SEVEN PHILOSOPHIES OF EDUCATION 

CONSTRUCTIVISM

• Why teach - Constructivists sees to develop intrinsically motivated and independent learners adequately equipped with learning skills for them to be able to construct knowledge and make meaning of them.

• What to teach - The learners are taught how to learn. They are taught learning processes and skills such as searching. critiquing and evaluating information, relating these pieces of information, reflecting on the same, making meaning out of them, drawing insights, posing questions, researching and constructing new knowledge out of these bits of information learned.

• How to teach - In the constructivist classroom, the teacher provides students with data or experiences that allow them to hypothesize, predict, manipulate objects, pose questions, research, investigate, imagine, and invent, The constructivist classroom is interactive. It promotes dialogical exchange of ideas among learners and between teacher and learners. The teacher's role is to facilitate this process.

• Knowledge - isn't a thing that can be simply deposited by the teacher into the empty minds of the learners. Rather, knowledge is constructed by learners through an active, mental process of development; learners are the builders and creators of meaning and knowledge. Their minds are not empty. Instead, their minds are full of ideas waiting to be "midwifed" by the teacher with his/her skillful facilitating skills.

ESSENTIALISM

• Why teach - This philosophy contends that teachers teach for learners to acquire basic knowledge, skills and values. Teachers teach "not to radically reshape society but rather to transmit the traditional moral values and intellectual knowledge that students need to become model citizens."

• What to teach - Essentialist programs are academically rigorous. The emphasis is on academic content for students to learn the basic skills or the fundamental r's reading, 'riting, 'rithmetic, right conduct as these are essential to the acquisition of higher or more complex skills needed in preparation for adult life. The essentialist curriculum includes the "traditional disciplines such as math, natural science, history, foreign language, and literature. Essentialists frown upon vocational courses..." or other courses with watered down academic content... The teachers and administrators decide what is most important for the students to learn and place little emphasis on student interests, particularly when they divert time and attention from the academic curriculum.

• How to teach - Essentialist teachers emphasize mastery of subject matter. They are expected to be intellectual and moral models of their students. They are seen as "fountain" of information and as "paragon of virtue," if ever there is such a person. To gain mastery of basic skills, teachers have to observe "core requirements, longer school day, a longer academic year..."

With mastery of academic content as primary focus, teachers rely heavily on the use of prescribed textbooks, the drill method and other methods that will enable them to cover as much academic content as possible like the lecture method. There is a heavy stress on memorization and discipline.

PROGRESSIVISM

• Why teach -  Progressivist teachers teach to develop learners into becoming enlightened and intelligent citizens of a democratic society. This group of teachers teaches learners so they may live life fully NOW not to prepare them for adult life.

• What to teach - The progressivists are identified with need-based and relevant curriculum. This is a curriculum that "responds to students' needs and that relates to students' personal lives and experiences."

Progressivists accept the impermanence of life and the inevitability of change. For the progressivists, everything else changes, Change is the only thing that does not change. Hence, progressivist teachers are more concerned with teaching the learners the skills to cope with change. Instead of occupying themselves with teaching facts or bits of information that are true today but become obsolete tomorrow, they would rather focus their teaching on the skills or processes in gathering and evaluating information and in problem-solving.

The subjects that are given emphasis in progressivist schools are the "natural and social sciences." Teachers expose students to many new scientific, technological, and social developments, reflecting the progressivist notion that progress and change are fundamental. In addition, students solve problems in the classroom similar to those they will encounter outside of the schoolhouse.

• How to teach - Progressivist teachers employ experiential methods. They believe that one learns by doing. For John Dewey, the most popular advocate of progressivism, book learning is no substitute for actual experience. One experiential teaching method that progressivist teachers heavily rely on is the problem-solving method. This problem-solving method makes use of the scientific method. (You will learn more of this in your Principles and Strategies of Teaching.)

     Other "hands-on-minds-on-hearts-on" teaching methodology that progressivist teachers use are field trips during which students interact with nature or society. Teachers also stimulate students through thought- provoking games, and puzzles.

PERENNIALISM

• Why teach - We are all rational animals. Schools should, therefore, develop the students' rational and moral powers. According to Aristotle, if we neglect the students' reasoning skills, we deprive them of the ability to use their higher faculties to control their passions and appetites.

• What to teach. The perennialist curriculum is a universal one on the view that all human beings possess the same essential nature. It is heavy on the humanities, on general education. It is not a specialist curriculum but rather a general one. There is less emphasis on vocational and technical education. Philosopher Mortimer Adler claims that the "Great Books of ancient and medieval as well as modern times are a repository of knowledge and wisdom. a tradition of culture which must initiate each generation." What the perennialist teachers teach are lifted from the Great Books.

• How to teach. The perennialist classrooms are "centered around teachers." The teachers do not allow the students' interests or experiences to substantially dictate what they teach. They apply whatever creative techniques and other tried and true methods which are believed to be most conducive to disciplining the students' minds. Students engaged in Socratic dialogues, or mutual inquiry sessions to develop an understanding of history's most timeless concepts."

