My Philosophy of Education

My Philosophy of Education: When I started thinking about my own philosophy of education, I opened the book of my life as a teacher and started flipping its pages one by one. Twenty two years of teaching is a long time. There were pages full of happiness and joy, others full of worry anger and disappointment. There were pages full of success and others of failure. There were pages of experimentations, hypotheses, validation and reconsideration of hypotheses. There were pages that I cherished and wished to treasure forever and there were pages that I wished I could tear out and erase. Finally, from these thousands of pages I copied the following few lines as "My Philosophy of Education", but there is still much that remains unwritten. Then my curiosity urged me to search for the thoughts of famous philosophers, thinkers and educators which intersected with my thoughts and my philosophy of education and what follows is the result, an amalgamate of both philosophies: humbly, my own, and others'.

Introduction: "The aim of education should be to teach us rather how to think, than what to think — rather to improve our minds, so as to enable us to think for ourselves, than to load the memory with thoughts of other men." Bill Beattie

The aim of education: Education is a primary means used in a person's quest for knowledge and truth.  It is a significant means of building up a human being who is capable of survival in the society and the world and of playing an essential role in pushing the society forward, making it prosperous and affluent. "All who have meditated on the art of governing mankind have been convinced that the fate of empires depends on the education of youth." Aristotle

Education is not merely a way of transferring information to the learner; education must enable the learner to know his potentials and give the suitable nutrients to his mind, considering it the source of human power and the source of human strength. "Learning is a kind of natural food for the mind." Cicero 

Education must give special attention to morals and ethics because they are essential and vital foundations of the human personality and the human society as a whole. If knowledge does not combine with ethics, it serves the opposite of its assigned purpose, leading the human and the whole society to catastrophic results. "Education is like a double-edged sword. It may be turned to dangerous uses if it is not properly handled." Wu Ting-Fang

The curriculum: The contents of the curriculum must be as practical and applicable to real life as possible. In addition to providing the learner with the suitable kinds of knowledge that would make the different aspects of his personal and professional life easier, it should include the proper tools for promoting the learner's critical thinking, analysis and creativity abilities.  "Do not go where the path may lead; go instead where there is no path and leave a trail."  Ralph Waldo Emerson

Every part of the curriculum must be clearly set to serve a certain essential need of the learner and his society through him. "In education it isn't how much you have committed to memory or even how much you know. It's being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't. It's knowing where to go to find out what you need to know and it's knowing how to use the information you get." William Feather

The curriculum must not be adopted from other societies or cultures and applied haphazardly; the curriculum must be designed to suit the society where it is to be used and to serve this society, intellectually, culturally and socially and in every other aspect. "We must be able to listen to our own voices, and trace our own footsteps; we must have our own heroes and heroines inspire us; we must persist with building our won culture with the ingredients close to hand and not import theses ingredients ready made from abroad". The late Michael King

The methods of teaching:  Motivation is an indispensible ingredient of the teaching methods. If the learner does not have enough motivation, then any approach used will be fruitless. When the learner feels that he needs the knowledge that he is supposed to acquire, he will be greatly motivated to learn. "It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows." Epictetus

No matter what subject is being taught, the scientific method, which depends on logic, analysis and criticism, must be applied. And whether the inductive or deductive method is used, the student must be involved in the learning process and must have a distinguished role in acquiring knowledge and participate in building up his knowledge instead of being lectured. "Tell me and I'll forget; show me and I may remember; involve me and I'll understand." Confucius

The use of the "dialectic" method of teaching is a very efficient way. It is through asking questions that we can provoke the learner's critical thinking and assist his learning in a better way. "The dialectic is neither fiction nor mysticism, but a science of the forms of our thinking insofar as it is not limited to the daily problems of life but attempts to arrive at an understanding of more complicated and drawn-out processes." Leon Trotsky

Story telling is a very proficient way of teaching. The use of stories, not only in language teaching, but also in sciences, mathematics and other subjects, can help the learner learn better and enjoy what he is learning very much. "Thought flows in terms of stories -- stories about events, stories about people, and stories about intentions and achievements. The best teachers are the best storytellers. We learn in the form of stories." Frank Smith

The role of the teacher: The teacher has a very essential role to play in the learning process, even though it is not a good idea that the teacher is at the center of the learning process.

The teacher is supposed to motivate the students to learn by making learning fun and interesting. He must be a moderator and guide the students into the circle of knowledge by assisting them to experiment, analyze, question and conclude and thus learn. "Do not train children to learning by force and harshness, but direct them to it by what amuses their minds, so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each." Plato

He must be a good model for his students, teaching them with his deeds more than with his words.

He must build bridges of confidence, communication and love with his students because without them a learner may be scared to take any steps towards learning.

"The teacher who is indeed wise does not bid you to enter the house of wisdom but rather leads you to the threshold of your mind." Gibran Kahlil Gibran

Conclusion: Plants are shaped by cultivation and men by education. .. We are born weak, we need strength; we are born totally unprovided, we need aid; we are born stupid, we need judgment. Everything we do not have at our birth and which we need when we are grown is given us by education. Jean Jacques Rousseau

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