Contemporary education offers a cacophony of approaches that go beyond academic knowledge—social and emotional learning, 21世纪技能, 幸福, 全人教育, 公民教育, 品格教育, 启蒙教育, 和其他人. Everyone believes that young people should learn some academic knowledge and that education should help prepare them for work. But the proliferation of alternatives reveals a widespread hunger to treat children as whole human beings whose development cannot be reduced to narrow academic competencies or measured through even narrower assessments. Contemporary education’s focus on knowledge and skills does not prepare young people to lead worthwhile lives. But how should education be expanded beyond academic knowledge and vocational skills? I offer a simple taxonomy for navigating the many alternatives.
斯坦顿E.F. Wortham
First, does the approach treat education as an instrumental means to a narrow end? Social, emotional and problem-solving skills are important. We would all like young people to recognize their own 和其他人’ emotional reactions, 与他人建立富有成效的关系, 成为合作伙伴, 创造性的问题解决者. But why 他们应该具备这些技能吗? Most answer: these skills will help them get better jobs, earn more money, and be happier. Money, 工作和幸福往往是好事, but education must be more than an instrument to reach ends like these. “Social and emotional learning” and “21世纪技能” are salutary, but they will not satisfy our hunger for a deeper education.
Second, does the approach focus on fragments of human beings or does it integrate multiple dimensions of human development? Our mainstream educational system overemphasizes the cognitive and vocational. Critics correctly point out that civic life is important because we want respectful, just, 人性化的社区. 身体健康很重要. Character is important, as are 人际关系 relationships and emotional stability. But we do not want to replace a narrow focus on academic knowledge with a narrow focus on civic, bodily, 人际关系, moral, 情感或其他功能. It is crucial to attend to other aspects of young people’s development, but not as a set of discrete competencies disconnected from each other. Our emotions, politics, morals and relationships are connected. If young people are to flourish, we must help them integrate these aspects of themselves.
Third, does the approach imagine developing individuals in social and natural contexts? Some approaches envision either integrated individual functioning or more just, 综合社会系统. 一些关于美德和品格的方法, 例如, provide compelling visions of how young people can flourish by developing and integrating intellectual, emotional, 关系和其他性格. But humans inevitably function within societies and the natural world—depending on them for sustenance, shelter, language, norms, 和技术. Educating individuals requires a normative account of the social and natural contexts that make individual development possible. 另一方面, many educational approaches that focus on a more just social world fail to understand the heterogeneity and developmental needs of the people who constitute society, treating individuals as mere precipitates of social “structure.” More adequate approaches must facilitate the development of heterogeneous individuals within changing social and natural contexts.
Finally, does the approach help young people imagine themselves within an ethical or spiritual world? Whether religious or not, humans are called to participate in a larger ethical order. Life becomes meaningful when we can imagine our efforts contributing to some larger good. 在太阳城网赌平台，我们实行“形成性教育”,” guiding young people to become more whole human beings living purposeful lives with others in community. 这并不包括灌输. It is not our place as educators in a heterogeneous society to tell young people what vision of the ethical order they should adopt. But we demand that they ask the questions: what will give my life meaning and purpose? 这个世界需要我做什么?
The proliferation of educational approaches that move beyond academic knowledge and skills is a good sign. But we must not settle for approaches that are instrumental, proposing a broader set of knowledge and skills merely as means to pursue jobs, 地位或短暂的幸福. We must not settle for fragmented visions of human development that aim to develop admirable but separate competencies. We must not settle for integrated visions of human development that ignore the social contexts that partly constitute individuals, nor for visions of just society that treat individuals as mere instantiations of social categories. We must educate so that young people become more integrated human beings who create purposeful lives together with others.
斯坦顿E.F. 华生,Ph值.D.查尔斯F. 多诺万,年代.J., Dean of the 林奇教育与人类发展学院 at 太阳城网赌平台