In this book John A. Weaver suggests curriculum studies scholars need to engage more in science matters. It offers a review of science studies writing from Ludwick Fleck and Thomas Kuhn to Philip Mirowski. The volume includes chapters on the rhetoric of science with a focus on the history of rhetoric and economics then on the rhetoric of models, statistics, and data, a critique of neoliberalism and its impact on science policy and the foundations of democracy, Harry Collin’s and Robert Evans’ theory of expertise followed by chapters on feminism with a focus on the work of Sharon Traweek, Karen Barad, and Vinciane Despret, postcolonial thought, with attention paid to the work of Daniela Bleichmar, Londa Schiebinger, Judith Carney, Sylvia Wynter, Paul Gilroy, and Sandra Harding, and a final chapter on Nietzsche’s philosophy of science. Each section is introduced by an interlude drawing on autobiographical connections between curriculum studies and science studies.

In the first edition of this book published in 1988, Shirley Engle and I offered a broader and more democratic curriculum as an alternative to the persistent back-to-the-basics rhetoric of the ‘70s and ‘80s. This curriculum urged attention to democratic practices and curricula in the school if we wanted to improve the quality of citizen participation and strengthen this democracy. School practices during that period reflected a much lower priority for social studies. Fewer social studies offerings, fewer credits required for graduation and in many cases, the job descriptions of social studies curriculum coordinators were transformed by changing their roles to general curriculum consultants. The mentality that prevailed in the nation’s schools was “back to the basics” and the basics never included or even considered the importance of heightening the education of citizens. We certainly agree that citizens must be able to read, write and calculate but these abilities are not sufficient for effective citizenship in a democracy. This version of the original work appears at a time when young citizens, teachers and schools find themselves deluged by a proliferation of curriculum standards and concomitant mandatory testing. In the ‘90s, virtually all subject areas including United States history, geography, economic and civics developed curriculum standards, many funded by the federal government. Subsequently, the National Council for the Social Studies issued the Social Studies Curriculum Standards that received no federal support. Accountability, captured in the No Child Left Behind Act passed by Congress, has become a powerful, political imperative that has a substantial and disturbing influence on the curriculum, teaching and learning in the first decade of the 21st century.

. Renewal of Life by Transmission. The most notable distinction between living and inanimate things is that the former maintain themselves by renewal. A stone when struck resists. If its resistance is greater than the force of the blow struck, it remains outwardly unchanged. Otherwise, it is shattered into smaller bits. Never does the stone attempt to react in such a way that it may maintain itself against the blow, much less so as to render the blow a contributing factor to its own continued action. While the living thing may easily be crushed by superior force, it none the less tries to turn the energies which act upon it into means of its own further existence. If it cannot do so, it does not just split into smaller pieces (at least in the higher forms of life), but loses its identity as a living thing. As long as it endures, it struggles to use surrounding energies in its own behalf. It uses light, air, moisture, and the material of soil. To say that it uses them is to say that it turns them into means of its own conservation. As long as it is growing, the energy it expends in thus turning the environment to account is more than compensated for by the return it gets: it grows. Understanding the word "control" in this sense, it may be said that a living being is one that subjugates and controls for its own continued activity the energies that would otherwise use it up. Life is a self-renewing process through action upon the environment.

The strength of democracy lies in its ability to self-correct, to solve problems and adapt to new challenges. However, increased volatility, resulting from multiple crises on multiple fronts – humanitarian, financial, and environmental – is testing this ability. By offering a new framework for democratic education, Teaching Democracy in an Age of Uncertainty begins a dialogue with education professionals towards the reconstruction of education and by extension our social, cultural and political institutions. This book is the first monograph on philosophy with children to focus on democratic education. The book examines the ways in which education can either perpetuate or disrupt harmful social and political practices and narratives at the classroom level. It is a rethinking of civics and citizenship education as place-responsive learning aimed at understanding and improving human-environment relations to not only face an uncertain world, but also to face the inevitable challenges of democratic disagreement beyond merely promoting pluralism, tolerance and agreement. When viewed as a way of life democracy becomes both a goal and a teaching method for developing civic literacy to enable students to articulate and apprehend more than just the predominant political narrative, but to reshape it. This book will be of interest to scholars of philosophy, political science, education, democratic theory, civics and citizenship studies, and peace education research.

