Ornstein, A. C., & Levine, D. U. (2003). Foundations of education. (8th ed.). New York: Houghton Mifflin.

Idealism

Idealism, one of the oldest of the traditional philosophies, goes back to Plato, who developed idealist principles in ancient Athens. In Germany, Georg W. F. Hegel created a comprehensive philosophical worldview based on idealism, and in the United States, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau developed a transcendentalist variety of idealism. Friedrich Froebel based his kindergarten theory on idealist metaphysics. Asian religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism also rest on the spiritual outlook associated with idealism.

 

Key Concepts

Metaphysics. Idealists, holding that only the mental or spiritual is ultimately real, see the universe as an expression of a highly generalized intelligence and will—a universal mind. The person's spiritual essence, or soul, is the permanent aspect of human nature that provides vitality and dynamism. This mental world of ideas is eternal, permanent, regular, and orderly. Truth and values are absolute and universal.

Idealists, such as the transcendentalists, have used the concepts of the macrocosm and the microcosm to explain their version of reality. Macrocosm refers to the universal mind, the first cause, creator, or God. Regardless of the particular name used, the macrocosmic mind is the whole of existence. It is the one, all-inclusive, and complete self of which all lesser selves are parts. The universal, macrocosmic mind is continually thinking and valuing. The microcosm is a limited part of the whole—an individual and lesser self. But the microcosm is of the same spiritual substance as the macrocosm.

Epistemology. Idealism emphasizes the recognition or reminiscence of ideas that are latent—already present but not evident—in the mind. Such ideas are a priori; that is, they concern knowledge that exists prior to and independent of human experience about them. Through introspection the individual examines his or her own mind and finds a copy of the macrocosmic mind. Since what is to be known is already present in the mind, the teacher's challenge is to bring this latent knowledge to consciousness. The goal of education is to help students arrive at a broad, general, and unifying perspective of the universe.

Idealist teachers prefer a hierarchical curriculum based on traditional disciplines or subject matter. At the top of the hierarchy are the most general disciplines, philosophy and theology. These general and abstract subjects transcend the limitations of time, place, and circumstance, and they transfer to a wide range of situations. Mathematics is valuable, too, because it cultivates the power to deal with abstractions. History and literature also rank high as sources of moral and cultural models. Somewhat lower in the curriculum, the natural and physical sciences address particular cause-and-effect relationships. Language is important because it is an essential tool at all levels of learning. For the idealist, the highest level of knowledge recognizes the relationships among all these subject matters and integrates them.

Axiology. Because idealists see the universe in universal and eternal terms, they prescribe values that are unchanging and applicable to all people. Thus ethical behavior reflects the enduring knowledge and values of human culture. Philosophy, theology, history, literature, and art are rich sources for transmitting this heritage of values. This kind of education requires that students be exposed to worthy models, especially the classics—the great works that have endured over time.

Logic. For idealists, logic, too, is based on the whole-part relationship. The part, a particular idea or principle, is derived from and agrees with the whole, which is more general. In organizing lessons, idealist teachers would follow a logical arrangement that emphasizes general principles or rules and then draws forth more specific illustrations from them. For example, an idealist teacher would introduce the general concept of nonviolence before discussing the harmful consequences of bullying one's classmates.

Realism

Realism, which stresses objective knowledge and values, was developed by the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. As described in the chapter on World Roots of American Education, during the Middle Ages, Thomas Aquinas articulated a variety of religious realism, known as Thomism, which was a synthesis of Aristotelianism and Christian doctrine. Alfred North Whitehead continued the realist tradition. Realism holds that (1) there is a world of real existence that human beings have not made; (2) the human mind can know about the real world; and (3) such knowledge is the most reliable guide to individual and social behavior. These doctrines provide a starting point for considering realism's educational implications.

 

Key Concepts

Metaphysics and Epistemology. For the realist, a material world exists that is independent of and external to the mind of the knowers. All objects are composed of matter. Matter, in turn, must assume the structure of particular objects.

Human beings can know these objects through their senses and their reason. Knowing is a process that involves two stages: sensation and abstraction. First, the knower perceives an object and records sensory data about it, such as color, size, weight, smell, or sound. The mind sorts these data into those qualities that are always present in the object and those that are sometimes present. By abstracting out the necessary qualities (those that are always present), the learner forms a concept of the object and recognizes it as belonging to a certain class. With this classification of the object, the learner understands that it shares certain qualities with other members of the same class but not with objects of a different class.

Like idealists, realists believe that following a curriculum of organized, separate subjects is the most effective way of learning about reality. Organizing subject matter, as scientists and scholars do, is a sophisticated method of classifying objects. For example, the past experiences of humankind can be organized into history. Plants can be studied systematically according to their classifications in botany. Units of political organization such as nations, governments, legislatures, and judicial systems can be grouped into political science. For the realist, the way to acquire knowledge about reality is through systematic inquiry into these subjects.

Axiology. In the realist's conception of knowledge, certain rules govern intelligent behavior. For example, human beings ought to behave in a rational way, and behavior is rational when it conforms to the way in which objects function in reality. From their study of reality, people can develop theories based on natural, physical, and social laws. Since natural laws are universal and eternal, so are the values based on them.

Logic. Realist teachers often use logic both deductively and inductively. For example, students in a botany class might examine many different types of roses that differ in color, scent, and size but conclude, through induction, that they are all members of the same genus. However, if the class is planting a rose garden on the school grounds as a project, the students can consult the literature on roses and deduce the general principles that contribute to successful gardening, such as correct location, amount of fertilizer, and water.

