Philosophy Matrix
Use the Knight textbook to complete this matrix. See the syllabus for detailed instructions. The following list is to help you consider what should be written in each column.
Metaphysics = What is reality/truth? What is purpose and meaning in life? Epistemology = Is it possible to know reality/truth? If so, how? Axiology = What values should be developed in education?
Learner’s Nature = What is the role of the learner? What is the human condition? Good? Bad? Neutral? What learner factors should be considered in education? Teacher’s Role = What is the most effective approach the teacher should take? Curricular Focus = What content is most important?
Methodology = What pedagogical strategies are most effective? Criticisms = What do opponents of this philosophy/theory say about it?
(The names beside each philosophy are just for reference to help you connect the philosophy with specific philosophers.) Traditional Philosophies
IDEALISM (Plato)
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Truth lies in a realm of ideas that is beyond the world of the senses Knowing truth requires it to fit into a harmonious nature of the universe. Values that express goodness and beauty with a life lived in harmony with the universe. Absolute Self-macrocosm and individual human self is microcosmic. Most important aspect of learners is intellect. Idealists concentrate on the mental development of the learner. The teacher’s role is to pass on knowledge of reality and to be examples of the ethical ideal. The curriculum must be formed around those subjects that bring students into contact with ideas Classrooms are an open extension on a library, because it’s a place where books and ideas form the center of attention. Methodology is lecturing, verbal transfer between teacher and student, reading and discussion. Seems as ivory tower experience. School is a sustainer of the status quo. REALISM (Aristotle)
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
The realist sees reality in terms of things that operate according to the natural law of the physical world in which people live that makes up reality. Truth for the realist is viewed as observable fact. The realist seeks to discover how the world works by examining it. The natural law thereby discovered is believed to be built into the nature of reality. Through natural law values are obtained. One knows the ethical and aesthetic judgment through the study of natural order. Developing of nature as the moral law. A beautiful art form reflects the logic and order of the universe. Student is viewed as a spectator viewing the universal machine. Students must be reinforced, disciplined, and shaped until they have learned to make the proper responses. The role of the teacher is to provide information about reality to the student in the quickest and efficient. The teachers are to demonstrate the regularities and laws of nature and to pass on to the student those facts of the natural world that have been verified by research.
The focus of realist curriculum is on demonstrable facts and the structural frameworks of the academic disciplines that give meaning to those facts. Language and mathematics are also important in the curriculum because they provide the entrance to an academic discipline. Modern realist favor teaching for the mastery of facts to develop an understanding of natural law. Modern realist favor demonstrations in the classroom, filed trips and the use of audio-visual aids in the absence of field trips. In favor of teaching machines and programmed learning Other questioned the naturalistic presuppositions of realism that seen to them to be more in harmony with deism, agnosticism, or even atheism than with personal Christianity. Realism tends to be deterministic and to minimize the importance of humanity in its attempt to be objective and scientific. The lack of free will and human dignity implied in realism is dehumanizing and does not harmonize with Christian revelation. NEO-SCHOLASTICISM (Thomas Aquinas)
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Two-sided coin, which is the natural world that is open to focus and the supernatural realm, which is understood through intuition. Neo-scholastics hold the nature of the universe to be permanent and unchanging. Neo-Scholastic believe in the hierarchy of the truth. Lower level relies on reason, which is the realm of nature and science that is limited. The higher level is the first principles and faith. The two realms overlap and form two routes to the same truth. They value most highly the truths that are logical, permanent and unchanging. Value developed through education is acting rationally. Good people are the ones whose desires and wills are subservient to their intellect. If they know what is right, they will do it, because it is reasonable to do what is good. Learners are a spiritual being who relate to God. Faculty psychology is what learners are viewed by neo –scholastics. The mind is carefully developed through different potentials. The faculty of reason, faulty of memory and the faculty of will allows the will to be brought under submission to the reason. Teachers are mental disciplinarians with the capability of developing reason, memory and will power in their students.
