An Introduction to Philosophy of Education, 4th Edition

[Pages:225]An Introduction to Philosophy of Education, 4th Edition

`Well written, accessible to students with no previous background in philosophy... an excellent introduction.'

The Times Higher Education Supplement (on an earlier edition)

What does it mean to be well educated? In the fourth edition of this best-selling textbook, the authors introduce students to the business of philosophizing, thereby inducting them into the art of reasoning and analysing key concepts in education.

This introductory text is a classic in its field. It shows, first and foremost, the importance of philosophy in educational debate and as a background to any practical activity such as teaching. What is involved in the idea of educating a person or the idea of educational success? What, if anything, can be known and how should we organize what we know for curriculum purposes? What are the criteria for establishing the optimum balance between formal and informal teaching techniques? How trustworthy is educational research? In addition to these questions, which strike to the heart of the rationale for the educative process as a whole, the authors explore such concepts as culture, creativity, autonomy, indoctrination, needs, interests, and learning by discovery.

In this new updated edition, the authors draw on the latest research in genetics to argue that education is uniquely human and is essentially what develops us as humans. Resisting modern tendencies to equate knowledge with opinion, and value judgements with taste, this book leads the reader into the business of philosophizing and champions the cause of reason in education.

Robin Barrow was previously Reader in Philosophy of Education at the University of Leicester, UK; he is currently Professor of Philosophy of Education at Simon Fraser University, British Columbia, Canada where for ten years he was also Dean of Education.

Ronald Woods was until recently Senior Lecturer in Philosophy of Education at the University of Leicester, UK.

Related titles

Philosophy and Educational Policy A critical introduction John Gingell and Christopher Winch Making Sense of Education An introduction to the philosophy and theory of education and teaching David Carr Spirituality, Philosophy and Education David Carr and John Haldane

The authors are grateful to Educational Philosophy and Theory for permission to make use of some material originally published in that journal.

An Introduction to Philosophy of Education, 4th Edition

Robin Barrow and Ronald Woods

4th edition revised by Robin Barrow

First published in 1975 by Methuen & Co. Second edition 1982 Third edition in 1988 by Routledge

Fourth edition published 2006 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

? 1975, 1982, 1988, 2006 Robin Barrow and Ronald Woods

This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2006.

"To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge's collection of thousands of eBooks please go to eBookstore.tandf.co.uk."

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested

ISBN10: 0?415?38127?4 (hbk) ISBN10: 0?415?38126?6 (pbk) ISBN10: 0?203?96995?2 (ebk)

ISBN13: 978?0?415?38127?7 (hbk) ISBN13: 978?0?415?38126?0 (pbk) ISBN13: 978?0?203?96995?3 (ebk)

Contents

Preface

vi

Foreword

ix

Introduction

1

1 Thinking about education

8

2 What is it to be human?

21

3 The concept of education

26

4 Knowledge and the curriculum

38

5 Curriculum theory

58

6 Indoctrination

70

7 Rationality

84

8 Self-determination

98

9 The postmodern challenge

109

10 Needs, interests, and experience

115

11 Creativity

142

12 Culture

155

13 Research into teaching

174

14 Conclusion: theory and practice

185

Bibliography

192

Index

197

Preface

Philosophers sometimes refer to a ship that needs repairs over the course of a long voyage, in order to illustrate certain problems or questions about identity. The wooden ship leaves harbour and, while at sea, certain planks have to be replaced. A short time later some others have to be replaced; a few days after that, some more; and so on, until by the journey's end all the planks that went to make up the original ship have been replaced. Is this the ship that was originally put to sea or an entirely different one? Whatever the answer to that question, this book is beginning to resemble that ship.

Since the launching of the first edition in 1975 five completely new chapters have been added, one has been thrown overboard, and the remaining text has been subjected to repeated overhaul. Nonetheless, I hope it can be said that the book remains recognizably the same one that Ron Woods and I set out to write thirty years ago. That is to say, I hope that it still provides a helpful introduction to the business of philosophizing in the sense of engaging in conceptual analysis and coherent reasoning about education, while providing a plausible answer to some specific educational questions and establishing at any rate the groundwork of an argument for a particular view of what education is all about and what it therefore demands of us.

In this revision, three new chapters entitled, respectively, `Thinking about Education', `What is it to be Human?' and `The Postmodern Challenge' have been added. `Thinking about Education' attempts to set the stage by briefly examining the context in which philosophical thought about education operates, stressing in particular the rational tradition in Western thought to which philosophical analysis belongs, and the wider concerns of schooling of which education is merely a part, albeit, it will be argued, the major part. It seems important also to address the question `What is it to be Human?' in view of much recent research, particularly in genetics, and in order to locate education as a peculiarly human activity. It seemed necessary to add the brief chapter on `The Postmodern Challenge' not in order to address any theses associated with any particular individuals, but to combat the stultifying effect of certain propositions, such as that there is no truth or

Preface vii

that nothing can be known, which, rightly or wrongly, are often classified as postmodern in tenor and which, if accepted, would undermine the key foundations not only of the positive educational argument of this book but also of the philosophical activity that it is concerned with. The chapter on `Understanding' of previous editions has been dropped, not because we do not continue to believe that education is primarily and essentially about understanding, but because a great deal of the overall text is concerned directly and indirectly with issues to do with understanding and knowledge, and, given a need to cut something at the publishers' behest, it was felt that a direct examination of what `understanding' means could be foregone. Beyond these major changes, the bibliography has been brought up to date and the remaining text has been subjected to various fairly minor revisions and one or two paragraph length additions.

I should like to conclude with a comment on the updating of references and examples. I have, by and large, attempted to bring specific examples of, for example, films up to date, so that the `Straw Dogs' of 1975, which became `The Texas Chainsaw Massacre' of 1988, now becomes `Crash'. This is simply to help the majority of readers recognize the reference! And though, for example, a few references to the game of Bingo are retained, because as a matter of fact for a period educational philosophers used it as an iconic example and argued about its specifically educational potential, most of them have been replaced by reference to, for example, video-games, since clearly it is the latter that represent a potential challenge to education today rather than Bingo. But, and this is important, by and large the philosophical references ? the author cited, the arguments explored ? have not been changed.

A very minor reason for this is that after discussion with the publisher it was agreed to produce a new edition of this work rather than a new introduction to philosophy of education altogether, since, strange as it may be, this book has proven itself capable of weathering changes of fashion and focus over time. If all the topics and the arguments relating to them had been brought up to date, drawing on new material written exclusively in the last ten years, then clearly it would not have been a new edition; it would have been a new book ? a different ship.

A major reason is related to the original aim of the book: to introduce the business of philosophizing about education. To that end, provided the examples are not so foreign as to be incomprehensible to the reader, it really doesn't matter what issues, what authors, or what arguments one uses, since the primary purpose is to illustrate philosophy in action and to have material on which to practice (i.e. get thinking). That reason would be sufficient to justify continuing to examine, for example, Peters' work on the concept of education or Hirst's work on forms of knowledge. Indeed, in the latter case, Hirst himself, if he hasn't actually repudiated his original thesis, has

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