Pedagogical Essay Research Articles

Mellan tradition och reform: Pedagogiska examensuppsatsämnen vid två svenska folkskoleseminarier 1915–1937

Between tradition and reform: Pedagogical essay topics at two Swedish teacher training seminars, 1915–1937. During the beginning of the twentieth century, a series of school reforms was carried out in Sweden. One concerned the education of elementary school teachers. In this article, we examine which knowledge and teaching ideals that was posed by some of those who had the task of putting this reform into practice. At the center are the nearly five hundred essay topics that were offered at the teacher training seminars in Lund (only male apprentices) and Falun (only female apprentices) 1914–1937. The results advocate that two rather different local cultures of knowledge were developed at the two seminars. While the essay topics that were offered in Lund mostly seems to promote a more traditional reproductive view on teaching, the ones proposed in Falun rather appears to encourage a much more reformistic understanding of schooling. Hence it is suggested that the latter might be understood as an aspiration to establish a more autonomous and independent women teacher identity.

Teaching the Short Fiction by Henry James: Critical and Pedagogical Essays ed. by Kathleen McDonald and Anne S. Jung (review)

Teaching the Short Fiction by Henry James: Critical and Pedagogical Essays ed. by Kathleen McDonald and Anne S. Jung (review)

Visit to a Familiar Planet: Some Questions to Ask Before Season Selection

Abstract: This Note from the Field uses the travel metaphor and inquiry format of Elinor Fuchs's well-known pedagogical essay, "EF's Visit to a Small Planet: Some Questions to Ask a Play," to pose questions about a related object of dramatic analysis: the familiar world in which you live. The questions posed in this Note invite readers to imagine their regional, institutional, and local world as a social text that is worth reading before (or alongside) selecting plays for a theatrical season. It is the interplay between familiar and distant planets that can yield, as so many socially engaged artists and educators have found, meaningful choices of plays for local audiences.

“Like setting down on a kag of powder and touching it off just to see where you’ll go to”: Reflections on Forty Years of Teaching Huckleberry Finn

Abstract A pedagogical essay reflecting on forty years of teaching Huckleberry Finn at both the high school and college level, recounting the author’s first experience teaching the novel, the expansion of the canon and the way that puts the novel in a broader context, and the importance of performing the dialect speech of various characters, modeling for students the way to read the novel for themselves. Even in perilous times for teaching controversial texts, the author suggests ways to teach Mark Twain’s masterpiece sensitively and effectively.

Sophistry in the writings of Miguel De Unamuno: between politics and pedagogy

The article explores the legacy of Miguel de Unamuno, one of the most prominent Spanish intellectuals of the late 19th and ear-ly 20th centuries. Unamuno was known not only as a writer, but also as a philosopher, philologist, journalist, playwright, social activist, and educator with unique and innovative ideas for his time. The focus is on his statements about the activity of the sophists, literary and rhetorical sophistry, as well as the sophisti-cal concept of education in general. The key question is who the sophists were for Unamuno: wise men working for the benefit of the city or verbal craftsmen creating an educational danger for the citizens? In his essay “On Consequence and Sincerity”, where he discusses philosophical issues, Unamuno turns to the sphere of sophistical activity. He believed that there is a danger of be-coming dependent on some authority (sometimes false) both in education and politics. Students, like voters, are made to believe in someone else's truth, so is there not a sophist inside the teach-er and politician? Unamuno supports his point of view with an example of a man who hated politics but fell in love with the doctrines presented by his teacher. In his essay “The Exploitation of the Intelligent”, where Unamuno reflects on deceivers, he ar-gues that a sophist may win in foolish verbal tournaments but not in calm and thorough written discussions. Based on his corpus of philosophical and pedagogical essays, one can conclude that Unamuno had an ambiguous attitude towards the sophists and sophistical education. By saying that he always saw a sophist in the depths of every dogmatist and a dogmatist in the depths of every sophist, Unamuno asserts that if he had to choose, he would undoubtedly choose a sophist. It is difficult to classify Miguel de Unamuno as either an opponent or a supporter of the sophists; rather, he sympathizes with them, using their activities to construct his arguments, which sometimes resemble sophistic ones.

