My Philosophy of Education

Me and philosophy are not friends. Really, I went mad in the first year of my undergraduate degree and decided to take a philosophy module. It just didn’t click with me. I guess there was a part of me that just couldn’t see the point. This was firmly the case until we started studying philosophies of education during the HDFE. This was philosophy I could understand. I didn’t always agree with the philosophy being taught, but I did understand the reasoning behind them. At the start of this course I had ideas about what I thought education should be. Essentially, I believed it should be the opposite of what it is. I remember teaching Leaving Cert Higher Level English grinds during my undergrad. I remember essentially teaching these kids to learn off stuff and repeat it in the exam. It felt wrong. Leaving Cert English was essentially a memory test. Having spent the previous number of years in a college English programme that encouraged critical thinking, this realisation was rather jarring. How was anyone supposed to enjoy something where their opinion wasn’t valued? These learners were being asked to repeat ideas that should in a subject that should encourage critical thinking. This is what Paulo Freire called ‘The banking syste of education’ whereby learners are fed the information and asked to give it back in an exam situation. This experience formed the basis for what I believed education should be prior to beginning this course. Education should encourage critical thinking and individualism. I have added to this philosophy over the course of the year.. My personal philosophy of education has become a hodgepodge of all the things I’ve learnt over the year. As it stands, this is what I believe. However, I also believe that a philosophy can grow and change over time. So this is my philosophy as I’m writing this portfolio, but I think it needs to be a living thing. A thing that can change and adapt as you grow as an educator and reflect back on your practice and ideals. Being too rigidly set in your beliefs closes you off to the new ideas that emerge all the time.

Education should be centred around our learners. It should incorporate the experiences, interests and abilities of our learners. Indeed, John Dewey, a philosopher who believed in progressive education stated that education is a “reconstruction of experience” (Dewey, 1938, p. 87). Dewey believed that new knowledge was acquired as we learn to apply our previous experiences to new problems. This was also a component of the educational philosophy of Freire. He believed that education should be rooted in the lived experiences of the learners. This is a key component of my own philosophy of education also. Learners, particularly adult learners, come into the classroom with their own experiences. These need to be acknowledged and harnessed in order for people to grow and change. It is also an essential part of peer learning which I believe to be very important. People with different experiences can come together to discuss their experiences and learn from one another. This was the case with our own class. We would all sit together and discuss our experiences on placement. We learnt an immense amount from each others’ experiences. We learnt how to deal with difficult situations from listening to each other talk.

I believe that we should empower our learners through education. We should create safe educational spaces filled with open dialogue, critical thinking, creativity, participation and reflections. In short, we should create an environment where our learners become active participants in their own education rather than the traditional passive learner who receives information from the teacher without question or critical reflection. Like Carl Rogers, I believe education should be learner focused. It should meet the outcomes that our learners set for themselves and cater to them. An example of this that I can draw from my own practice comes from a centre where I have been a volunteer for many years. The centre caters specifically to survivors of industrial abuse. I was asked if I would come in once a week and teach some of their clients how to use their smartphones. I walked into that first class knowing very little about their backgrounds except that they had been in industrial schools. It quickly became evident that many of them could not read well. None of the items I had prepared were able to be used so I went home and remade everything. All of the handouts changed to pictorial step by step guides instead of any writing. These proved to be very popular with the learners and began to be adopted as the method of making handouts among many of the teachers in the centre. Since that say I have learnt that catering to your students and their individual needs means that they are more likely to be successful and enjoy the educational experience. I know now that had I handed out the handouts I had made before going into the class, I would have intimidated many of the people there and they would not have returned. Listening to and being observant of the needs of learners is my main focus when I’m teaching. I believe it helps create the right environment for them to thrive.

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