It’s the teacher’s responsibility to decide what knowledge the child should learn. The decision should harmonize with the child’s interest and curiosity, but subject matter concerns, rather than student’s desires are central to education. The curriculum should give priority to cultivating rationalism. Education should focus on sharpening the intellect by training the mind to think. The end result is for people to understand the Absolute Truth of the cosmos. Thus, the mind must be strengthened and toughened to reach the Truth. Internal logic subject matter is best and should be center of curriculum such as foreign language and Mathematics. Training of the intellectual powers, which is rooted in mental discipline. Relation to discipline inherent in the subject matter strengthens intellect through exercises in reason and memory. The mind is strengthened by strenuous mental exertion. Neo-Scholastic emphasis on the mental and rational side of human nature has not provided a base for the practical and physical in education.
Modern Philosophies
PRAGMATISM (William James, John Dewey)
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Denies their philosophic position has metaphysics.
They do not believe in ultimate and absolute realm of reality. Pragmatist relies on the community Knowledge is rooted in experience.
Knowledge is different from belief.
Individuals make knowledge as they interact.
No A priori and Absolut Truth.
Truth is relative, changing and expanding.
The axiology is directly related to the epistemology. Humanity is ultimately responsible for values. Values are relative and there are no absolute principles on which we can learn. The learner is active in their environment.
Natural problem solvers.
Experiential learners.
The teachers are the guide, fellow problem solvers, project facilitators. The student’s interest and problems as defined by the group.
The group choice, scientific methods, group work, projects, and experimentation. Most Christians view it as having an insufficient perspective on reality, truth, and value. EXISTENTIALISM (Nietzsche, Kierkegaard, Sartre, Heidegger, etc.)
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Existence preceded essence. The act of daily living is a process of defining personal essence. The individual is the authority. The individual has choices
The values of individuals are based on their interest. They are free to make choices and actions. Free choosing agents, responsible for making meaning, independent.
Facilitator
Explore possibility with students
Encourage independent learning styles
Open to individual student choice and interest
Art, theatre, liberal, humanities, literature
Individual goal setting
Self assessment
Reflection
Journal writing
Individualization
Difficulty for some Christians in relation to understanding existentialism is that religious existentialists often use the same word (god, creation, or redemption.) as traditional Christianity with different meaning.
Contemporary Educational Theories for Transmission
PERENNIALISM (Adler, Hutchins, William Bennett, Allan Bloom, etc) Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Search for unchanging truth found in collective wisdom of western culture Truth and knowledge is changeless and found in western culture Changeless; determined by the very nature of reality
Students are passive learners. Students learn what is being taught. Self-contained knowledge- teacher is supposed to know all the answers. Teacher is the expert of content knowledge and pass on wisdom
Basic skills and recurring themes in humanity. Geometry, English literature, world geography, algebra, trigonometry, ancient geography, world history, U.S. history. * Liberal arts formed traditional education.
Teacher-made tests, standardized test, memory work (in is a muscle) spelling bees. Direct instruction and Socratic dialogue
. Critics of perennialism contend that low-ability students simply cannot master subjects such as logic and foreign languages.
ESSENTIALISM (E.D. Hirsch) Metaphysics = What is reality/truth? What is purpose and meaning in life? Epistemology = Is it possible to know reality/truth? If so, how? Axiology = What values should be developed in education?
Learner’s Nature = What is the role of the learner? What is the human condition? Good? Bad? Neutral? What learner factors should be considered in education? Teacher’s Role = What is the most effective approach the teacher should take? Curricular Focus = What content is most important?
Methodology = What pedagogical strategies are most effective? Criticisms = What do opponents of this philosophy/theory say about it?
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
What is prevalent is what helps the individual live well and what benefits humanity Truth exists in classics and modern science. Must learn process and content. Knowledge is gained through interaction and rational thought Determined by natural order of things. Values exist in the best of culture. Role of the student is there to listen and learn. The learner’s nature should focus on discipline. Because students need t discipline to focus on the task at hand. Effort is more important than interest.