EXISTENTIALISM

• Why teach - The main concern of the existentialists is "to help students understand and appreciate themselves as unique individuals who accept complete responsibility for their thoughts, feelings and actions." Since 'existence precedes essence', the existentialist teacher's role is to help students define their own essence by exposing them to various paths they take in life and by creating an environment in which they freely choose their own preferred way. Since feeling is not divorced from reason in decision making, the existentialist demands the education of the whole person, "not just the mind."

• What to teach. "In an existentialist curriculum, students are given a wide variety of options from which to choose." Students are afforded great latitude in their choice of subject matter. The humanities, however, are given tremendous emphasis to "provide students with vicarious experiences that will help unleash their own. creativity and self-expression. 

• How to teach - "Existentialist methods focus on the individual. Learning is self-paced, self-directed. It includes a great deal of individual contact with the teacher, who relates to each student openly and honestly. To help students know themselves and their place in society, teachers employ values clarification strategy. In the use of such strategy, teachers remain non-judgmental and take care not to impose their values on their students since values are personal."

BEHAVIORISM

• Why teach - Behaviorist schools are concerned with the modification and shaping of students' behavior by providing for a favorable environment, since they believe that they are a product of their environment. They are after students who exhibit desirable behavior in society.

• What to teach - Because behaviorists look at "people and other animals... as complex combinations of matter that act only in response to internally or externally generated physical stimuli," behaviorist teachers teach students to respond favorably to various stimuli in the environment.

• How to teach - Behaviorist teachers "ought to arrange environmental conditions so that students can make the responses to stimuli. Physical variables like light, temperature, arrangement of furniture, size and quantity of visual aids have to be controlled to get the desired responses from the learners....Teachers ought to make the stimuli clear and interesting to capture and hold the learners' attention. They ought to provide appropriate incentives to reinforce positive responses and weaken or eliminate negative ones." (Trespeces, 1995)

LINGUISTIC PHILOSOPHY

• Why teach - To develop the communication skills of the learner because the ability to articulate, to voice out the meaning and values of things that one obtains from his/her experience of life and the world is the very essence of man. It is through his/her ability to express himself/herself clearly, to get his her ideas across, to make known to others the values that he/ she has imbibed, the beauty that he/she has seen, the ugliness that he/she rejects and the truth that he/she has discovered. Teachers teach to develop in the learner the skill to send messages clearly and receive messages correctly.

• What to teach - Learners should be taught to communicate clearly -how to send clear, concise messages and how to receive and correctly understand messages sent. Communication takes place in three (3) ways-verbal, nonverbal, and paraverbal. Verbal component refers to the content of our message, the choice and arrangement of our words. This can be oral or written. Nonverbal component refers to the message we send through our body language while paraverbal component refers to how we say what we say the tone, pacing and volume of our voices.

• How to teach - The most effective way to teach language and communication is the experiential way. Make them experience sending and receiving messages through verbal, non-verbal and para-verbal manner. Teacher should make the classroom a place for the interplay of minds and hearts. The teacher facilitates dialogue among learners and between him.

Here is a sample of a philosophy of education. Study the example of Teacher Macrina's Philosophy of Education given below, 

My Philosophy of Education as a Grade School Teacher. I believe that every child;

• has a natural interest in learning and is capable of learning.

• is an embodied spirit.

• can be influenced but not totally by his/her environment. is unique, so comparing a child to other children has no basis

• does not have an empty mind, rather is full of ideas and it is my task to draw out these ideas

• I believe that there are unchanging values in changing times and these must be passed on to every child by my modeling, value inculcation and value integration in my lessons. 

I believe that my task as a teacher is to facilitate the development of every child to the optimum and to the maximum by:

• reaching out to all children without bias and prejudice towards the "least" of the children

• making every child feel good and confident about himself/ herself through his/her experiences of success in the classroom

• helping every child master the basic skills of reading, communicating in oral and written form, arithmetic and computer skills

• teaching my subject matter with mastery so that every child will use his/her basic skills to continue acquiring knowledge, skills and values for him/her to go beyond basic literacy and basic numeracy

• inculcating or integrating the unchanging values of respect, honesty, love and care for others regardless of race, ethnicity, nationality, appearance and economic status in my lessons

• consistently practicing these values to serve as model for every child strengthening the value formation of every child through "hands-on-minds-on-hearts-on" outside the classroom 

• providing every child activities meant to develop the body, the mind and the spirit

• teaching not only what to learn but more important how to learn

It is important that you make explicit your philosophy of education. Your philosophy of education is your "window" to the world and "compass" in life. Your philosophy is your own thought and formulation, never formulated for you by another that is why you were advised to begin stating it with the phrase "I believe." It is best to state it in the concrete not in the abstract like a theory because this is your blue print to daily life.