Brittany posited a question regarding educators having a philosophical background. It seems essential that a good teacher would be versed in some form of philosophy.
Anyone studying to be an educator ought to be taking classes in or independently studying pedagogy. Pedagogy is a sub-field within philosophy. Therefore, any educator who has properly pursued their education has already done philosophy. Pedagogy just as stepped in philosophical thinking as any other branch. Philosophy fosters independent thought, and healthy skepticism. These are traits that good educators ought to strive to engender in their students.So it would follow that an educator who does not possess these traits would not be very successful in engendering them. Studying philosophy could prove a corrective to this.
This is not to suggest, however, that to be an independent thinker one must necessarily have an interest in studying philosophy. The value of the philosophical background comes from a practice in critical thinking, which can be achieved without pursuing an education in philosophy. So a good teacher would necessarily be a good critical thinker.
Ought we to make critical thinking part of an educator's professional development?
No comments:
Post a Comment