Mujawo asked:

What is the value of philosophy of education?

===========

Well, here are some questions you might consider:

Should we incorporate "practical" subjects like motor repair into public education? Why or why not?

Should we use physical punishment in schools in order to enforce discipline? Why or why not?

Should class sizes be large or small?

What is a "teacher"? How educated should they be? In what subjects?

What are we educating children to be: broadly educated people with some knowledge in many areas,
or narrowly, with deep knowledge in a few areas? Defend the answer. Should children who do better
academically be placed in faster tracks?

Should education include moral goals, or should it just be of facts? What is a fact? What is the best
morality to learn? Why?

That should get you started.

Steven Ravett Brown

Here's my answer. If you are involved in education — and I am a teacher — then your whole practice
is based on your beliefs about what education is, what its purpose is and a large number of other
assumptions. You may recognize these assumptions explicitly, or they may be unacknowledged.
Philosophy of education is all about facing up to these assumptions and subjecting them to reflective
thought. For me, and I suspect for many people, thinking through deeply those things that underlie
our practice helps us to become clearer about what we are trying to do, to identify those things that
we do which are not helping us to achieve our aims, and to plan what we will do to achieve those
aims better. Philosophy of education (like the philosophy of anything) therefore, for me, arises in
taking what is puzzling or interesting in our experience and subjecting it to critical inquiry.

Unfortunately, much of what is taught as philosophy of education in schools of education makes little
effort to connect with the experiences of trainee teachers. It is usually what puzzles and interests the
lecturer, or some distant philosopher. Further, it is not a joint inquiry by the lecturer and students, but
a pre-packaged lecture. Philosophy becomes dead to many students in this situation. To make things
worse, the trainee teachers are often taught this philosophy before they have much in the way of
experience of teaching, so that the puzzles and interests have not yet arisen. No wonder many
trainee teachers (me included) disliked the philosophy of education they endured in their training.

Tim Sprod