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Kizel, A. (2020). Empowering Students: The Dialogical Philosophy of the Democratic Schooling in Israel. In: Borys Khohod & Nevide Akipinar Dellal (eds.) Modern Critical Trends in Education. Dusseldorf: Lap Lambert Academic Publishing, pp. 49-61.

Authors:

Abstract

Democratic schooling in Israel is one of the most challenging systems confronting nation-centered education. It is one of the most significant approaches of counter-education. It clearly expresses the criticism of conservative education that focuses on curriculum and the testing achievements policy. This suggested article seeks to contribute to the discussion about the place of democratic schooling in Israel today, and its opportunities to children empowerment. It combines the history of this approach and the philosophy underlying the contribution of dialogue toward the development of students. The article will discuss these issues: Democratic Education in Global Perspective, The dialogical dimensions of the Democratic Education, Dialogue in Group Learning, Democratic Schools as a Pluralistic Space, Democratic School as an Organization. The article will introduce the opportunities of democratic schools in Israel and will present the dialogical philosophy of those schools. Those opportunities offers their students empowerment through community of learners and learning; pluralistic learning commitment to constant self-examination and change; creation of democratic structures and processes in schools; curriculum that suggests democratic experiences; cooperative learning process involving the student-teachers; learning community that acknowledges the uniqueness of the student and is based on the equal right of every person to express this uniqueness.
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CHAPTER 3
EMPOWERING STUDENTS: THE DIALOGICAL
PHILOSOPHY OF THE DEMOCRATIC SCHOOLING IN
ISRAEL
Arie KIZEL1
Democratic Education in Global Perspective
There have been three distinct waves in alternative education during the 20th Century:
The first wave occurred during the twenties and the thirties and was called “new
education” or “progressive education.” The second wave took place during the seventies
and was called “open and free education.” The present wave, which started in the
nineties, was given the name “democratic education.”
The progressive education movement was an integral part of early twentieth century
reform and was directed toward the reconstruction of American democracy (Cremin,
1961).
The ideology of progressive education, particularly in the wave of the open schools,
wished to liberate the individual from the rigidity of society, seeing it as depressing and
technocratic. Learning seemed to them a natural part of growth, with no need for adult
intervention. These progressive educators expressed deep faith in the individual human
and a lack of faith in public institutions, and were therefore identified as radicals, despite
their claim that their principles were a more correct reflection of preferred principles for
society (Miller, 2007).
1Prof.Dr. (Ph.D.), Dept. of Learning, Instruction and Teacher Education, Faculty of Education, University
of Haifa, Israel, akizel@edu.haifa.ac.il
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MODERN CRITICAL TRENDS IN EDUCATION
The democratic approach to education is not an isolated experiment, limited to one or two
schools here and there. In fact, the schools belong to a growing and dynamic international
network. They form part of an evolving movement devoted to teaching children
democratic values and responsibilities by immersing them in a democratic environment
(Gutmann, 1987).
The oldest existing democratic school is the Summerhill School currently based in
Suffolk, England that was founded in Germany in1921. Its philosophy was written by
Alexander Sutherland Neil. He believed that the happiness of the child should be the
paramount consideration in decisions about the child's upbringing (Neil, 1996; Croall,
1983). Sudbury Valley School, a democratic school was founded in Framingham,
Massachusetts in the USA in 1968 and continues to be the model practiced by dozens of
Sudbury Schools around the world. Certain facets of those schools set them apart from
other types of schools and so they are known as “democratic schools” or “free schools
(Sadofsky & Greenberg, 1994).
The influence of democracy in education has spread rapidly (Kelly, 1995). In Japan the
‘free school system’ boasts nearly one hundred schools. There are at least 250 such
schools or similar in the USA, where home-schooling is also common as a reaction
against the regimentation and punitive nature of their regular school system.
In Israel, the schooling system has over twenty-two schools that call themselves “The
Democratic Schools.”
