The purpose of education?
One of the most telling responses I get when talking to educators is in response to the question, 'What, for you, is the purpose of education?'. Roughly three-quarters of those I ask reply with something along the lines of, 'I don't know´. Unless I have no other option, I tend to avoid these people since it strikes me as bizarre that a teacher had not, at least, considered the question at some point. On the other hand, any reasoned response tends to score high with me.
So, what is the purpose of education?
(btw, I'm not interested in a citation battle, but rather ideas and arguments. This is debate, not an academic paper.)
So, what is the purpose of education?
(btw, I'm not interested in a citation battle, but rather ideas and arguments. This is debate, not an academic paper.)
Comments (50)
If I hoped to be a teacher, the answer to that question would be - because there are things I know, feel, see, and understand that I want to show others. I want them to have a chance to see the world that I can see. To me, a lot of what goes on on this forum has a similar motivation.
To a relatively small percentage of students, I think the purpose of education is the reciprocal of that I've expressed for the teacher. It's a chance to learn more about the world away from everyday life. To learn skills and identify talents.
To most students, I think it's what they do because they're expected to. It's a job really.
For society? I'll let our social philosophers speak to that.
To modify the behavior of those being educated.
I do that often as well, pause to take a deep breath. That is a reasonable take on what a teacher is supposed to be. But it goes way beyond that.
You have to be a mother, father, baby sitter, big brother sometimes as well. You also have to be a student, things change from day to day and you should be keeping up. Paying the students for doing their jobs is a job in itself, you have to be an accountant almost. You have to be a project manager to keep all of the little bits and pieces together and running smoothly and up to standards. Plus good understanding of the educational laws is most useful. Etc, etc, etc.
And you have to work hard at staying human and same.
Quoting tim wood
I try to give my students basic knowledge that will be useful in everyday life. And a lot of them think that it is too much because "the information is available on google, so why should I learn it".
I agree that formal education has a civilising mission, but civilising for whom? Is 'taming' merely the imposition of majority societal norms upon the individual being educated?
This is true, but so general as to be useless.
I was assuming that a candidate would have the necessary technical knowledge to teach their subject. Also, the core curriculum is usually decided by government policy so regarding intention, there's not a great deal of room for manoeuvre.
No, but my hope is that a teacher would at least have thought about the question and would thus have at least one answer.
Indeed. Knowing 'how' or 'why' is not the same as knowing where to look for information.
The primary purpose of education is to inspire a lifelong love of learning in the student and a corresponding awareness of the possible limitations of knowledge. (the exemplary case here would of course be Socrates)
In this sense, education (at its best) is not limited to learning about specific things - however useful that information may be - but, more importantly, it involves the development of a particular way of being, one which is marked by passion, amazement, humility, etc., etc.,
I saw the latter philosophy at work in the last university I worked at where engineering/science and business accounted for over 75% of all courses and was growing in proportion, while the arts and humanities, and social sciences that made up the rest were continually shrinking away. Students then were being funneled into courses for economic reasons irregardless of who they were as people and who they wanted to become. Sad.
I notice you ask what it is, and not what it ought to be.
Education is an indoctrination into a world that forbids creativity, individuality, and promotes conformity through competition and measurement of 'progress'. It is the industrial production of adults depressed into compliance with a vacuous and self-destructive world of production/consumption.
Well maybe I'm exaggerating a wee bit. But there is a process goes on in schools round here that manages to take endlessly curious explorers and questioners and endlessly enthusiastic creators and actors at 5 yrs old, and turns them by age 11 into sullen resentful disinterested refuseniks. Some few escape...
I feel like this is like my post, but with a red hot chili pepper thrown in. :)
I wanted specifically to respond to @Eric's stab. One only needs to inspire a lifelong love of learning after it has been destroyed. It is the natural condition of children.
https://anewkindofhuman.com/creative-genius-divergent-thinking-test/
:pray: And I guess you may have seen Ken Robinson's Ted Talk.
Yes, this is exactly what I had in mind!
To restore that natural curiosity and love of learning after it's been strangled to death through traditional schooling by middle childhood.
The purpose of education is twofold: it is to induct a child into the ways of the world on the one hand, and into the ways of the child's people, on the other.
To give children a stock of general facts about the natural world (a rough or preparatory sketch, to be fleshed out with their own experience), and to give children the tools to be able to interact with the social world around them, so that they can learn to communicate, interact and co-operate with others of their tribe in ways they understand.
It is basically to install a child's brain with the collective wisdom of the tribe up to that point, so that it has something to work with, a structure to both rely on and repair (even contribute to the perpetuation of) as it goes.
There's some debate about whether the process of education should lean more towards rote learning or more towards the eliciting of creativity. I think that depends on the personality type of the child. But again one might ask: go with the grain or against the grain? Should we get "square" kids to do fingerpainting and creative types to buckle down and learn their multiplication tables? Or the other way round? Min-max, or bring all faculties to some sort of balance? Again, this is when it gets down to the judgement of teachers, who know more intimately the psychology and character of the particular children they're teaching.
You ought to know. Let's hear it!
