My Educational Philosophy :: Philosophy of Education Teaching Essays

My Educational Philosophy Education is diverse. Due to the various natures of knowledge and students, it is difficult to place my educational philosophy in one category. Each student is unique; curriculums vary depending on many factors. I feel that many educational philosophies are beneficial to education. The nature of students reflects many things including heredity, home life, and society as a whole. Through my experiences working with Americorps/Energy Express, I learned children from lower income families tend to lose three months of education during the summer break. The students never regain these losses. While lower income children lose learning, children from higher income families gain a month of learning. This demonstrates the importance of home life in the nature and education of students. When teaching, one must always consider the aspects that may affect the students’ nature along with the nature of knowledge. Knowledge is both relative and absolute. Literature is an example of relative knowledge. Interpretation of books or poetry depend on the person reading the material, the place where the literature is read, and the time period in which the person is living. Science and mathematics are absolute. One plus one equals two regardless of the time, place, or person. Acquiring knowledge, whether absolute or relative, is the purpose of education. Public education is important to improving society and the future. Like Plato, I feel education gives people the ability to think critically instead of being blindly led by others. As a future teacher, I am idealistic in that I hope to encourage students to challenge themselves, I also hope to encourage students to continue learning throughout life, and prepare for college. To accomplish these goals, I will incorporate pragmatic methods like hands on activities through laboratory experiments and problem solving into my teaching. This also falls under experimentalism. The Socratic method of small group discussions, lecturing, and questioning will be used to help students acquire knowledge. Using many methods will help all students to understand the material presented. Discipline will play an important role in reaching my goals for the students. I plan to use pragmatic methods also in establishing rules.