Both/And Teaching Philosophy

So, when I took the Philosophy of Education Survey, I found out one interesting fact that I did not realize.  I, apparently, am very into Perennailism teaching, which is teaching that focuses on the great books of the past.  I agree with this to some extent, but because it is Teacher-Based instruction, I really don't like it.  Discussions can only get you so far in understanding things.

So, I'm just going to list my numbers in each area.  Essentialism: 8; Perennialism: 19; Progressivism: 24; Social Reconstructionism: 24; Existentialism: 25.  I do believe that teaching the essentials (reading, math, etc.) are important, but education is not only about the essentials.  Unfortunately, in this society, as Milton Chen points out in his book Education Nation, we have a very strong either/or philosophy to everything.  Either essentials in the curriculum or other stuff.  But, Chen points out that it should be a both/and philosophy because that is much healthier.  So, both essentials and other stuff is much better.

So, I can be a teacher who has all of these philosophies under his belt.  I, however, am a very strong advocate for existentialism.  I'm sure that you realized that when I did my presentation on Special Education in the Juvenile Justice System and my part of the presentation was completely up to the students in the class to chose in what order to learn.  Existentialism really ensures that studlents are actually listening and focusing and learning while you are teaching.  The reason that they are focusing is because they chose it.

One way of doing this is creating 3-5 lesson plans for just one day and give the students a choice to chose between these choices that I give them.  I could also let them teach the class, that way they are engaged and they are teaching what they want to teach.

I love the aspect of existentialism that believes that the point of education is to help the students find out who they are, I really think that that is true.  But if it is true, then essentialism is possibly thrown out the window, but I think it can be both existentialism within essentialism.  For instance, I can still make 3-5 lessson plans on an essential task and then give them the choice which would make it borderline existentialism.  But the lesson plan within it will be very existentialism, they have the choice of what order they want to learn the essential knowledge things.