Expert of Knowledge. Teacher’s essential knowledge. Maintain task-oriented focus. The teachers know what the students need to know and are well acquainted with the logical order of the subject matter and the way it should be presented. The teacher role demands respect. The teacher is the classroom authority. Strong emphasis on basic skills and on disciplines knowledge and scholastic achievement in secondary schools. Reading, spelling, language art, mathematics, U.S. and World History. No vocational education. Elementary school should focus on basic skills that contribute to literacy and mastery of arithmetical computations. Secondary education would aim at developing competency in history, mathematics, science, English, literature and foreign language. Tap dancing, basket weaving and etc. are not the business of the school. Avoids methodological frills and soft pedagogy and concentrated o sound, proven instructional methods. The teacher is enacting the curriculum and setting the standards to which the students must meet. The teacher’s evaluation role undermines students’ interest in study. As a result, the students begin to take on more of a passive role in their education as they are forced to meet and learn such standards and information. BEHAVIORISM (Skinner)
Metaphysics = What is reality/truth? What is purpose and meaning in life? Epistemology = Is it possible to know reality/truth? If so, how? Axiology = What values should be developed in education?
Learner’s Nature = What is the role of the learner? What is the human condition? Good? Bad? Neutral? What learner factors should be considered in education? Teacher’s Role = What is the most effective approach the teacher should take? Curricular Focus = What content is most important?
Methodology = What pedagogical strategies are most effective? Criticisms = What do opponents of this philosophy/theory say about it?
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Reality for the behaviorist is independent of human knower. Events are explained by essences, causes, and inner principles. Observe living organisms including humans in an attempt to discover the laws of behavior. After these laws are discovered they will provide a foundation for technology of behavior. Efficiency, economy, precision and objectivity are central values considerations in education. Students learn in daily life through the consequences of their acts. The learner does not have any opportunity for evaluation or reflection within the learning process; they are simply told what is right or wrong. The teacher’s role is to create an effective learning environment. The teacher is the dominant person in the classroom and takes complete control; evaluation of learning comes from the teacher who decided what is right or wrong. Behaviorists are at least as concerned about how people behave as that they know. They do not tend to be big innovators in curriculum.
They will however give a fair trial to any new curricula that someone else might write. Empirical verification is central in behavioral methodology. Positive reinforcement is the missing ingredient in most school environments. Popular as a method of discipline and computer aided instruction. Cannot study sensation & perception as it denies mental aspects •
Study of after images through verbal reports is a kind of defeat of methodological behaviorism A Muscle
Twitch Psychology which fails to take into account the purposive behavior
Contemporary Educational Theories for Transformation
PROGRESSIVISM (Dewey)
Metaphysics = What is reality/truth? What is purpose and meaning in life? Epistemology = Is it possible to know reality/truth? If so, how? Axiology = What values should be developed in education?
Learner’s Nature = What is the role of the learner? What is the human condition? Good? Bad? Neutral? What learner factors should be considered in education? Teacher’s Role = What is the most effective approach the teacher should take? Curricular Focus = What content is most important?
Methodology = What pedagogical strategies are most effective? Criticisms = What do opponents of this philosophy/theory say about it?
(The names beside each philosophy are just for reference to help you connect the philosophy with specific philosophers.) Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Students should understand the major problems facing society The curriculum should move from the abstract to the concrete, from the theoretical to the practical – learning by doing Values are relative and rules are sometimes inadequate in guiding complex decision-making Students are active beings. Students naturally want to learn and will learn if they are not frustrated in their learning by adults and authorities who seek to impose their wills and goals. Teacher role is as an advisor, guide, and fellow traveler rather than of authoritarian and classroom director. Teachers have more experience than their students. The child is the focal point of the school. They sought to develop a curriculum and teaching method that grew out of students’ needs, interest and initiatives. Curriculum content is derived from student interests and questions. The scientific method is used by progressivism educators So that student
can study matter and events systematically and first hand.
Shared decision making, planning of teachers
with students, student
selected topics are all aspects. Books are tools
, rather than authority
Focus on problem solving, knowledge is seen as an instrument for managing experience. *project method allows a teacher to guide to lead students through a larger part of curriculum in an almost painless manner. One way in which progressives differ a great deal from classical educators is that they often permit some degree of student self-evaluation to figure into the grading process. Critics charge that students are not equipped to do this fairly and objectively and that the practice demonstrates that progressives do not enforce high academic standards.
RECONSTRUCTIONISM (Counts)
Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Reconstructionist agrees that everyday, personal experience constitutes reality. The reconstructionist claims that truth is what works, and we arrive at truth through a process of trial and error. The deconstructionist’s answer to this is whatever the public consensus says it is.