Pragmatism

Pragmatism emphasizes the need to test ideas by acting on them. Among its founders were Charles S. Peirce (1839-1914), William James (1842-1910), George Herbert Mead (1863-1931), and John Dewey (1859-1952). Peirce emphasized using the scientific method to validate ideas empirically, and James applied pragmatic philosophy to psychology, religion, and education. Mead emphasized the child's development as a learning and experiencing human organism. Dewey, in particular, applied pragmatism to education.

The chapter on Pioneers in Education examines Dewey as an educational pioneer. Here we focus on his pragmatic or experimentalist philosophy, which featured change, process, relativity, and the reconstruction of experience.

Influenced by Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory, Dewey applied the terms organism and environment to education. Dewey saw human beings as biological and sociological organisms who possess drives or impulses that sustain life and promote growth and development. Every organism lives in a habitat or environment. Education, so conceived, is to promote optimum human growth.

Rejecting the a priori idealist and realist perspectives, Dewey's test of experience meant that human purposes and plans could be validated only by acting on and judging them by their consequences. The need to judge by consequences also applied to educational programs. Did a particular educational program, curricular design, or methodological strategy achieve its anticipated goals and objectives? For Dewey, the only valid test was to try out the proposal and judge the results.

Whereas idealism and realism emphasized bodies of substantive knowledge or subject-matter disciplines, Dewey stressed the process of problem solving. For Dewey, learning occurs as the person engages in problem solving. In this experimental epistemology, the learner, as an individual or as a member of a group, uses the scientific method to solve both personal and social problems. For Dewey, the problem-solving method can be developed into a habit that transfers to a wide variety of situations.

 

Key Concepts

Metaphysics and Epistemology. Whereas idealism and realism emphasize an unchanging reality, pragmatism or experimentalism sees epistemology as a process of examining a constantly changing universe. In Dewey's philosophy of experimentalism, the epistemological, or knowing, situation involves a person, or organism, and an environment. Experience, defined as the interaction of the person with the environment, is a key concept. The person interacts with the environment to live, grow, and develop. This interaction may alter or change both the person and the environment. Knowing is thus a transaction, a process, between the learner and the environment. Although each interaction has some generalizable aspects that carryover to the next problem, each episode will differ somewhat. Effective people, by using the scientific method, can solve problems and add the features of a particular problem-solving episode to their ongoing experiences.

If reality is continually changing, then a curriculum claiming to be based on permanent realities is foolish. Concepts of unchanging or universal truth become untenable. The only guides that human beings have in their interaction with the environment are tentative assertions that are subject to further research and verification. Therefore, according to pragmatists, what is needed is a method for dealing with change in an intelligent manner. The Deweyites stress problem solving as the most effective method for directing change toward desired outcomes. Even though reality involves constant transformation or reconstruction of both the person and the environment, humankind can benefit from the process. Each time a human experience is reconstructed to solve a problem, a new contribution is added to humanity's fund of experience.

Axiology and Logic. Pragmatic axiology is highly situational. Since we inhabit a constantly changing universe, values, too, must change. Values are relative to time, place, and circumstance. What contributes to personal and social growth is valuable; what restricts or limits experience is unworthy. Further, we can clarify our values by testing and reconstructing them in the same way scientific claims are verified.

Following the scientific method, experimentalist logic is inductive rather than deduced from first principles as in idealism and realism. Tentative assertions are based on empirical evidence and must be tested.

Existentialism

The philosophy of existentialism, representing both a feeling of desperation and a spirit of hope, examines life in a very personal way. An existentialist education encourages deep personal reflection on one's identity, commitments, and choices.

 

Key Concepts

The existentialist author Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) stated that "Existence precedes Essence." This means that human beings are born and enter the world without being consulted. They simply are here in a world that they did not make or shape. However, they possess volition, or will, which gives them the freedom to make choices and to create their own purposes for existence. As people live, they are thrust into choice-making situations. Whereas some choices are trivial, those that deal with the purpose and meaning of life lead to personal self-definition. A person creates his or her own definition and makes his or her own essence. You are what you choose to be. Human freedom is total, say the existentialists, and one's responsibility for choice is also total.

This conception of a human being as the creator of his or her own essence differs substantially from that of the idealists and realists, who see the person as a universal category. Moreover, whereas the idealist or realist sees the individual as an inhabitant of a meaningful and explainable world, the existentialist believes that the universe is indifferent to human wishes, desires, and plans. Existentialism focuses on the concept of Angst, or dread. Each person knows that his or her destiny is death and that his or her presence in the world is only temporary. It is with this sense of philosophical dread that each person must make choices about freedom and slavery, love and hate, peace and war. As one makes these choices, a question is always present: What difference does it make that I am here and that I have chosen to be what I am?

According to the existentialists, we must also cope with the fact that others persons, institutions, and agencies—are constantly threatening our choice-making freedom. Each person's response to life is based on an answer to the question, Do I choose to be a self-determined person or do I choose to be defined by others? But existentialism does see hope behind the desperation. Each person has the potential for loving, creating, and being. Each can choose to be an inner-directed, authentic person. An authentic person, free and aware of this freedom, knows that every choice is really an act of personal value creation.

Since existentialists have deliberately avoided systemization of their philosophy, it is difficult to categorize its metaphysical, epistemological, axiological, and logical positions. However, some comments on these areas can illustrate the existentialist point of view. As already stated, each person creates his or her own self-definition, or essence, by the personal choices he or she makes. Epistemologically, the individual chooses the knowledge that he or she wishes to possess. It is axiology that is most important for existentialists, because human beings create their own values through their choices.