Harry Potter and the Other: Race, Justice, and Difference in the Wizarding World ed. by Sarah Park Dahlen and Ebony Elizabeth Thomas

Reviewed by: Harry Potter and the Other: Race, Justice, and Difference in the Wizarding World ed. by Sarah Park Dahlen and Ebony Elizabeth Thomas Emily Lauer (bio) Harry Potter and the Other: Race, Justice, and Difference in the Wizarding World. Edited by Sarah Park Dahlen and Ebony Elizabeth Thomas. University Press of Mississippi, 2022. The essay collection Harry Potter and the Other: Race, Justice, and Difference in the Wizarding World is a broad-ranging and necessary addition to the ever-evolving field of Harry Potter scholarship. As the editors mention in their introduction to the book, they were motivated by the need to explore "the contradiction that lies at the heart of the Potter series: an author and a world that make the tacit promise of fantastic escape for the marginalized, all while the author inscribes exclu sion and bigotry within the wizarding world—as well as with her public words" (9). The contributors to Harry Potter and the Other employ a breadth of approaches to the vast transmedia landscape of the world of Harry Potter. The collection ranges widely: from analysis of specific fan artists' race-bending illustrations of characters, to a pedagogical essay about how one professor of color uses the Potter series in a college composition course, to an examination of trans-exclusionary themes in the Harry Potter books predating Rowling's public anti-trans stance, to race issues in the film and theater casting of expansions of the Harry Potter series beyond the original six books. The editors Sarah Park Dahlen and Ebony Elizabeth Thomas corral these various perspectives on the "other" in the Harry Potter series into three main sections. The eight essays in part 1, "Race, Gender, and Gender Identity," address how encounters with the other are framed and presented in various texts of the wizarding world, and how fans have reacted. In this section, I found the essay "The Magical (Racial) Contract: Understanding the Wizarding World of Harry Potter through Whiteness" by Christina M. Chica to be a particular standout. Chica posits that in the world of Harry Potter, "wizardness" can be seen as an analog of whiteness. Explaining how "Wizardness (Whiteness) is maintained by property and power over others" (72), Chica details the ways in which the privileges of "wizardness" have political, moral, and legal ramifications in the series. Her essay [End Page 420] has changed the way I think about the functions of magic in the series. Part 2 of Harry Potter and the Other, "#BlackHermione," is much smaller and more focused. The three essays in this section explore the varied fan reactions to the casting of a Black actress to play Hermione in the stage production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, and analyze J. K. Rowling's tweet endorsing the casting decision. In this section, Ebony Elizabeth Thomas's chapter "Hermione is Black: Harry Potter and the Crisis of Infinite Dark Fantastic Worlds" describes her own experiences as a Black woman in the Harry Potter fandom of previous decades, and provides a useful framework for how fans and scholars are expected to "reconcile multiple storyworlds" (194). Thomas notes that this chapter is a "truncated version of the original" sixth chapter of her book The Dark Fantastic: Race and the Imagination from Harry Potter to Hunger Games (201). In part 3, "History, Pedagogy, and Liberation," the authors of the four essays that comprise this section look at issues of justice within the book series and also in the way the series is used in our world. The final essay of the collection, "The Failed Wizard Justice System: Race and Access to Justice in Harry Potter" by Charles D. Wilson, is a highlight of the collection and a strong finish. Wilson closely examines the way the legal system is portrayed in the Ministry of Magic in the series in order to make clear its various shortcomings. He points out that "this is more of world-building exercise than a focal point of the series" (288), succinctly voicing an underlying issue of so many of the essays in this collection. Wilson's essay, through its critique of the institutions of the wizarding world, clarifies how inconsistent it is in its policies...

Teaching French Neoclassical Tragedy. Edited by Hélène E. Bilis and Ellen McClure