Such a question cannot be answered in a short interview. Given that teacher training is little more than a box ticking exercise I imagine you'd be happy with a rehearsed stock answer.
Do you really think that ANY candidate had no answer, or have you not taken the trouble is assess the power of your position, in intimidating candidates with such a question, and failed to notice several potentially excellent teachers along the way ?
Quoting charleton
So many assertions, so little time.
Quoting charleton
I don't know anything, but I have my preferences.
Short answer; the purpose of school education is about providing the wherewithal to optimise both positive and negative liberty according to the ability and needs of the student within a framework of societal norms.
This video is just about the worst thing ever to have happened to pedagogy. It's total nonsense.
OK, well, maybe you can say why you think that's the case.
It's the kind of thing that parents, politicians and school administrators watch and then think that they understand what goes on in schools without having to go to the trouble of doing any real research. It has set up a straw man with the teaching profession as the enemy of the student that has been almost impossible to eradicate. Its success has prompted a sect-like army of management consultants masquerading as education gurus to descend upon insecure management teams and feast upon their limited budgets. It is to education what cosmeceuticals are to science. It is fucking dire because its message is so infantile and easy to understand that it is immensely more attractive than reality.
Sounds a bit like word salad to me. At best weasel words.
If my teacher tells me to stand on my head with a fish in my bum, and I refuse, then I will be responding negatively to their suggestion; if I accept the instruction that would be positive.
Education is to push societal norms, by examination, otherwise there is no growth or change. Education is to preserve and extend knowledge. To allow each student to gather knowledge and skills to the best of their ability, and by pushing their potential to new lengths. It is to make students aware of 'norms' and to teach them critical skills to examine those norms so that they can thrive is an ever changing world, socially, economically, and artistically.
But as a teacher it ought to be your duty to nod sagely and ignore those bastards that are clueless and get on with your job for the sake of the next generation.
Box tickers make bad teachers.
Those who can, teach. Those that cannot, lead.
I think you're reading this into my initial post. I'm not demanding a singular answer or a dissertation, I'm just asking them, conversationally, amongst many other questions, what they think that the purpose of education is. As I've already said, I like to hear a reasoned reply, but not necessarily a prescriptive one. I mean, do you or anyone else think that having chosen to be a teacher, having undergone the necessary training required, and in many cases having years of experience it is reasonable not to have, at least, considered at some point this seemingly relevant question?
I, clearly, do think it's important, and I also think an inability to even attempt an answer, says something about the depth of commitment to a profession that really does require commitment over and above the merely transactional. No less important is that having a global vision of why you do what you provides an axiomatic basis for developing a pedagogy. In order to achieve x,I first need to know what x is before I can approach x.
Imagine two Spanish teachers. One believes that the purpose of his subject is to allow his students to become expert in Spanish linguistics, whilst the other believes that the purpose is to allow allow her students to gain access to other cultures and be at home in a distinct language context. You would expect these two to have wildly differing methodologies since the outcomes they desire are wildly differing.
I take it you're not familiar with Berlin's Two Concepts of Liberty.
So what's your point?
No, it is the main activity of a teacher.
Your definition of behavior is too narrow. You take it as whether they are good or bad boys and girls.
Everything that you do, from what books you pick to read to whether you pick your nose in public is part of it.
The purpose of any education is to impart ways of behaving that conform to the needs of the society.
Education in the rain forest tribe is not about sitting in a classroom learning from books but about learning what plants and animals you can eat, how to look after the forest, how to build shelters, in other words the needs of the society.
Today we need engineers and chemists, doctors and nurses, cops and politicians so the education system is geared to making people behave like them.
Critical thinking, investigation and evaluation, written and oral communication skills are some of the things I call basic knowledge. I expect my high school kids to be able to wipe their own noses and asses.
Quoting tim wood
Unfortunately they are not masters of their own lives, they only think they are. Most of them still are very dependent on mom and dad to keep their lives going. I would seriously have to disagree that most of these kids are fit to survive in the real world.
The kids today think that the internet, farcebook, twatter and so on are most important thing their is. Getting likes and followers out ways almost anything for some of them. And the sad thing is that some of them actually believe that there is nothing more they need to know than how to use these damn things.
Quoting tim wood
I will invite you to class one day so that you can judge from a better perspective. Mainly because there is not really a way to give a good description here.
Quoting tim wood
There are a lot more, I did not not really see the need to be exhaustive in the list. :wink:
If you mean by this, what subjects do I teach, then the answer is quite a few over the years. I have worked mostly in bi-lingual schools so it is not as easy as you might think. Some of the course I have taught are;
English lit, grammar, writing.
Introduction to psychology.
Introduction to sociology.
Cultural history.
Quoting tim wood
Not sure exactly what you are asking here.
It would be impossible for most teachers to go beyond giving students anything more than the basics of their knowledge. How could a teacher that has a university level of education be expected to pass on all of that knowledge to school kids.
Being able to write a proper essay, perform math at a reasonable level, understand that people around the world do not all live the same kinds of life, know that laws exist for reasons, are all necessities, basic knowledge that is needed for students to succeed in university. This is what most teachers try to pass on.
