Philosophy
Interesting passage from Maria Montessori?s The Absorbent Mind.
?You will be asking already,? What, then, is the real purpose of childhood?? And we can hardly proceed with confidence in scientific education without first trying to answer this question. For the child has a double duty. And if we consider one side of it only, the duty of growing up, there is a danger of suppressing his best energies.?
Children have two jobs and only one of them is to be an adult in training. What?s the other one?
I?ll talk about Montessori?s own answer tomorrow, but the question itself is so rich, I wanted to throw it out to be played with first. Ground rule: you cannot answer ?Just being a kid,? you need to fill in what that means.
- What Is The Purpose Of School?
There is always hand-wringing about our schools, "Our schools are failing," "What will it take for our schools to succeed?" All this, of course, begs the question exactly what is it they are succeeding or failing in doing? To simply say "to educate children"...
- Right And True And The Way We Educate Our Kids
I'm reading Strawson's Introduction to Logical Theory and in a footnote in the first chapter, he draws a distinction between a student giving a correct answer and giving a true answer. The point brought to mind a conversation I was a part of over...
- Do Grades Hurt As Well As Help The Educational Process?
It's early in the semester and grades and grading does not yet have the bite it will have later, so this distance may allow for some more open minded consideration. For the project on Maria Montessori that I've been working, I came across this...
- What Makes A Great Teacher?
When I'm on a plane chatting and the person next to me finds out that I teach philosophy, the reaction is either, "I took that in college and hated it" or "I took that in college and had the strangest teacher." When I get the second one, inevitably...
- Richard Dawkins: Growing Up In The Universe - The Ultraviolet Garden
Continuing his Michael Faraday Christmas Lectures, Growing Up in the Universe, Richard Dawkins begins by asking a seemingly simple question: what are living organisms (bees, for instance) for? The question seems so innocent that there is a very long tradition...
Philosophy
The Purposes of Childhood
Interesting passage from Maria Montessori?s The Absorbent Mind.
?You will be asking already,? What, then, is the real purpose of childhood?? And we can hardly proceed with confidence in scientific education without first trying to answer this question. For the child has a double duty. And if we consider one side of it only, the duty of growing up, there is a danger of suppressing his best energies.?
Children have two jobs and only one of them is to be an adult in training. What?s the other one?
I?ll talk about Montessori?s own answer tomorrow, but the question itself is so rich, I wanted to throw it out to be played with first. Ground rule: you cannot answer ?Just being a kid,? you need to fill in what that means.
- What Is The Purpose Of School?
There is always hand-wringing about our schools, "Our schools are failing," "What will it take for our schools to succeed?" All this, of course, begs the question exactly what is it they are succeeding or failing in doing? To simply say "to educate children"...
- Right And True And The Way We Educate Our Kids
I'm reading Strawson's Introduction to Logical Theory and in a footnote in the first chapter, he draws a distinction between a student giving a correct answer and giving a true answer. The point brought to mind a conversation I was a part of over...
- Do Grades Hurt As Well As Help The Educational Process?
It's early in the semester and grades and grading does not yet have the bite it will have later, so this distance may allow for some more open minded consideration. For the project on Maria Montessori that I've been working, I came across this...
- What Makes A Great Teacher?
When I'm on a plane chatting and the person next to me finds out that I teach philosophy, the reaction is either, "I took that in college and hated it" or "I took that in college and had the strangest teacher." When I get the second one, inevitably...
- Richard Dawkins: Growing Up In The Universe - The Ultraviolet Garden
Continuing his Michael Faraday Christmas Lectures, Growing Up in the Universe, Richard Dawkins begins by asking a seemingly simple question: what are living organisms (bees, for instance) for? The question seems so innocent that there is a very long tradition...