The editors’ starting point in their impeccably judged Introduction to this collection of pedagogical essays is to confront the question of what value tragedy written in the 1600s can offer today. All contributors have embraced that challenge, mostly recounting their own experiences of teaching and even sharing some failures as well as successes of their different approaches. Appropriately, given the subject, the book is divided into five acts. The first, ‘Reframing Tragic Poetics’, contains an inventive and intellectually rigorous piece by Larry F. Norman and David Wray on the place of Racine’s Phèdre amongst the various ancient and modern versions of the Phaedra myth; John D. Lyons’s characteristically incisive essay on the role played by fate in French tragedy; a challenging article by Jeffrey N. Peters on place and space in Corneille and Racine; Faith E. Beasley’s wonderful reappraisal of the important creative role of female spectators in the success of and controversy generated by Le Cid; an interesting comparison by Andrea Frisch of two theatrical versions of Julius Caesar’s death (by Jacques Grévin and Georges de Scudéry); and Juliette Cherbuliez’s fascinating discussion of hypotyposis as a pedagogical tool with undergraduates and postgraduates. Part Two is devoted to ‘The Performance of Tragedy on Stage and in the Classroom’, with very useful contributions on text and image in theatrical performance (Laurence Marie), performance and interpretation as a tool to tap students’ creative and collaborative impulses (Blair Hoxby), Racine’s lessons on communicative strategies (Jennifer Tamas), teaching and performing musical tragedy (John Boitano and Louise Thomas), and machine theatre (Hélène Visentin). In Part Three, ‘New Geographies, New Temporalities’, three chapters focus on teaching neoclassical theatre beyond the canon: Julia Prest’s extraordinary work on staging theatre in eighteenth-century Saint-Domingue is translated into an undergraduate course on theatre and society in the colonial era; Ellen R. Welch considers the staging of Corneille and Racine in multicultural France; and Sylvaine Guyot analyses the reception and performance of two modern versions of Bérénice by Faustin Linyekula. The fourth part concerns ‘Tragic Politics: Between the Ancien Régime and the Present’, with a comparison of Phèdre and more contemporary political worlds by Marc Bizer, an illuminating essay by Toby Wikström on teaching early modern globalization through two little-known plays (Des Croix’s Les Portugais infortunés and the anonymous Le More cruel), Sylvie Romanowski’s consideration of absolutist politics within Britannicus, and Jeffrey M. Leichman’s comparison of kingship within plays by Corneille and Aimé Césaire. In the final section, ‘Explorations in Theory and Technology’, Jennifer Row reads Polyeucte and Esther against the grain, giving them a persuasively queer makeover; Anna Rosensweig makes use of recent scholarship to consider theatre from an affective viewpoint; Theresa Varney Kennedy and David Jortner transform the Querelle du Cid into courtroom drama (with students playing the roles of debaters and jurors); and Hélène E. Bilis shows the huge value of using available databases to study neoclassical tragedy. A measure of the book’s success, upon this reader, was that it made me eager to introduce some of the excellent pedagogical suggestions into my own teaching but also deeply envious of those students who have had the privilege of attending such inspiring and innovative classes.

Sociocultural dominants of developing students’ value intentions: context of civilization challenges

The study of the influence of sociocultural dominants on value intentions formation in young generation of specialists (teachers) is important for identifying useful ideas that can be implemented to improve axiological situation in the country and the world in accordance with civilization challenges. The article highlights a wide range of theoretical achievements and presents results of empirical research, which confirms positive dynamics of value intentions development in students of pedagogical and art specialties. Generalized conclusions about development of this important phenomenon in the context of declining demand for value dominants, are confirmed by statistics. The study was based on axiological, socio-cultural, systemic and interdisciplinary research. The research field consisted of educational institutions in Kyiv (Ukraine), the sample was 356 respondents (students of the first bachelor’s level). The adequacy of the applied experimental tools (questionnaires, Pedagogical essays) is proved. The experimental work was conducted online using Google services. The results of the study show positive dynamics of the value intentions development and a significant correlation between students’ motivation to value-oriented activities and sustainability of this direction in the future. The importance of sociocultural determinants in the development of value intentions in students of pedagogical specialties based on sociocultural knowledge is proved.

Sociocultural dominants of developing students’ value intentions: context of civilization challenges

The study of the influence of sociocultural dominants on value intentions formation in young generation of specialists (teachers) is important for identifying useful ideas that can be implemented to improve axiological situation in the country and the world in accordance with civilization challenges. The article highlights a wide range of theoretical achievements and presents results of empirical research, which confirms positive dynamics of value intentions development in students of pedagogical and art specialties. Generalized conclusions about development of this important phenomenon in the context of declining demand for value dominants, are confirmed by statistics. The study was based on axiological, socio-cultural, systemic and interdisciplinary research. The research field consisted of educational institutions in Kyiv (Ukraine), the sample was 356 respondents (students of the first bachelor’s level). The adequacy of the applied experimental tools (questionnaires, Pedagogical essays) is proved. The experimental work was conducted online using Google services. The results of the study show positive dynamics of the value intentions development and a significant correlation between students’ motivation to value-oriented activities and sustainability of this direction in the future. The importance of sociocultural determinants in the development of value intentions in students of pedagogical specialties based on sociocultural knowledge is proved.

