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1:2 The Critical Thinking Skills Movement and Its Implications for Religious Education |
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Written by Anthony Thorpe
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The publics interest in the idea of philosophy and young people has been awakened with the success of Sophies World by Jostein Gaarder (NY: Phoenix House 1995). How might this interest in philosophy form a link with the teaching of religious education? Historically the links between philosophy and religion have been strong buy many teachers have assumed that philosophy is something that young people are incapable of understanding let alone able to use as part of their learning. Arguments from Piagets psychology of learning also suggest this but the Critical Thinking Skills Movement claims that these objections can be met. Could teachers be underselling the capabilities of their students? What then might be the implications for the teaching of religious education of a more philosophical approach that sought to develop critical thinking skills? It is also important to ask what the assumptions are behind these implications and whether they are acceptable from a Christian viewpoint. |
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1:2 Lessons About Education that Christianity Can Learn from a Defector |
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Written by William F. Cox, Jr.
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Horace Mann, father of American public schools, favoured allowing only that religious content in public education that met the agreement of all its constituents. Then as well as now, Christians noticeably conflict with Mann, a defector from Christianity, in arguing that biblical world views and practices should prevail. Ironically, Manns position better approximates the application of the biblical Golden Rule prefigures the same implications about religion in education as proposed by C.S. Lewis fifty years ago. From out of this conflict there is a lesson for Christianity regarding a biblical view of education. |
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1:2 Joined-Up Thinking - The Resurgence of Interdependence |
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Written by David Cracknell
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This article is a tentative exploration of human and organisational interdependence. It is a simple theme with long historical roots but one which has only recently benefited again from the attention it deserves. It is a powerful principle which has enormous potential for change throughout our society but nowhere more so than in education. There is emerging a clear shift in emphasis away from individualism and towards a greater investment in social cohesion and Christians in education need to be aware of it and to reflect on the challenges and opportunities it brings for witness and leadership. What might a heightened interest in interdependence mean for the development of educational thinking, policy and practice - and for Christian discipleship? |
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1:2 Readiness for Discarding? |
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Written by Elizabeth Ashton
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This article examines the assumptions underlying the influential researches of Ronald Goldman into the religious thinking of childhood. The Piagetian base against which Goldmans theories were developed is analysed before a full investigation is made of Goldmans researches, his methodology, notions of childhood and confusions concerning what children appeared to know and what they had the potential to understand.
The article concludes with an examination of Goldmans own ideas of religion and its language-use. It is concluded that his work, like that of Piaget, is essentially romantic, although disguised in empirical methodology. It is argued that the content of Religious Education in primary schools ought to be reviewed as a matter of urgency since the work of Goldman has contributed to a serious underestimation of pupils potential for understanding spiritual narrative. |
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1:2 Postmodernism and Teacher Education Programmes in Christian Colleges |
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Written by Harro Van Brummelen
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With the decline of a modernist techno-rationalist view of knowledge, teachers are no longer knowledge dispensers but dialogue faciliators who refer the notion of one right view. Although postmodernism comes in a variety of forms e.g. constructivism, it does have some central features. There are both strengths and weaknesses in the postmodernist approach to life and in the way it applies to education. Christian teacher education programmes should be transformative, vital and transcendent, based in a vision of humanity which rejects both the oppressive impotence of modern scientism and the ego-exalting autonomy of postmodernity. |
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Volume 1 (1997) 