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Application of essentialism in the educational process
Application of essentialism in the educational process
Educational theories and their implications for education
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Existing Predominant Theory in Public Schools vs. Theories Used in Alternative Education
Currently, public schools operate predominantly on an entirely different educational philosophy system than free or alternative schools. Teachers employed by public schools tend to function largely under an essentialist philosophy. This philosophy dictates using more traditional settings and teaching styles to teach merely the basic skills to students. Only information considered pertinent to a student’s success in his or her academic career is taught in the classroom. Further supporting this philosophy, information is transmitted to students in the most efficient and quickest way – often in the appearance of lecture and notes format. In order to impart the maximum amount of what is considered by these teachers to be essential, efficient knowledge, order and discipline ought to be maintained (Gutek, 2011).
Free and alternative schools maintain vastly distinctive educational philosophies compared to their public school counterparts. Walking into an alternative school would yield extremely different observations than that of public schools. Teachers and students would act differently, classrooms would be set up in diverse ways, and classes would even sound different. These schools are guided by various sets of philosophies unique from essentialist theory. However, because this study focuses solely on one alternative school, only its educational philosophy will be utilized as the theoretical framework for this paper. As previously stated in the above discussion about Blue Mountain School in Floyd, the school follows a contemplative progressive educational philosophy. By declaring this as their educational philosophy, Blue Mountain ...
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...ssive education theory, this philosophy will become the theoretical framework for this study. As stated above from various sources, progressive education tends to be much more focused on the child rather than the teacher and uses real-world activities to teach students information. Classrooms in a progressive education-based school have the potential to be louder and messier than their public school counterparts with the teacher taking on the role of facilitator rather than dictator.
This chapter outlined the existing traditional public school’s philosophy compared to progressive education theory ascribed to by Blue Mountain School. Progressivism was defined using several references to gain a better understanding of the theory in general and in relation to this study. Chapter 3 will describe the qualitative methods used for data collection in this analysis.
Many progressives thought that the greatest way to reform society was through its schools. Public education had grown rapidly since the Civil War. Progressives had new ideas about the purpose of education. Progressive educators believed that children should learn best by contributing in activities where they can work on projects and learn at their own rate. I thought this idea was a better way of learning because memorizing methods were really stressful and many people have diverse ways of learning: visual, hearing, hands on, and etc.
Hayes, William. "The Progressive Education Movement." The Progressive Education Movement: Is It Still a Factor in Today's Schools? N.p., Nov. 2006. Web. 12 Mar. 2014. .
Progressive education was a movement based on an emphasis of learning by doing. This style of learning was more about hands-on projects and more experimental learning with groups that will help sharpen social skills. It was a style that allowed teachers to teach the content areas around the needs of the students. John Dewey was a huge supporter and promoter for progressive education. Dewey stated in his journal My Pedagogic Creed, “I believe that the true education comes through the stimulation of the child’s powers by the demands of social situations in which he finds himself.”(Vol. 54 p.77) He believed that all learning took place based on the social situations a kid was presented. Dewey started schools in Chicago that were based on the progressive movements. The school actually combined to teach future teachers this style and approach to education. Dewey stated “This process begins unconsciously almost at birth, and is continually shaping the individual’s powers, saturating his consciousness, forming his habits, training his ideas, and arousing his feelings and emotions.”(Vol.54 p.77) He believed that the set-up of schools should be designed and taught around the real-life and occupational based on community surroundings. Along with the help of other school reformers such as Ella Flag Young, they tried to change school systems throughout the country.
One of the main concepts behind progressivism was to improve the overall American lifestyle. Many state citizens were subject to products of low quality education, as well as low income households. According to a term paper provided by Academia.edu, progressivism allowed students to learn and develop as a person through lessons that cause the student to become involved in the lesson, along with the provision of a scientific method that allowed reflective thinking. (Mercado) Mercado’s document also observes that a challenge that the subject causes in modernized education is many educational environments follow a procedure where students are provided with a task or assignment, and are expected to practice it until they become seemingly...