How many kids do you know that have left high school without the basic knowledge that they are going to need to survive?
Quoting tim wood
What did you learn in high school? Was there anything earthshaking about it? Or was it just a basic look at the different areas of human knowledge to give you an opportunity to get a feel for what you are good at?
After leaving high school, were you prepared to go out into the real world and fend for yourself. Most people that don't want jobs at Walmart want to go to university, did you go? Were you prepared for learning at the university. If you were then you probably had good teachers that gave you the basic skills and knowledge that were necessary.
As you said too many teachers don't do a good job, but it is not always their fault. And as universities all over the world are finding out, a lot of the students are not being properly prepared to learn and study at their level.
I have, at least I believe I have, made a difference to the lives of some of my students. I doubt any teacher can claim they made a difference to all of their students. I have presently an ex student at Harvard(on a full scholarship), 2 at the university of Munich, and quiet a few at other good universities around the world including Japan and Korea. Several others have graduated from universities in France, the UK, Switzerland.
I cannot nor will not claim responsibility for any of my ex students being where they are, they got there because that was what they wanted to do. But the first person they look for when they come to visit the school is me. No, I am not bragging. Even the owner and principal are left waiting.
Quoting unenlightened
Are you referring to another brick in the wall?
I don't think it is. Imparting knowledge, both propositional and 'knowhow' is only one aspect of education. An educational establishment is also a social institution. Children do not in general approach teachers to ask them to teach; rather more so, teachers approach children and ask them to learn. This changes everything. It makes a joy into a duty.
Does it not stand to reason, even by your own definition, that one must be in possession of knowledge to be able to impart it to others? I impart some of my knowledge to the students, it is then their job to learn it.
Quoting tim wood
As I explained before, teachers would not be able to impart all of the knowledge they possess to their students. Much as one might try to do so, not many students would be capable of learning it.
For example, a math teacher should be capable of high level equation solving, working out prime numbers to the thousandth, working out square roots . He might try to teach everything he knows but it is doubtful that he will get past the basics of math. University level math might include things like the square root of 2. A high school teacher would be able to teach about square roots but it is not really likely that the students would grasp the concepts of the square root of 2. So he teaches the basics and prepares the kids to go to university as best he can.
Quoting tim wood
But does the fisherman teach the person everything he knows? Would he be able, in a short time, to show the person how the tides, shore lines, water temperature, time of day, type of bait, the depth of the the water, the depth of the bait in the water, the size of the hook and line, the type of boat needed and a lot of other factors that affect the catching of different type of fish? And that is not taking into account which fish to keep and which to throw back for some reason.
Unless he was being paid very well, had plenty of time to dedicate to teaching it and that the person was really, I mean really interested in learning I doubt that his teachings would go beyond the basics. He would try to teach what the person would need to know to catch fish.
Quoting tim wood
That would be a long list.
Let's see if I can make a short list of things that are taught both in and out of school.
I am a heavy goods vehicle, heavy machine driver/operator and mechanic. I have taught, although informally, both.
I am a qualified, certified welder, gas and electric. I have trained people to do both.
I have training in technical drawing and have taught that.
I can plot multiple boat's or ship's courses on a chart using radar and GPS. Never had the chance to teach it but I am confident that I could do.
I have a Microsoft certificate that means I can give computer classes, which I am presently going. I am not going to try to teach the kids everything I know because it would be a waste of time. So I teach them the basics of computer literacy that they need to do assignment and that will be useful in university or most of the jobs they get.
I have plenty of knowledge of the English language, grammatical, written and spoken and try to teach it. Some kids just don't get the idea of being bilingual.
I have a certain amount of knowledge about sociology and psychology, not enough to say that it is university level but more than enough for a high school curriculum. I teach what is in the curriculum in a way that applies to peoples lives.
There is a lot of other stuff that I sometimes apply in short practical courses as well but time is short today.
And in this sense the purpose of education is to change their behavior to suit the society. Behavior as in the way they live their lives, not as in discipline.
Quoting unenlightened
Ain't that the truth. So few students nowadays want to ask questions because the fear being shown up for a dunce in front of the other dunces. And to make it worse, now we have to worry about them laughing at each other on the internet.
You're a legend now, unenlightened.
Foremost is the ability to reason.
I read some book a while ago about a guy who went to an ivy league school who said that there was competition among the students to constantly ask questions and gain recognition. The point was that it put the Asian students at a disadvantage because their culture demanded that the teachers be respected and listened to, and that it was also disrespectful to the other students to force them to listen to you when there was a more learned professor in the room.
I used to see it in corporate meetings as well. The same guy would always drone on about nothing just to show his great interest in everything corporate to the boss, which was really annoying during the meetings and doubly annoying when he became the boss.
Despite all this, I still have faith that the world is built on a solid foundation of truth, justice, and righteousness upon which this house of cards cannot stand, but that might also be wishful thinking, but I've not given up hope.
I am sure that Plato would disagree with the orientals. I do too, even my avatar does.