By investigating the re-emergence of intellectual, moral, and civic virtues in the practice and teaching of science, this text challenges the increasing professionalization of science; questions the view of scientific knowledge as objective; and highlights the relationship between democracy and science. Written by a range of experts in science, the history of science, education and philosophy, the text establishes the historical relationship between natural philosophy and the Aristotelian virtues before moving to the challenges that the relationship faces, with the emergence, and increasing hegemony, brought about by the professionalization of science. Exploring how virtues relate to citizenship, technology, and politics, the chapters in this work illustrate the ways in which virtues are integral to understanding the values and limitations of science, and its role in informing democratic engagement. The text also demonstrates how the guiding virtues of scientific inquiry can be communicated in the classroom to the benefit of both individuals and wider societies. Scholars in the fields of Philosophy of Science, Ethics and Philosophy of Education, as well as Science Education, will find this book to be highly useful.

"Educational philosopher Nel Noddings draws on John Dewey's foundational work to reimagine education's aims and curriculum for the 21st century. Noddings looks at education as a multi-aim enterprise in which schools must address needs in all three domains of life: home and family, occupational, and civic. She raises critical questions about the current enthusiasm for standardization, the search for 'one-best-way' solutions, and the practice of maintaining a sharp separation between the disciplines. Comprehensive in its scope, chapters examine the liberal arts curriculum, vocational education, restructuring secondary school, extracurricular activities, national and global citizenship, critical thinking, and moral education."--Back cover.

Scholarship on the history of West Germany's educational system has traditionally portrayed the postwar period of Allied occupation as a failure and the following decades as a time of pedagogical stagnation. Two decades after World War II, however, the Federal Republic had become a stable democracy, a member of NATO, and a close ally of the West. Had the schools really failed to contribute to this remarkable transformation of German society and political culture? This study persuasively argues that long before the protest movements of the late 1960s, the West German educational system was undergoing meaningful reform from within. Although politicians and intellectual elites paid little attention to education after 1945, administrators, teachers, and pupils initiated significant changes in schools at the local level. The work of these actors resulted in an array of democratic reforms that signaled a departure from the authoritarian and nationalistic legacies of the past. The establishment of exchange programs between the United States and West Germany, the formation of student government organizations and student newspapers, the publication of revised history and civics textbooks, the expansion of teacher training programs, and the creation of a Social Studies curriculum all contributed to the advent of a new German educational system following World War II. The subtle, incremental reforms inaugurated during the first two postwar decades prepared a new generation of young Germans for their responsibilities as citizens of a democratic state.

Focusing on a wide range of critical issues, this book provides a comprehensive analysis of the linkage of different educational ideas, policies, and practices to a commitment for democratic schooling. Informed by significant, interdisciplinary research, as well as by his own extensive professional experiences as a teacher, professor, department chair, and dean, Teitelbaum examines contemporary concerns related to three broad areas: 1) teaching and teacher education; 2) curriculum studies; and 3) multiculturalism and social justice. His approach is to integrate the current and the historical, the practical and the theoretical, the technical and the socio-political, and the personal and the structural. With this volume, Teitelbaum considers how schools should be organized and funded, what they should teach and to whom, the role that teachers, students, and parents should play in school life, and the need and prospects for schools and teacher education programs that foster meaningful learning, critical reflection, and social justice.

Originally published in 1916, this early work by American philosopher and educational reformist John Dewey is both expensive and hard to find in its first edition. It details Dewey’s ideas on Educational Philosophy and the formation of the mind in relation to society. This fascinating work is highly recommended for anyone interested in the concept of individuality during the early twentieth century along with its educational doctrines. Many of the earliest books, particularly those dating back to the 1900s and before, are now extremely scarce. We are republishing these classic works in affordable, high quality, modern editions, using the original text and artwork.

This year marks the centenary publication of John Dewey’s magnum opus, Democracy and Education. Despite its profound importance as a foundational text in education, it is notoriously difficult and—dare we say it—a little dry. In this charming and often funny companion, noted philosopher of education D. C. Phillips goes chapter by chapter to bring Dewey to a twenty-first-century audience. Drawing on over fifty years of thinking about this book—and on his own experiences as an educator—he lends it renewed clarity and a personal touch that proves its lasting importance. Phillips bridges several critical pitfalls of Democracy and Education that often prevent contemporary readers from fully understanding it. Where Dewey sorely needs a detailed example to illustrate a point—and the times are many—Phillips steps in, presenting cases from his own classroom experiences. Where Dewey casually refers to the works of people like Hegel, Herbart, and Locke—common knowledge, apparently, in 1916—Phillips fills in the necessary background. And where Dewey gets convoluted or is even flat-out wrong, Phillips does what few other scholars would do: he takes Dewey to task. The result is a lively accompaniment that helps us celebrate and be enriched by some of the most important ideas ever offered in education.