The role of the student in the reconstructionist learning environment is to be an active participant. Students are encouraged to think critically about the world in which they live in and how it can be changed for the better. Challenged teachers to become “transformative intellectuals. Teachers must awaken the students self conscious to social problems. Working with student interests and needs, teachers serve as guides and facilitators in assisting students to reach their goals. The emphasis is on the future, and on preparing students to be independent-thinking adults. Teaching methods should focus on democratic principles in classroom as students are led into opportunities to choose between varying social, political, and economic options. Social sciences used as reconstructive tools. (Anthropology, economics, sociology, political science, and psychology) Critical investigation and discussion. Problem solving, pupil teacher dialogue. Flexible seating arrangements. Too much confidence is placed on the powers of teachers and educators to act as primary instruments of social change. CRITICAL PEDAGOGY (Friere, Giroux, Noddings, Gloria Watkins [bell hooks], Peter McLaren, etc) This section might be a bit more challenging than the ones above. You are encouraged to supplement the textbook information with internet searches on the topic. Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
Promotes an educationally conscious social reality and strives to eliminate the tremendous inequalities in the world. More radical the person is, the more fully he or she enters into reality so that, knowing it better, he or she can transform it. This individual is not afraid to confront, to listen, to see the world unveiled. draws attention to questions concerning who has control over the conditions for the production of knowledge, values, and skills, and it illuminates how knowledge, identities, and authority are constructed within particular sets of social relations learners are teachers. Therefore, learners are not recipients of knowledge rather they become creators students must actively question and participate in the construction of their own reality. This requires a close examination of their political and social ideologies and assumptions.
Engage in a dialogue with our students and allow them to build their own understanding and subject matter schema vast enough that they are able to change their own situations without our push. Teachers should construct curricula that draw upon the cultural resources that students bring with them to the school. This suggests not only taking the languages, histories, experiences, and voices of the students seriously, but also integrating what is taught in schools to the dynamics of everyday life Revolutionary role for schools. Critical pedagogy argues for the importance of developing multiple literacies. We need to develop social literacies that are functional, cultural, and critical. In this sense, we need literacies that both recognize the importance of cultural differences and the importance of individuals communicating across various social, cultural, and political borders. Critical pedagogy also encourages students to be aware or critical of their own attitudes, values and prejudices.
However, postmodernist composition theorists argue that it is unethical to position the teacher in the powerful role of the liberator who controls students for the sake of the students’ own good CONSTRUCTIVISM (Piaget, Vygotsky, Constance Kamii, etc)
This section might be a bit more challenging than the ones above. You are encouraged to supplement the textbook information with internet searches on the topic. Metaphysics
Epistemology
Axiology
Learner’s Nature
Teacher’s Role
Curricular Focus
Methodology
Criticisms
In metaphysics constructivists
believe that human beings enter the world neither inherently good nor evil but rather neutral in genetic orientation, behaviorally active and with free will. Believe that we know reality through the lens of our cultural and historically derived personal conduct. In axiology constructivists believe that values are existential. Values emerge in the context of living and experiencing as opposed to having been divinely ordained or being inherent in nature. To constructivists values emerge through the social interaction of human beings as they engage in experience
Active learner, Self directed, creative and innovative. Learners construct their own knowledge beginning with what they already know, exploring what needs to be known next and determining the quality and effectiveness of their pursuit through authentic assessment and application The teacher as a facilitator of learning as opposed to a dispenser of knowledge. Facilitators help the learner to get his or her own understanding of the content. It promotes using curricula customized to the students’ prior knowledge. Elimination of grades and standardized testing. Instead, assessment becomes part of the learning process so that students play a larger role in judging their own progress. – See more at: http://www.funderstanding.com/theory/constructivism/#sthash.zsXk0CmA.dpuf
Provides students with hands-on activities. Hands on problem solving. Reciprocal questioning- students work together to ask and answer questions. Jigsaw classroom- students become experts on one part of a group project and teach it to others in their groups. Structured controversies- students work together to research a particular controversy. While some constructivists argue that “learning by doing” enhances learning, critics of this instructional strategy argue that little empirical evidence exists to support this statement given novice learners
