Philosophy of Education
By
FND 504
Summer 2005
My philosophy of education encompasses many attributes from my experiences as a learner and as a teacher. Through the years and along my path of life, my experiences have helped to shape what I believe are ideals for education and possibly even for life. These personal accounts have given me the quintessential record of what my philosophy of education is.
My past experience as a student was very dogmatic. Having spent twelve years in private Catholic institutions my early years of learning were very different from what I have observed in classrooms today. As we discussed in class, education has always been changing [1]; and I feel it has changed drastically since I have been involved in formal classroom education. The changes that I have observed are quite grand, but are also, in my opinion, quite good.
The first major change I have encountered is the idea of grouping children or learners for class activities. Having never been a part of this type of learning I find it to be the most profound. Why wouldn’t classmates be able to help each other out with ideas about a reading project or a social studies presentation? Feedback from peers is incredibly powerful and useful for gaining insight and knowledge on the processes that children use in order to complete a task. When a classmate mentioned in our discussion that her daughter’s classroom is very interactive and group activities are taking place on a daily basis I was taken aback for a moment [2]. I now have observed for myself this type of learning in
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Practicum I and have seen firsthand how useful a tool for learning that group
interaction is.
The second major change that I have witnessed is the role of the teacher in the classroom. My experiences have only shown me that the teacher stands in front of the classroom and as it has been expressed “Stand and Deliver” the material in which we are supposed to at a later date regurgitate out on a test. Granted, this style of teaching works for some, but couldn’t it be much better? I guess that is what gets me to the core of what I feel are my personal ideals for education.
On our first day of class this summer, the word eudaimonia was introduced to me for the first time [3]. After learning that it is a feeling of being in harmony with one’s higher self or soul, I realized this is the word that I have needed to know to describe my own personal philosophy on life. If my ideal goal in life is to obtain this status of eudaimonia, why couldn’t that be the base of my teaching philosophy as well?
Therefore, at the platform of my philosophy of education, I would like to place the ideal of being enlightened. To describe more indepthly I would like for not only me, as the educator or teacher, but also the students to be uplifted so as to encourage intellectual or moral improvement. In order to get there, many values and convictions must be present in the classroom and must also be practiced.
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One of the most essential and influential people in a child’s life is his or her teacher. Since so much interaction takes place between them it only makes sense to have established values that are practiced in the classroom. What I do not want to take place in my classroom is the condition that David T. Hansen describes in his article as the gap that exists between what teachers say they want to do and what actually takes place in their work (Hansen, 163 [4]). In my classroom there are some fundamental principles that will be upheld. These include positive attitudes and a willingness to learn. This goes both ways for the teacher and the learner. It is possible for a teacher to learn from a student. Other convictions that I hold strong are the ideas of fairness, sincerity, honesty, trustworthiness, and love.
As Gary D. Fenstermacher mentions in his article that the teacher’s conduct, at all times and in all ways, is a moral matter; this is the reason that teaching is a profoundly moral activity ( Fenstermaher, 133 [5]). I wish to use that moral obligation of teaching and implement my personal ideals of fairness, sincerity, honesty, trustworthiness, and love to develop moral beings. The children of today have such magnificent influences from so many mediums, they need to know what lies at the core and experience that enlightenment themselves. Popular culture in television, movies, and video games, all too often do not focus on humanity and what it means to be a moral and educated being in
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this world. The fact that many children have two working parents and spend more time “on their own”; need positive and significant influences to help keep them on the right path.
As an educator I believe there are two aspects of education in schools. The first is the content of the material and the manner in which it is delivered. This is a huge area, but as we discussed in class the standards are always changing and often vague [6]. Also ,since children spend so much time at school and away from parents the other part of the education lies in the moral code of life. This is the more difficult of the two partly because it is not graded in school, nor do you see the affects of it at school immediately. It may be twenty years down the road and a child comes across a dilemma. Which path will he or she choose? Will any of his or her experiences from school have an impact on that decision? Will he or she choose the enlightened path? This is the part of education that will impact you for the rest of your life. As David T. Hansen points out in his article, teachers’ personal qualities promise to be as influential on students, in the long run, as their pedagogical know-how (Hansen, 165 [7]).
In the fourth edition of School and Society, by Steven E. Tozer, Paul C. Violas, and Guy Senese, it is written in Chapter One that schools are complex institutions with varied and intricate relationships to their surrounding communities [8]. Society as a whole impacts what the children learn and behaviors that are formed. I plan on using the content of the material that I must teach according to state standards and deliver it in a way that is applicable and
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true for each student. Since meaningful curricula differs so much among the
students , I feel it is my job or responsibility to implement ways so as to make most content meaningful to my students. I must know my students and respect where they come from and what their moral understandings are.
As Tozer, Violas, and Senese point out in Chapter one of School and Society, that schooling refers to the totality of experiences that occur within the institution called school, as well as involving teaching and learning not included in either curricular or extracurricular activities [9]. This type of learning occurs in the school’s hidden curriculum ( Tozer, et al, 7 [10]). As part of my teaching style, in order to implement the hidden curriculum, I must go back to my convictions mentioned before. By being what one could call a “good example” and promote the development of student enlightenment, which is the ultimate goal, I must be honest with the students, other teachers, and myself. I must be sincere in my tone and in my words. I must be fair when confronting problems and situations. I must be trustworthy so my students will come to me if they have a question. And above all, I must have love. I must have love of the students, love of myself, and love of the profession of teaching.
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