This paper outlines the constructivist approach to teaching and learning and reviews some of the literature to establish a linkage between constructivist theories of learning and humanistic psychology. In particular, the paper recognizes the work of Carl Rogers and suggests that his contributions to the professional literature on teaching and…

The goal of teaching philosophy is to develop philosophically literate students and to ensure that students develop philosophical literacy by design and not by chance. Perhaps the best method for teaching philosophy to beginning students is the public model, in which the practice of defending positions in the public arena forces students to become…

Jacob Eschbach Yoder was one of the many northern schoolteachers who went south to assist in educating the newly freed African American population in the years immediately following the Civil War. Impelled by a religious fervor stemming from his upbringing in the Mennonite faith and especially by the educational ideals he had absorbed from his…

This Swedish paper discusses the design of an inclusive curriculum for students with disabilities based on Rousseau's concept of a social contract. The importance of a curricular philosophy in which social competence and ecological conditions are crucial provisions in shaping the curriculum is discussed. The social contract philosophy is used to…

Recent American educational research focuses on the differences between urban and nonurban schools. Ideas such as "inner city" are taken as self-evident and are imposed as a way to achieve a more just and equitable national system of schooling. The urban environment is singled out as violent. This essay takes the position that the…

It is argued that what is proposed currently as multicultural education is little more than a series of superficial nods to subordinate groups that often celebrate deficits and disguise the legacy of colonialism, and that a pedagogy of critical analysis of the inequities inherent in such a system is more appropriate. A critical, holistic approach…

This book contains the following papers on the Leonardo da Vinci project: "Looking for Post-16 Education Strategies for Parity of Esteem in Europe" (Lasonen); "Improving Parity of Esteem as a Policy Goal" (Makinen, Volanen); "Alternative Strategies for Parity of Esteem between General/Academic and Vocational Education in…

Research increasingly supports the theory that individuals' epistemological beliefs--their fundamental views about knowledge and how it is acquired--influence academic learning, thinking, and problem solving. This paper presents preliminary findings of an ongoing study of educators from Chile and Missouri involved in research projects. A total of…

Society at present is a sophistic society, a rhetorically negotiated and mediated consensus reality. The 20th century has been a brilliant and bloody transition from "idealism" to the "sophistic." Perhaps the tools of the Sophistic--rhetorical tropes, social construction of meaning, a pragmatic linguistics of consensus making…

This fastback examines the theory and practice of constructivist teaching and suggests how teachers can decide what form of constructivist teaching they might want to use. Constructivist teaching theory is explored under the headings "knowledge" and "humans." According to constructivist theory, knowledge is constructed by humans, it is conjectural…

Both critical thinking and much of moral education see the function of education as the bringing forth of the rational capacities of the child. Although there are similarities between the interest in critical thinking as the basis for educational reform and the educational concern with the moral development of school children, crucial differences…

This paper reviews the program of the Bryn Mawr Summer School for Women Workers in Industry, held from 1921 to 1938, and attempts to discern whether the curriculum and pedagogy of the school was feminist. An introduction notes that sources for the paper include course syllabi, videotaped interviews, and first person accounts of the school's…

Teacher roles in contemporary American schools should be more closely aligned to hermeneutics as the study of meaning (interpretation/understanding). A marriage between Platonic notions of interpretation and the quest for meaning with the interpretive theories of Friedrich Schleiermacher, Wilhelm von Humboldt, Wilhelm Dilthey, and Hans-Georg…

For a communication studies administrator, the scholar envisioned in Ernest Boyer's "Scholarship Reconsidered: Priorities of the Professoriate" is an instructive guide to faculty and administrators pondering the balance or relationship between teaching and research. It is an immodest claim that each discipline teaches well but broadly…

This guide provides volunteer hunter-education instructors with background information on subjects related to hunter education. A major goal of hunter education is to develop an environmental ethic among outdoorsmen, based on a deeper understanding of the natural world. Chapter 1 clarifies terms frequently used within the broad context of outdoor…