The democratic system in Israel has also an academic department of democratic education
in Hakibbutzim College in Tel-Aviv, which conducts research and development, trains
new teachers in democratic methods, and publishes books in the field (Hecht, 2005). As
well, in Israel and Japan the trend to make education more democratic and more child-
centered extends beyond the schools that call themselves ‘democratic.’
Democratic education principles have been gradually penetrating many mainstream and
alternative schools. In England, there are dozens of schools that embrace principles of
democratic education to varying degrees. The oldest one, Summerhill, has been operating
successfully for over 80 years, and it serves as a model for many schools worldwide. As
the trend toward more democratic education gathers momentum, more such schools have
opened in New Zealand, Canada, Germany, Denmark, Russia, Korea, Taiwan, Thailand,
Nepal, and India.
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MODERN CRITICAL TRENDS IN EDUCATION
Many of the democratic schools are part of The Alternative Education Resource
Organization (AERO) that was founded in 1989 by Jerry Mintz. AERO's goal is to
advance student-driven, learner-centered approaches to education. AERO is considered
by many to be the primary hub of communication and support for educational alternatives
around the world. Education Alternatives include, but are not limited to, Montessori,
Waldorf (Steiner), Public Choice and At-Risk, Democratic, Homeschool, Open, Charter,
Free Schools, Sudbury, Holistic, Virtual, Magnet, Early Childhood, Reggio Emilia,
Indigo, Krishnamurti, Quaker, Libertarian, Independent, Progressive, Community,
Cooperative, and Unschooling. One of AERO's areas of expertise is democratic process
and democratic education, but equally important is the networking of all forms of
educational alternatives.
The dialogical dimensions of the Democratic Education
Democratic education does not have a specific manual or handbook that deals with each
educational situation that arises. Every school is an independent community of learners
and learning, and they each have a pluralistic nature and commitment to constant self-
examination and change. They do this to remain current and relevant for their
stakeholders.
Democratic education represents the dialogical approach in education. It views
conservative education as part of a monologic and monolithic education. As Rupert
Wegerif (2008) stated, the criticism of the monologic paradigm is as follows:
[the monologic] overlook[s] the fact that knowledge is never independent of social,
historical, and biological contexts that give it meaning. One aspect of the contextual
background required to interpret knowledge claims is their position within
conversations including what could be described as the long-term conversations of a
culture. (p. 274)
In contrast, according to the dialogic paradigm identified with Bakhtin and Volosinov:
Any utterance needs to be seen as a link in a chain of communication. Dialogicality
means not merely that participants in interactions respond to what other participants
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MODERN CRITICAL TRENDS IN EDUCATION
do, they respond in a way that takes into account how they think other people are
going to respond to them. (Ibid)
Despite the difficulties involved in defining the dialogic in educational terms, we
can point to a number of approaches related to this concept. An expansionary trend
seeks to rely primarily on post-modernist, anti-authoritarian trends in its opposition to
hierarchies and dichotomies in education. This trend is very inclusive and relates
dialogue to such domains as inter-personal communication, nonviolent
communication, interpersonal respect, encouragement of creativity, and strengthening
school-community collaboration. Democratic education as a concept and as a
philosophy of education is an expression of this approach.
The second approach is reductive in nature, as it is concerned solely with defining,
quite narrowly, the difference between dialogue and authoritarian approaches. This
approach does not question school hierarchies but seeks to establish criteria that
will shift philosophic dialogue from the theoretical to the methodological domain
that can be applied in educational practice. Such approaches attempt to define the
desired form of dialogue between teacher and pupil, lesson planning, and ways of
conducting dialogic teaching-learning processes.
During the 20th century, the dialogic philosophy was associated more than all others with
its most prominent advocates, such as Martin Buber, Emmanuel Levinas, along with
Paulo Freire’s critical pedagogy, the humanistic psychology propounded by Carl Rogers,
Nel Noddings’s pedagogy of care and concern, and even the integrative perspective of
Georg Gadamer's hermeneutics (Aloni, 2008).
