四位西洋思想家的教育改革論點

Abstract

美國教育哲學家赫欽斯(R.M. Hutchins)認為偉著(great books)的價值之一是開 啟視野，因為這些書保存下來的原因是每個時代的人們，因受這些榜樣的鼓舞而得到提昇。 值此臺灣大肆推動教育改革之際，從傳統中採擷偉大思想家對教育改革相關問題的識見，應 能得到若干啟示並避免嘗試錯誤。 本文針對臺灣目前棘手的教育問題，如 1.對教育改革缺乏較正確的認識； 2.「教育目的」不明確； 3.學科本位主義太濃； 4.「在家自行教育」的想法否定學校教育的功能等四項。 擇取康德的「開明專家主導致教育實驗」教育改革觀點；懷海德的「博雅的專才」教育目的 論；斯賓塞論述「何種知識有最有價值」時，以完全生活的五種活動做為課程內容；及坤體 良論「家庭教育與學校教育的優劣」中，肯定學校教育有家庭教育無法達到的教育效果等主 題，探討思想家這些問題的看法及教育改革的措施，做為臺灣進行教育改革的參考。

R. M. Hutchins (1899-1977), a contemporary American philosopher, argued that 「 great books have endured because men in every era have been lifted beyond themselves by the inspiration of their examples. 」 At this moment, our government is putting enormous efforts in ameliorating the educational environment. Moreover, educational reform, which should be founded on the basis of sound theories, is essentially a piece-meal process and therefore takes time. Under such circumstances, one of the best ways to make the educational reform mors efficient is to adopt the insights of educational philoso- phies from the great thinkers. These insights are embodied in their great books. This paper aims at discussing how to cope with some of the urgent educational problems in Taiwan in the light of the philosophies proposed by four great thinkers concerning educational reform: 1. Kant's doctrines of educational reform; 2. Whitehead's emphasis of 「 the general specialist 」 as the aim of education; 3. Spencer's discussion on 「 What knowledge is of most worth? 」 ; Quintillian's proposal on 「 the comparative merits of private and public instruction 」.