Today’s Plan:
- Focus Groups
- Discussion & Reading Notes
- Homework
Focus Groups
To get things started today, I am going to ask you to form groups of three. Each group will be assigned a question to research. Here’s the questions:
- What does Dewey identify as the problem(s) with “traditional” education? (What is traditional education?)
- What does Dewey identify as the problem(s) with “progressive” education? (What is progressive education?)
- What is the responsibilities of a teacher? What are the challenges of being a teacher? What does it mean to exercise authority without being an authority?
- What is a “philosophy of experience”? (What is “habit” for Dewey? Why is it important?)
I’ll give your groups 15 minutes to come up with a response to these questions. I’ll ask you to read a response that brings our attention to at least two places / passages in the text.
Discussion
We’ll open discussion with your responses to the questions above; I also want to highlight a few passages and share my notes.
Homework
There’s two readings for homework. The first is from Paulo Freire (.pdf uploaded to files). The second reading is from Audre Lorde and is available online via this link.
I would also ask you to think about your upcoming essay assignment (detailed in the last post). Here’s a quick guide to our readings this semester:
- Plato’s Republic VII, the allegory of the cave, an interest in Ideal Truth, a question about who can be educated, an interest in abstract knowledge and disciplines (math, music, etc) for their ability to help us learn to think abstractly
- Isocrates, an interest in civic education, politics, also based on paideia (link to Wikipedia definition), the idea that we teach an Ideal set of cultural values. The purpose of education is to “enculturate” citizens, to unite them under a common set of morals, values, history, and laws, to prepare them for working together in the polis.
- Cicero builds on this tradition, though he is less interested in moral instruction and more interested in teaching creative and argumentative methods that will make someone a better debater, better practitioner of rhetoric and politics. He has an interest in finding a balance between Plato’s abstract knowledge and real world application
- Petrarch’s interest is in preparing people to deal with the hardships of life: specifically change. He notes that we aren’t built to deal with change. He stresses that much of life is dealing with change (and sadness, and death). He opposes abstract knowledge and thinking (Plato), but also he opposes politics and business. True education aims at growing one’s soul, one’s ability to deal with oneself.
- Dewey’s notions of “experience” and “habit,” his desire to connect learning to students’ present experiences as a way of shaping future decisions, desires, and abilities. Note that unlike many of our other theorists, Dewey is interested in primary education.
Of course, we will add to this list Freire, and Lorde. Remember for your papers that I want you to address (in some fashion, to greater and lesser extents) 4 educators as you build your own theory of education, thinking both about the ENDS of education, as well as the MEANS.