Dialogue is an integral consideration that is central to approaches of humanistic
education. The essence of the dialogic is understood to lie in a person’s relationship
to him/herself, as well as to others, as free, autonomous subjects involved, consciously,
in shaping one's own character and world. Developing the dialogic in an educational
setting, formal or informal, requires learning to draw upon one's reflective, logical,
autonomous, critical, ethical, and creative aspects of consciousness.
Many democratic schools rely on the philosophy of Martin Buber in terms of
inter relationships. The core purpose of his thinking, in which the “dialogic man” is
central, is not to hone consciousness and enrich knowledge, but rather, Buber aspires to
strengthen human
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MODERN CRITICAL TRENDS IN EDUCATION
cooperation that is, in his view, existential, faith-driven, and inter-personal. Buber
sought to shift the issue of human existence into one that seeks to be inclusive of human
experience. Buber called for implementation of a “method of dialogism” (Barzelai,
2000, p.145) that requires entry from a person's inner knowledge and so assigns a
secondary place to external perception. The dialogic method bridges the chasm
between experience and consciousness; that is, it joins facilitation of experience
with post-facto knowledge of an experience. Furthermore, by means of human
attachment, dialogic thought establishes a bridge with reality and in doing so the
encounter with the Other (Buber, 1938/1962, pp. 430-431). According to Buber,
only reflective introspection not empirical impression is capable of perceiving
human essence and thus “consciousness is not gained by means of parsing a
concrete entity rather through deep penetration into essence of a concrete entity;
such penetration reveals the essence-within of such an entity” (Ibid, p. 97).
For Buber, encounter (Begegnung) has significance beyond co-presence and
individual growth. He looked for ways in which people could engage with one another
fully to meet themselves. The basic fact of human existence was not the individual
or the collective as such, but rather for Buber – “Man with Man”. Principles of the
Buberian dialogic method and his conception of the dialogic encounters are
especially relevant today, regarding the possibilities of counter-education.
For example, (a) the relation to the Thou is immediate; (b) there is no terminology
between I and Thou, no politically-correct language or pseudo-police, no
preconception and no imagination, and memory itself changes, since it plunges from
singularity into the whole; (c) there is no purpose between I and Thou, no greed, and
no expectations; (d) longing itself changes since it changes from dream into
appearance; (e) only where all means and objectifications do not exist can
encounter happen.
According to Buber, the authentic solution to existential loneliness is misframed as
being dependent on the choice between collectivism and individualism (Buber,
1938/1962, p. 110). In Buber's view, we should be liberated from this Kierkegaardian
belief in favor of a third optionthe interpersonal path residing in the bond between
one person and another. This alternative lie “beyond the subjective, out of the domicile
of the objective, on a path along a narrow ridge along which you and I meet, in the in-
between” (Ibid, p. 112).
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Dialogue in Group Learning
Democratic education also implements four components of the method developed by
Nelson and Hackmann and are implemented in dialogue within group learning. The four
are the following:
xImportance of producing results: Ultimately, this process involves answering
the philosophic question posed by eliciting the truth about the nature of
worldviews regarding tolerance, freedom, justice, and responsibility.
xImportance of participation in process: To be active in the cooperative process
involves seeking answers to questions and developing mutual understanding of
others. This process involves the following: members share their concrete
experiences; the group selects some from among these experiences for detailed
investigation; and active participation in the examination process.
xImportance of enriching an individual’s deep understanding: The approach
aims to enrich an individual’s understandings and insights as the dialectical
process advances in a manner that allows participants to grasp the moral
complexities of everyday life.
xImportance of dialogue as a practice in shaping educational life. To achieve,
via dialogue, greater clarity regarding what is and is not an act guided by
educational thought, as well as one that advances participants' confidence in
the dialogic process as a means to arriving at conclusions re the desired
approach to an educational/educative life. (Saran & Neisser, 2004)
Democratic schools, like democracy itself, do not happen by chance. They are a result of
explicit attempts by educators to put in place arrangements and opportunities that will
bring democracy to life (Bastian et al. 1986; Wood 1988, 1992). These arrangements and
opportunities involve two lines of work. One is to create democratic structures and
processes by which life in the school is carried out. The other is to create a curriculum
that will give young people democratic experiences. As Maxine Greene (1985) tells us,
“Surely it is an obligation of education in a democracy to empower the young to become
members of the public, to participate, and play articulate roles in the public space” (p. 4).
