Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), a detail of The School of Athens, a fresco by Raphael.
Aristotle gestures to the earth, representing his belief in knowledge
through empirical observation and experience, while holding a copy of
his Nicomachean Ethics in his hand. Plato holds his Timaeus and gestures to the heavens, representing his belief in The Forms
Idealism is the first systematic
philosophy in Western thought led by Socrates and Plato. "Ideal"
means a "conception of objects as something that are perfect, having noble
character, visionary and existing only in imagination". So idealism represents the group of
philosophies which assert reality or reality as we can know it that is
fundamentally mental, mentally constructed, or otherwise immaterial. Any system
or theory that maintains that the real is of the nature of thought or
that the object of
external perception consists of ideas or the tendency to represent things in an
ideal form, or as
they might or should be rather than as they are, with emphasis on values. Plato
believed that education helped move individuals collectively toward achieving
the good. Also evil comes through ignorance, and education will lead to the
obliteration of evil because education is transformation and by ideas live can
change.
"I know that I know nothing"
–Socrates-
The method of teaching used in this philosophy is the Socratics' method;
also known as method of elenchus, elenctic method, Socratic irony, or Socratic
debate. It is named after the classical
Greek philosopher Socrates. Socratics' method is a form of inquiry and debate
between individuals with opposing viewpoints based on asking and answering
questions to stimulate critical thinking and to illuminate ideas.
Also, it is known as the dialectical method, often involving an oppositional discussion
in which the defense of one point of view is pitted against the defense of
another; one participant may lead another to contradict himself in some way,
thus strengthening the inquirer's own point. Other method invented and
mentioned in the philosophy of Immanuel Kant,
intuition is thought of as basic sensory information provided by the cognitive
faculty of sensibility (equivalent to what might loosely be called perception).
Kant held that our mind
casts all of our external intuitions in the form of space, and all of our
internal intuitions (memory, thought) in the form of time.
Idealism views that education should focus on moral, spiritual and mental
aspects of human being and the truth values are absolute, timeless, and
universal. Thus education must be concerned with ideas and concepts and their
relationship with the final outcomes of education that are most general and
abstract subjects. All materials should promote critical thinking. Mathematics
is important to develop abstract thinking while history and literature are
important to develop moral and culture. Focus on reading and writing where reading
material will foster discussion through the "big ideas" and the
student writing will emphasize both personal expression and clear reasoning.
Focus on the concepts over specific facts and confront problems that arise from
the "human condition".
The teacher teaches in the lecture form in order to stimulate thought and
not to convey information. Therefore the teacher acts as a facilitator who uses
a high percentage of open questions to allow the participants to
reflect critically on their own way of thinking, feeling, or behaving in a
given context - usually involving a problem or desired outcome - and guiding
participants to form the conclusion or an axiom/principle/belief
through their own efforts, potentially highlighting dissonance, conflicts of
thought and actions with questions for further discussion. The teacher planning
methodology must contain the following steps. Plan and build the main
course of thought through the lessons. Build in potential fallacies
(errors) for discovery and discussion. Know the common fallacies. It may help to start or check with the
conclusion and work backwards. The methodology to be
followed in operation:
- The
teacher and student agree on the topic of instruction.
- The
student agrees to attempt to answer questions from the teacher.
- The
teacher and student are willing to accept any correctly-reasoned answer.
That is, the reasoning process must be considered more important than
pre-conceived facts or beliefs.
- The
teacher's questions should expose errors
in the students' reasoning or beliefs, and then formulate
questions that the students cannot answer except by a correct reasoning
process. The teacher has prior knowledge about the classical fallacies
(errors) in reasoning.
- Where
the teacher makes an error of logic or fact, it is acceptable for a
student to draw attention to the error.
Additionally, the teacher must be knowledgeable and proficient enough to
spontaneously ask questions in order to draw conclusions and principles from
the students.