Strauss’s piece, “Is this any way to train teachers?”, challenges the teaching styles of the current education system by examining the RGSE teacher program. She claims that this program only takes the ineffective opinion of charter schools into account, and does not diversify or create a beneficial learning environment. Strauss’s piece can be observed through the lens of a pragmatic progressive educator, as well as someone that adamantly opposes the essentialist view of teaching during the modern historical context.
Essentialism, made popular by William Bagley in the 1930’s, is the form of education most of us know well from our schooling experiences. It has also been called the “...
The philosophy of essentialism is important to me, although I feel students can still relate to school in a positive way. Students can learn the core subjects—reading, writ...
This book, Dare The School Build a New Social Order by George Counts, is an examination of teachers, the Progressive Education Movement, democracy and his idea on how to reform the American economy. The book is divided into 5 different sections. The first section is all about the Progressive Education Movement. Through this, George Counts points out many downsides and weaknesses of this ideal. He also talks about how he wants teachers to lead society instead of following it. In the second section, he examines 10 widespread fallacies. These fallacies were that man is born free, that children are born free, they live in a separate world of their own, education remains unchanged, education should have no bias, the object of education is to produce professors, school is an all-powerful educational agency, ignorance rather than knowledge is the way of wisdom, and education is made to prepare an individual for social change.
There are four philosophies of education. They consists of perennialism, progressivism, social Reconstructionism, and essentialism. Each philosophy of education plays a role in American education. Today essentialism plays one of the biggest roles in American education. Essentialism tries to give all students the most basic academic knowledge, skills, and character development. I too believe in the essentialism philosophy of education. I agree with this philosophy because I believe that intellectual self-discipline should be encouraged within the classroom, all students have the ability to learn regardless of their needs, and teachers should concentrate on teaching basic skills. All of these beliefs falls under the essentialism philosophy
Considering the traditional teaching methods and the abundance of test-taking in schools, it is evident that the philosophical theory, Essentialism, has a strong presence in classrooms. Although Essentialism affects policymakers, parents, and the mass public, it most importantly affects the students. By deeply analyzing the issue of an overwhelming Essentialist presence in education, one can conclude that Essentialism is the root of contemporary issues in education.
Essentialism is Essentialism refers to the "traditional" or "Back to the Basics" approach to education.
“Education is a social process; education is growth; education is not preparation for life but is life itself.” John Dewey describes and supports progressivism, an education philosophy that I professionally identify with. Progressivism is a student centered philosophy that focuses on experiences, opportunities, and values that enhance a student 's learning and life. The role of the teacher is to act primarily as a facilitator of learning, they encourage and guide students to explore and promote individual development. As a future educator I believe it is important to involve students and allow them to take responsibility for their own learning and achieving their goals. The role of the student is to discover, engage, and express themselves.
... from experience and the teacher is only a guide or a supervisor of their learning. I prefer progressivism over any other philosophy because education should be geared more towards the needs and interests of the students.
I want my classroom to be full of progressivism. Children should be given the chance to explore, develop opinions, and have extraordinarily unique personalities without one test determining the student’s knowledge. My philosophy is that education should be offered to students in the way that they learn best, whether it be through bookwork, group work, or presentations that not only will help them learn now, but also with everything they do. Education is a right and a gift that should be handled with care.
Progressivism is a theory of education that encourages students to think on their own and create their own ideas to test out. In order, for the students to figure out the answer to their new idea or concept learned with hands on experiences used in the classroom. The progressivist named John Dewey believed that people learned most when their past experiences related to the concepts they are currently learning. This allows the students to connect with their experience that happened in life to the new stuff they would currently learn in the classrooms. In which, the students would engage more to learn about the new ideas or knowledge. Progressivists also believed that education should allow students to learn from each other to create a better society. The teacher’s role in the classroom is to keep in check that the students are on task but not under mind their new ideas while doing an experiment. The methods they use are student focused or orientated such as discussion, mental modeling. The students can engage with their peers and discuss their new ideas or own opinions with other without any judgement of being wrong. Progressivism and epistemology are closed connected because they let students help each other out learn new ideas with the information given by the teachers, and can connect it knowledge they have from previous