Participants of the democratic system agree that Article 26(2) of the International
Declaration of Children’s Rights, which is directed toward freedom, tolerance and
understanding, constitutes a working framework for the daily practice in democratic
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MODERN CRITICAL TRENDS IN EDUCATION
learning environments. This means that students are given a vote over curricular and
administrative decisions that affect their lives.
Schools in a democratic education system in Israel have different styles of teaching-
learning processes. Some are almost totally non-directive with their pupils, while others
offer a more conservative blend of direction and negotiation. These schools aim to
promote the democratic values of tolerance, egalitarianism, pluralism, freedom, and social
and environmental responsibility. They do this by modeling and living these values in the
classroom. They put warmth, spontaneity, and the joy of learning in the center of life
within the school. They believe that the best way to study these values is by living them
day-to-day from the earliest years in school. They think that one shouldn't merely speak
about values, but do the values, and live by them, and actually feel them as part of the
school’s routines.
Democratic schools promise that each child is given as much control as is feasible over
his or her learning process. Obedience and compulsion is replaced by self-determination
and responsibility as a way of expressing pedagogy of care and understanding.
Lisa Goldstein (1998) introduces the notion of an 'ethic of care' to early childhood
education. She discusses care as encapsulating ethical and philosophical ideas. Goldstein
explores Noddings' (1984) use of the term caring as, “... not an attribute or personality
trait, but a relation. Caring is not something you are, but rather something you engage in,
something you do. Every interaction provides one with an opportunity to enter into a
caring relation” (cited in Goldstein, 1998, p. 2).
Noddings' concept of motivational displacement refers to the teacher's obligation to “meet
the other as onecaring” (1984, p. 17), giving primacy to the goals and needs of the cared-
for. As Noddings points out, this process will be unpredictable as reciprocity in these
relationships occurs because of new encounters.
Within certain limits, children self-regulate the schedule of their learning and have a
significant voice in the choice of subject matter. Children can move independently from
one activity to another, remaining longest with what most arouses their fascination
although group activity is encouraged. A fundamental principle of democratic education
is that children are more motivated to learn, and learn better, to the extent that they have
choice over how and what they learn.
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Democratic education is not a system in a pedagogical sense. The common principals are
pluralism, diversity, and individualism. There are many democratic schools and each of
them is different. As Dewey (1938/1997) emphasized,
The emergence of what is called new education and progressive schools are the
product of dissatisfaction with traditional education. In fact, it serves as its
critique [...] when one attempts to formulate the philosophy embedded in the
creation of new education, one can, I believe, discover common principles for a
variety of progressive schools existing today. As opposed to education being
forced from above, they present the expression and fostering of the individual.
As opposed to external discipline we see freedom of activity. As opposed to
learning from texts and teachers we present learning from experience. As
opposed to acquiring separate skills and techniques through drill we present
their acquisition to achieve a goal on which they have a vital and direct
bearing. As opposed to preparation for the distant future they present full
fulfillment of the maximum opportunities of life in the present. As opposed to
materials and static goals they present familiarization with achanging world."
(pp. 17-20).
Democratic Schools as a Pluralistic Space
The goal of respecting human rights in school is the center using the following tools:
A democratic community with a parliament, judicial committees, executive committees
and participation of all partners in school community.
Pluralistic learning that allows students to choose their favorite subjects and offers self-
study programs with a lot of opportunities.
A dialogical relationship based on unique models of inter-relationship between adults
and children and between children.
