The 4 Philosophies

Abstract:
The four philosophies are idealism, realism, pragmatism, and existentialism.

The purpose of school for an idealist is to provide students with an educational environment that will help them expand on their ideas. Idealists believe that schools need to help prepare students to be a beneficial member of society. Students should focus on literature, philosophy, politics, history, and the arts. They are encouraged to study and most importantly reflect on their subjects. Reflection is a big part of the preferred methods of instruction, along with lecture and discussion.

Realists believe that the purpose of school is to help students understand the causes of things and to teach them intellectual and moral virtue. They focus on subjects such as mathematics, science, language, literature, and history. Realists like a lot of variety of teaching methods and believe that even the teacher is considered a learner. Students need to know how to think clearly and understand the world.

The purpose of school according to pragmatism is to model a democratic society. They focus on subjects like history, geography, and the sciences because that's the most relevant in society. Pragmatics want to understand humans and why they do the things they do in social situations. The instruction is very hands-on and deals with a lot of experiments. Students are seen as more adult-like, and are capable of setting their own goals for their learning. The teacher is expected to model the type of knowledge they want the students to have, which is experimental knowledge.

Existentialism deals a lot with the freedom of choice, so school for an existentialist is supposed to show students how to take responsibility for their own actions and deal with the consequences of their actions. It focuses on the individual student and their own personal learning. Each student is unique and is capable of making their own choices. Teachers are expected to help their students achieve their own personal potential by being a good role model to them.

Reflection:
None of these four philosophies really jumped out at me as my own philosophy, but I think that realism was the one that I agreed with the most. I liked what realism said about the nature of the learner and the nature of the teacher. I believe strongly that throughout our lives that we never stop learning. Teachers can learn a lot from their students, and they have to be open to the idea that their students can be smarter then them at some stuff. To a realist, the teacher's job is to teach their students how to think clearly so that they are able to understand things in the world. Realists believe that theoretical subjects like math and science are more important then the arts, which I don't agree with. Math and science are very important in school, but so are the arts. I don't like it when art and music programs are the first things cut whenever a school needs to cut out something. Realists also believe that schools should help students find the causes of how things work. I think that students need to know how to find out causes of things, but schools also need to help students grow as individuals so they can be productive members of society. So overall I agree with what realists believe in, but I think there are more things that are important.