PHILOSOPHICAL

THOUGHTS ON
EDUCATION
 ESSENTIALISM
• IT IS A CONSERVATIVE
EDUCATIONAL THEORY
THAT AROSE IN RESPONSE
TO PROGRESSIVE
EDUCATION
 ESSENTIALISM
• WILLIAM BAGLEY, MICHAEL
DEMIASKEVICH AND ALDEN
SHAW WERE RECOGNIZED
LEADERS OF ESSENTIALISTS IN
EDUCATION IN 1938.
 ESSENTIALISM
• The essentialists have as their
ultimate aim “ to fit the man to
perform justly and skillfully.
• The essentialists believe that
essential skills, knowledge and
attitude needed by the individual in
making has adjustments to the
realities of life.
 ESSENTIALISM
• The elementary school
curriculum should aim to
cultivate basic tool skills that
contribute to literacy and
mastery of 4 r’s—reading,
writing, arithmetic and right
conduct.
 ESSENTIALISM
• Schooling requires
discipline and a respect for
legitimate authority.
• Learning requires hard
work and discipline
attention.
 IDEALISM
• Plato developed the classic
formulation of idealist principles.
• Hegel, a German Philosopher,
created a comprehensive
philosophical and historical world
view based on idealism
 IDEALISM
• In the United States, Ralph Waldo
Emerson and Henry David Thoreau
elaborated on the idealist conception of
reality.
• The founder of Kindergarten, Friedrich
Froebel was an exponent of idealist
pedagogy.
• The leading contemporary proponent of
idealist education is Donald Butler.
 IDEALISM
• The pupil is an spiritual being whose
chief purpose in life is to express his own
nature.
• The role of education is to provide the
conditions under which the purpose can
be achieved.
• The child shall be treated as a spiritual
being and not as physical mind.
 IDEALISM
• The purpose of teaching is not
so much to familiarize the
student with a mass of
information as to stimulate
him to discover the meaning
of this information for himself.
 IDEALISM
• Aims of Education:
–To contribute to the development
of the mind and self, the school
should emphasize intellectual
abilities, moral judgments,
aesthetics and self-realization,
individual freedom, responsibility
and self-control.
 IDEALISM
• Curriculum
–A body of intellectual subject
matter which is essential to
realization of mental and
moral development.
 IDEALISM
• Teacher-Learner Relationship
–The teacher must be excellent mentally
and morally in personal conduct and
convictions.
–The teacher must exercise skills in
providing opportunities for pupil’s
mind to analyze, discover, synthesize
and create.
 REALISM
• Education requires a central core of
subject matter to acquaint the pupil with
the basic physical structure of the world
in which he lives.
• For the realist the purpose of education
is to enable him to become balance, well-
adjusted in harmony and physically and
mentally.
 REALISM
• Aim of Education:

–To provide the student

with the essential
knowledge he will need
to survive in the natural
world.
 REALISM
• Curriculum
–Basic components of the
curriculum are the: subject
matter/body of knowledge and
the appropriate pedagogy- fit
to the readiness of the
learners.
 PERENNIALISM
• It is an educational theory that draws
heavily on the principles of realism.
• Robert Maynard Hutchins is one of
the most articulate perennialists.
• Schools are designed to cultivate
human intelligence.
 PERENNIALISM
• Aims:
–Develop the power of
thought
–Search and disseminate the
truth
 PERENNIALISM
• Curriculum
–Hutchins recommended the
study of classics or the great
works of western civilization