The cooperative learning process involving the teacher candidates and teachers that takes
place during the school year enables participants to engage in such dialogic exchanges
about the organizational nature of educating. Such a dialogic process builds a
philosophic community that may stand in opposition to a static, lifeless, fossilized,
synthetic reality that is classifiable and predictable. This new educator's community can
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develop an activist dimension given that the dialogic can intensify the need for and value
of activism. The hermeneutics of care, even love, can be expressed in the group's
meetings; as modesty, not a sense of superiority, is required in this ongoing creative
process. Hope, too, is integrated as participants come to understand one another's foibles,
whether it be the teacher candidates or the educator.
The dialogic dimension relates, as well, to the principle of responsibility, as enunciated
by Emmanuel Levinas (1972/ 2006). In his view, as a speaking subject, a person does not
place him/herself in the center but turns to the Other. This attitude of commitment to the
Other must also be expressed in action; This process in the practice of democratic
schooling is expressed by interpersonal meetings between teachers (or as they are
sometimes called “mentors”) and students.
This process also involves participants to be in discussion about the educational
philosophy of their school. This enables the student and the teacher to become familiar
with themselves, to raise questions, to share doubts, and to engage in a dialogue guided
by ethical concerns. The dialogic elements should be characterized by mutual openness,
without taking an educational philosophy for granted, or to have concern for the
continuity of an organizational reality.
Democratic education uses pluralistic learning that acknowledges the uniqueness of the
student and is based on the equal right of every person to express this uniqueness (Hecht,
2002). The basic idea is that pluralistic learning is based on “wasted” time – opposite the
linear learning which advocates “well spent” time on acquisition of absolute processed,
edited knowledge. This right knowledge is prepared and mediated by the teacher and
educational institutions. These ideas underline Dewey's inspiration of William James
philosophical pragmatism which was similar to the ideas underpinning Pestalozzi's object
teaching, which joined thinking and doing as two dimensions of the learning process.
Through works such as The School and Society (1899), The Child and the Curriculum
(1902), and Democracy and Education (1916), John Dewey articulated a unique and
revolutionary reformulation of educational theory and practice based upon the core
relationship he believed existed between democratic life and education. Dewey's vision
for the school was inextricably tied to his larger vision of a good society, wherein
education was the wellspring of democracy itself. Because each classroom represented a
microcosm of the human relationship that constituted the larger community, Dewey
s.
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MODERN CRITICAL TRENDS IN EDUCATION
believed that the school, as a “little democracy” could create a “more lovely society”
(Dewey 1899, 1902, 1916).
According to the proponents of democratic education, the conservative educational
system turns all of us to “squaracists,” into people who are categorized according to the
degree of their success within the world of the square.
Yaacov Hecht, the founder of the first Israeli democratic school in Hadera (1987) said
that Inside the “square” we continually try to measure everyone with respect to the ideal
concept of square, namely each person wants to be like the other. What we get is a Gauss
Curve. Children are measured and classified according to clear criteria. A student is
labeled as excellent, mediocre, or weak according to his or her proximity to the square.
According to Hecht, on the journey that takes place within the square students learn these
“truths”:
1. There is a “correct knowledge” that is in the hands of the authorities.
2. Their personal quest is of no significance because it is not relevant to learning.
3. Their personal stand is not relevant and the “correct knowledge” that was discovered
by very unique individuals lies in the hands of the “right people.”
4. Any discovery that does not reconcile with “correct knowledge” is a mistake.
5. One is expected to avoid making mistakes. Making mistakes takes off points from the
learner’s final score.
6. It is highly important to prove that one has the right answer.
Democratic School as an Organization
With regard to organizational dialogue the democratic school functioned, as Slotte (2004)
proposed, by adopting dialogue as a way of strengthening organizational intelligence. In
doing so, he based himself on Buber, Bohm, a physicist who employed the dialogic
approach in his scientific work, as well as Isaacs and Freire.
