Philosophy and Psychology Screens

The Philosophy and Psychology Screens

Studying learners, contemporary life, and subject specialists produces far too many objectives, and many of them clash. Two screens cut the list down. A school’s philosophy filters out the objectives that do not fit its values, and the psychology of learning filters out the ones that are not realistic to reach. This chapter works through both.

Screening with Philosophy

Why a long, inconsistent list must be screened, and how a school’s philosophy and its democratic values do the first filtering

Philosophy's Questions

How a school’s view of materialism, and of whether to fit learners to society or change it, shapes which objectives survive

Philosophy and Equal Education

How a school answers whether different classes need different education, and whether schooling should be vocational

The Psychology Screen

How the psychology of learning separates changes that learning can produce from those it cannot, and realistic goals from impossible ones

Grade Placement and Conditions

When an objective can best be learned, the sequence learning follows, and the conditions that make learning stick