Thinking about Learning

by Martin Cohen
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6 books
Plato thought it was the most important thing of all, and for most of us, formal education has had a decisive influence on who we end up being. And yet ‘philosophy of education’ is not the stuff of YouTube channels or influencer endorsements. Somewhere along the line, education became something governments just did to their citizens, whether they liked it or not, and certainly without much imagination. And yet, if education is not much thought about today, that’s not to say we can’t benefit from exploring the very different prescriptions for bringing up children of the philosophers. Some of these books are pretty old, but that’s because their messages are timeless.
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Worldview Guide for Plato's Republic

W. Bradford Littlejohn, 2019
There’s good and bad in Plato’s theory. Good is the pioneering message that both boys and girls should be educated, as well as that what should be taught should be adapted to the child’s age and needs. Surely, ‘good’ is Plato’s conviction, and the central purpose of education is moral - creating citizens who are prepared to contribute to the common good. More problematic was his advocacy of state control and censorship – not for nothing is Plato considered the first totalitarian. “The direction in which education starts a man will determine his future life.” writes Plato, and that’s more true today than it has ever been.

Emile

Jean Jacques Rousseau, Barbara Foxley, 2024
Jump forward to the 18th century and a very different perspective from another philosopher, the Swiss-born French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Émile is a tale about the upbringing of a rich man’s son, Émile, by a tutor who is given unlimited authority over him. Rousseau’s intention is to show how allowing children the freedom to explore and develop ideas (as opposed to the artificial and formal education of not only his time but ours too) enables their healthy and natural development. Rousseau recommends that education should take the form of Games and other forms of amusement until age 12, after which the child starts to learn - not from books-  but from the “book of the world.”

Tom Brown's Schooldays

Thomas Hughes, 2008
You probably think of this book as a novel, but for its author, Thomas Hughes, it was supposed to be a serious look at educational policy. The book describes Tom’s time at the British fee-paying school famous for inventing one of the worst ball games in history. The book is indeed highly sporty and culminates in a cricket match, but the most dramatic aspect of it is Tom’s persecution by ‘Flashman,’ the school bully. Tom himself is energetic, stubborn and athletic, rather than intellectual. The bullying comes to a head after Tom refuses to hand over a sweepstake ticket for the favourite in a horse race, with Tom deliberately burned in front of a fire. Hughes seems to see all of this as part of “boys growing up.” Ooh er!

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

J.K. Rowling, 2015
Fiction accounts of boarding school life have inspired numerous other authors, including one J.K. Rowling. Her hero, very different from Tom Brown, is  of course one Harry Potter, who we discover attending Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in all of the first six books of the eponymous series. Hogwarts is presented as a boarding school of magic for students aged eleven to eighteen. Although obviously not intended as a treatise on education, Rowling does promote certain ideas over others. Hogwarts is unashamedly hierarchical, and the key ability of being able to do spells is considered to be inbred rather than anything that can be taught. Another message is that Professors can punish students with relative impunity - Harry even has "I must not tell lies" carved into the back of his hand!

Teaching As a Subversive Activity

A No-Holds-Barred Assault on Outdated Teaching Methods-with Dramatic and Practical Proposals on How Education Can Be Made Relevant to Today's World
Neil Postman, 2009
But back to more student-friendly accounts - and Neil Postman and Charles Weingartner’s book, which came out at the time the Vietnam War was causing riots in America. “What is it that students do in the classroom?” the authors ask before answering: “Well, mostly, they sit and listen to the teacher.” After which, of course, they are asked to repeat the teacher’s words and are awarded grades if they remember them correctly. Ideas and imagination are not required. This, we might say, is teaching as a submissive activity. Postman and Weingartner instead want to do away with grades, tests, textbooks, courses, and traditional authority figures. No more “content.” No more “subjects.” Instead, learning must become a process, not a product, with young people free to think critically about society, politics, and culture.

The End of Education

Redefining the Value of School
Neil Postman, 2011
Lastly, another book by Neil Postman, this one more constructive and less polemical. Postman’s point is that today's schools lack any inspiring narrative for students and instead promote the false "gods" of economic utility and consumerism while feeding social division, envy and resentment. He argues for new educational values based on global citizenship, critical thinking and appreciation of diversity. But Postman’s other concern is that modern information technology is anti-historical, anti-scientific, anti-conceptual and even anti-rational! What this means is that we are losing our ability to think and instead willingly transferring control of our lives to machines.