Slotte's argued that dialogue is a form of philosophic work that can be internalized in an
organizational culture and employed in such organizational activities such as daily
meetings, developmental discussions, work-related meetings, problem-solving, developing
organizational strategies, leadership, and developing the directions of an organization's
values. His research provides examples from the daily life of leaders, organizations, and
employees, and he found that staff enjoyed the advantages achieved through such
philosophical dialogic endeavors. Also, dialogue embedded in the organizational culture
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MODERN CRITICAL TRENDS IN EDUCATION
improved communication and work relations, as well as served as a resource for problem-
solving and organizational trust.
In responding to the critique of the dangers of banal use of dialogue as a concept, Slotte
claimed that a simple but important lesson to be learned from such criticism is that
dialogue, or any other change program, does not work if it is subordinated to the modes of
thinking, communication, and culture that dialogue is aimed at in the first place. In such
situations, dialogue becomes a mere “buzz word” in the service of the forces that real
dialogue challenges. This can happen when, for example, the goal of a dialogue is
determined in advance. Then, strong pressure is exerted to reach the goal, and, as a result,
authentic dialogue, creativity, surprise, and joint investigation disappear. If dialogue and
dialogical methods merely are incorporated in organizations, in conflict situations and in
the classroom without questioning the dominating views of communication, then learning,
thinking together, and interaction in dialogue will only become a means to enhance the
current practices that we wish to change. This is a core reason why a philosophy of
dialogue is needed (Slotte, 2004).
Slotte's approach to dialogue as an organizational tool is expansive. On the one hand, he
assumes that it is not certain that leadership, an agenda, or decision-making will emerge in
the process. On the other hand, criteria similar to the process supported by Isaacs can be
employed: listening, organizational investigation, airing of opposing perspectives
advances thinking, rejection of prejudgment, refraining from generalizing, respect for
others, and preservation of organizational balances.
Sollte, as noted, drew heavily from Bohm's work, as well as from Senge (1994) who
mentioned that dialogue is not merely a set of techniques for improving organizations,
enhancing communications, building consensus, or solving problems, rather, it is based
on the principle that conception and implementation are intimately linked with a core of
common meaning. During the dialogue process, people learn how to think together not
just in the sense of analyzing a shared problem or creating new pieces of shared
knowledge, but in the sense of occupying a collective sensibility, in which the thoughts,
emotions, and resulting actions belong not to one individual, but all of them together.
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Summary
This article introduces the opportunities of democratic schools in Israel and presented the
dialogical philosophy of those schools. Those opportunities offers their students
empowerment through community of learners and learning; pluralistic learning
commitment to constant self-examination and change; creation of democratic structures
and processes in schools; curriculum that suggests democratic experiences; cooperative
learning process involving the student-teachers; learning community that acknowledges
the uniqueness of the student and is based on the equal right of every person to express
this uniqueness.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
C
hapter
S
Summary:
Democratic schooling in Israel is one of the most challenging systems
confronting nation-centered education. It is one of the most significant approaches of counter-
education. It clearly expresses the criticism of conservative education that focuses on
curriculum and the testing achievements policy. This suggested article seeks to contribute to
the discussion about the place of democratic schooling in Israel today, and its opportunities to
children empowerment. It combines the history of this approach and the philosophy
underlying the contribution of dialogue toward the development of students. The article will
discuss these issues: Democratic Education in Global Perspective, The dialogical dimensions
of the Democratic Education, Dialogue in Group Learning, Democratic Schools as a
Pluralistic Space, Democratic School as an Organization. The article will introduce the
opportunities of democratic schools in Israel and will present the dialogical philosophy of
those schools. Those opportunities offers their students empowerment through community of
learners and learning; pluralistic learning commitment to constant self-examination and
change; creation of democratic structures and processes in schools; curriculum that suggests
democratic experiences; cooperative learning process involving the student-teachers; learning
community that acknowledges the uniqueness of the student and is based on the equal right
of every person to express this uniqueness.
Keywords:
Democratic schooling; Dialogue in Education; Education in Israel.
