentals of cosmic design and then to interpret
their meaning in an authentic and persuasive way.
Searching for fundamentals of cosmic design,some philosophers are led to the
conclusion that order is imposed on the universe by a rational being,God,and that in the
unfloding of Gods plan human beings have duties and obligations that He expects them to
fulfill.Other philosophers,while acknowledging order and design in the physical and social
worlds ,remain unconvinced abaout divine authorship.With no God to creat and manage the
world,nature is the source by the data of experience,and it is up to philosophy to relate the
evidence of order and design to persons from all walks of life whose destiny it is to find
temporal and perhaps eternal satisfication from their lives.
The role of the general philosopher is broad and comprehensive ,taking into account
all of reality and all of life;the educational philosopher assumes a somewhat less ambitious
charter.His role,when he subcribes to philosophys prespective purpose,is to discover mans
nature,capacities and responsibilities,to find and elaborate dependable intellectual and moral
knowledge,to unlock the secrets of the learning process,and finally in a comprehensive and
prescriptive code,to map out the direction education should take.Such directions is given with
accompanying declarations about its worth and authenticity: Grant that the analysis of human
nature and the nature of learning is sound and one is rewarded with logically conceived palan
for education that elicits assent and demands adoption. In
All this has a harsh sound to contemporary ears unusd to hearing so much confidence
put in rational processes on one hand and the validity of emperical data to justify these
processes on the other.But when one is prepared to acknowledge the dogmatism of truth(a
stance these philosophers find comfortable) ,the crendentials of a prescriptive educational
philosophy are hard to contradict.
Aristotle a Pioneer.Over the centuries educational philosophers have been in the habit
of writing directions for education;so illustrations of a prespective educational philosophy at
work are fairly easy to find.The persuasive deductive logic Aristotele (384-322 B.C) started
education exemplifying a prescriptive purpose.He left this commission for others who,over
the course of nearly twenty centuries,did their best to carry it out.
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philosopher,psychologist,and educator
psychology because the science of psychlogy posseses those principles on which learning and
pedagogic method are based.
Adopting the disinterested stance of a scholar,Hebart spent his several years as a
German university pofessor building what he expected would be a complete and
comprehensive theory of education.In effect,he told his students-many of them inquistive
Americans taking their doctorates in German universities-and readers what ought to be
done ,but perhaps with misplaced confidence in the power of logic to persuade,he neglected
to solicit support for vast array of educational conclusions and allowed them to stand on their
own merit.(11)
In some casses merit was good enaoug h to keep his ideas alive among his most
zcalous disciples,but for the most part,without an enthuastic and persuasive justification from
their author,these conclusions withered from lack of cultivation and prmotion and eventually
died.Herbart,we believe,was eager to set an educational standard.His hope that this standard
would make a difference in schools the world over was almost certainly genuine,but he
refusthated,for whatever reason,to embellish his product with a kind of artistry that gives
permanent appeal to an educational rank and file.
In company with Hebart,other educational philosophers sticking close to an orthodox
code of scholary objectivity and pronouncing their educational dictain cleair but unemotional
language have suffered a similiar fate.They learned too late ,if they learned at all,that
educational philosophy must campaign for devoted adherents,and that in its campaign,appeals
to reason must be supported and sometimes be supresded by appeals to economic
interest,social
responsibility,political
expedicney,religious
orthodoxy
and
emotional
disposition.
Regulary deploring the decline of American education into a cult of vocantion alism
and professionalism,Hutehins employed his educational philosophy to confirm the distinctive
human abilities of thought and expression and then to describe the kind of educational
program most likely to develop them.When Hutehins wrote the liberal education of human
beings,he refused to restrict it to an elite aristrocracy,one without much need to plunge into
the practical affairs of life .Rather,he saw it for all citizens who everyday are charged with not
only making a living but with making decisions affecting their society.(12)
Critics of Hutehins educational philosophy have been disposed to call a curriculum
filled with the worlds finest literature and one aimed at the development of thought and
12
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knowledge,about how society is held together,what human nature is,or what the end of
education should be.As a consequence,practitioners of philosophy as an inquiring discipline
choose to help teachers and students meet various challenges in the educational
enterprise.They encourage teachers to be experimental and flexible in their approach to
learning,and they solicit attention to interests and needs of students.
Examples of prescriptive educational philosophy are easilly found in educations long
history ,but any quest into the distant past for example of educational philosophy as a
discipline off inquiry and investigation is bound to disappointing.Most philosophers
belonging to this camp joined it by following in the footsteps of its charter member:John
Dewey(1859-1952).
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John Dewey and Philosophys New Charter.John Dewey began a long and illustrious
association with paragmatism,a philosophy of education steadfastly commited to
inquiry,doubting that any general theory of reality is possible or necessary as a foundation for
philosophical inquiry.From this position of doubt,only a short step brought him to an equally
skeptical view of the status of knowledge.Truth cludes the grasp of human beings.
With equivocal attitudes about reality and with similiar reservations about the
possibility of arriving at dependable knowledge.Dewey wrote the twentieth centurys most
famous book on educational philosophy,Democrazy and Education.In it he gave educational
philosophys inquiring purpose its first real lease on life.
The broad thesis of Deweys great book is not easily summarized,but in it he clearly
undertakes to authentice the principle that experience is the ultimate of all
things.Experience,then may be taken as the banner under which all inquiry-committed
educational philosophy ,marches,and the philospohers function is to sort out varieties of
experience,trrying to find those conspiring to promote social effeciency.The point is,and
Dewey was always eager to make it no one could know prior to wading in the pool of life
experience how education should try to promote social effeciency.Trial alone might nor be a
valid test but in the last analysis,it is the only test possible.
In this conception of purpose,educational philosophys role is to acess trials of
teaching and learning,and to assess them according to scienctific testing procedures,and then
make some comment about their worth.Even these comments however,should not be taken as
authoritative or prescriptive.It is not educational philosophys business to tell educators what
should not be done,or what should or should not be taught.Educational philosophy should
instead inquire into the consequences of teaching and learning and thus be in a position to
give us some insight into what has been done,what the shortcomings are,and how we may do
better when we try again to recruit education to the cause of social efficiency.
A summary of Educational Philosophys Purposes
Each philosophy of education,we have seen,defines it purpose in a different way and
the defenition put forth makes a difference in the way each philosophy approaches
fundamental educational issues.What purpose in different way and the defenition put forth
makes a difference in the way each philosophy approaches fundamental educational
issues.What purpose do educational philosophies acknowledge? The question can anwered
this way.
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FIGURE 1.1
Purposes for Educational Philosophy
CHARACTERIZATION
SUMMARY
PHILOSPHER AND
Inspirational
EXAMPLE
Platos Republic Roussess
PetersEthics in Education
meaning educational
Education
Herbarts The Science of
Higher Learning in
their implementation
America;Maritains
practices adopted in
Education;Klpatricks The
Foundation of Method
Analytical
Prescriptive
Investigation
either justification or
reconstruction
2.Educational philosophy undertakess to give directions with respect to kind of education that
is best in a certain political,social,and economic context.
3.Educational Philosophy is preoccupied with correcting violations of educational principle
and policy.
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4.Educational philosophy centers attention on those issues in educational policy and practice
that require resolution either by emperical research or rational reexamination
5.Educational philosophy conducts an inquiry into the whole of the educational enterprise
with a view toward assesing,justifying,and reforming the body of experience essential to
superior learning.
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