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ene
og
q
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arni
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ro
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A concern with reason has always been at the heart of European educational theory. For the ancient Greeks, reason was considered the defining characteristic of humanity. Both Aristotle and Plato argued that the promotion of reason should be a central aim of education. The movement for universal education that began in eighteenth-century France was at least in part inspired by the belief that education for all would expand the influence of reason in society and therefore fuel social progress. Harvey Siegel (1997) argues that thinking skills programmes are a continuation of this Enlightenment project to promote reason by means of education. Some “postmodernist” thinkers, such as Lyotard and Foucault, have strongly criticised this Enlightenment project. However most postmodern theory applied to education, when examined closely, does not involve a rejection of the ideal of reason so much as a redefinition of reason in terms of local dialogues (e.g., Parker, 1997). The important question is not so much, should education promote reason but, rather, which model of reason should it promote. In this chapter I tentatively put forward the suggestion that the idea of “dialogue across difference” (Burbules, 1993) offers a coherent model of reason that could serve as an ideal within education. THE DIALOGIC TURN Recently there has been an increasing number of studies in education and psychology informed by dialogical rather than monological theoretical assumptions. © Cambridge University Press 2008 and Cambridge University Press, 2009.
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In this article I propose a conception of empowering educational dialogue within the framework of humanistic education. It is based on the notions of Humanistic Education and Empowerment, and draws on a large and diverse repertoire of dialogues—from the classical Socratic, Confucian and Talmudic dialogues, to the modern ones associated with the works of Nietzsche, Buber, Korczak, Rogers, Gadamer, Habermas, Freire, Noddings and Levinas. These forms of dialogue—differing in their treatment of and emphasis on the cognitive, affective, moral and existentialist elements—have become more dominant in recent educational discourse and practice—an intellectual phenomenon that calls for a more analytic and reflective elaboration of the essential elements that constitute educational dialogues. Hence it is the purpose of this article to elucidate the distinguishing marks of true dialogues, to set them within the normative discourse of humanistic education and empowerment, and to offer a normative and stipulative conception of empowering educational dialogue that can be utilized in the various intellectual and practical spheres of humanistic education—a paradigm,working definition, and outline for contemporary teachers in their quest to develop their students’ sensibilities and sensitivities, and empower their ability to live complete, autonomous, authentic, moral and dignified human lives.
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Caring has become a buzzword in education. However, the commonly held understanding of caring—characterized by gentle smiles and warm hugs—obscures the complexity and the intellectual challenge of work with young children. Coupling early childhood education with this simplistic conception of caring will be detrimental to the field. As an alternative, the author draws on feminist moral theory, specifically the ethic of care, to develop an understanding of caring that emphasizes its deeply ethical, philosophical and experiential roots. Using narratives of life in a primary grade classroom, this article highlights the ways that the ethic of care can be used to enhance our understanding of what it means to be caring teachers.
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Experience and Educationis the best concise statement on education ever published by John Dewey, the man acknowledged to be the pre-eminent educational theorist of the twentieth century. Written more than two decades after Democracy and Education(Dewey's most comprehensive statement of his position in educational philosophy), this book demonstrates how Dewey reformulated his ideas as a result of his intervening experience with the progressive schools and in the light of the criticisms his theories had received. Analysing both "traditional" and "progressive" education, Dr. Dewey here insists that neither the old nor the new education is adequate and that each is miseducative because neither of them applies the principles of a carefully developed philosophy of experience. Many pages of this volume illustrate Dr. Dewey's ideas for a philosophy of experience and its relation to education. He particularly urges that all teachers and educators looking for a new movement in education should think in terms of the deeped and larger issues of education rather than in terms of some divisive "ism" about education, even such an "ism" as "progressivism." His philosophy, here expressed in its most essential, most readable form, predicates an American educational system that respects all sources of experience, on that offers a true learning situation that is both historical and social, both orderly and dynamic.
The Dialogic Person: The Contribution of Martin Buber to Philosophy
  • D Barzelai
Barzelai, D. (2000). The Dialogic Person: The Contribution of Martin Buber to Philosophy. Jerusalem: Magnes Press (Hebrew).