Empirismo e ideologia. Il marxismo italiano e Dewey

This article examines the dialogue between twentieth century Italian philosophy and American pragmatism. The second post-war period Italian culture is marked by an interest in Dewey’s writings. The rewiew “Il Politecnico” by Elio Vittorini is interested in the American philosopher, it indicates a convergence between the young Marx and pragmatism. Dewey is an important point of reference for rationalist philosophy. On the contrary, Marxist intellectuals reject the philosopher, seeing him as an ideological phenomenon of American imperialism. However, after the 1956 crisis and publication of Praxis ed empirismo by Giulio Preti (1957), a different critical attitude prevails in Marxist studies. Especially in pedagogical essays, some intellectuals show the links between Dewey’s thought and the Gramsci’s reflection in the Quaderni del carcere. Pragmatism; Imperialism; Marxism; Philosophy; Socialism.

French as a Foreign Language (FFL) Teachers of the 21st Century: Empowered Teachers

The text is a self-reflexive pedagogical essay in which the analysis carried out by a university professor of French as a Foreign Language is described during her postgraduate process. It deals with topics such as the needs of a beginner professor, the characteristics of the university professor of the 21st century, as well as those of an FFL professor. The reflection comes after recognizing the importance of the pedagogical component for the training of university professors and the challenges that a university professor of the 21st century has to face, who must understand how transcendental his or her work is in the training of future professionals.

A práxis pedagógica e os aprendentes surdos: implicações e pressupostos do paradigma vygotskyano na prática

Esse artigo trata sobre o Paradigma da Aprendizagem de Levy Vigostsky (1896 -1934) e as implicações que essa mesma teoria pode possibilitar para uma prática educativa que dinamize a aprendizagem dos educandos surdos. Destarte, a teoria sociointeracionista com seus pressupostos de aprendizagem pode viabilizar práticas que medeiem conhecimentos significativos, partindo das especificidades e das experiências sócio-históricas dos educandos surdos. Nesse sentido, esse estudo analisou as possíveis implicações do Paradigma Sociointeracionista de Levy Vigotsky para a práxis pedagógica com educandos surdos e como esses mesmos princípios podem viabilizar práticas voltadas para a aprendizagem desses sujeitos. A metodologia utilizada por esse trabalho foi a análise documental, a qual contribuiu para uma compreensão mais aprofundada das implicações do sociointeracionismo para o processo de ensino-aprendizagem dos aprendentes surdos. Os resultados deste estudo é a consolidação de um rico ensaio teórico e pedagógico que permite a compreensão e possível aplicação dos constructos teóricos do sociointeracionismo de Vygotsky para a prática pedagógica com educandos surdos, de forma a fomentar aprendizagens significativas.

Historical and pedagogical works of G. Gubaidullin as a result of his social and pedagogical activity

The relevance of the study consists in the fact that pedagogical thought, experience of teaching and upbringing of many generations and of multinational people made it possible to create a modern education system in Russia. An appeal to the pedagogical thought of enlighteners of the past and a critical rethinking of the historical experience of organizing education will contribute to improving the quality of education and achieve better results in educating the young generation. Turning to the history of pedagogical thought and upbringing experience will reveal the pedagogical values that have been forgotten, but are relevant for modern education, which will expand our ideas about the great thinkers of the past. Modern education reforms actualize the need to refer to the past experience of organizing training and education, as well as pedagogical thought, which will prevent numerous mistakes in the education system. The pedagogical thought of the great enlighteners of the past has always been and remains relevant at all times, for their correctness has been proven by time. The pedagogical thought and practice of education during the period of historical changes in Russia in 1920-30-s are of particular relevance. During this period of historical development of social and political life, the education system is also radically changing, which is significant for its great thinkers and educators who are called upon to organize education, instill cultural values in the young generation, and reveal all the wealth and effectiveness of national education. The problem of the research is to study the pedagogical heritage and practical activities of the educators of the early 20th century, in particular, G. Gubaidullin, who left a bright trace in the history of Tatar pedagogical thought. The purpose of the research is to reveal the practical pedagogical activity of the Tatar educator G. Gubaidullin, which was later theoretically generalized and reflected in pedagogical essays. In the course of the research the following methods have been applied: study of archival materials, manuscripts, theoretical literature; comparison of the pedagogical heritage of the past and the modernity; analysis of practical activities and pedagogical heritage of the educator; induction and deduction. The research results and key conclusions are the following: the pedagogical idea and experience of educating the young generation at the beginning of the 20th century have been proposed on the example of creativity and activities of the Tatar educator and teacher G. Gubaidullin for studying pedagogical educational institutions, the history of Pedagogy and education, theory and methods of educational work in the direction of preparation of 44.03.01 «Pedagogical education».

Editor's Re: Marks

Editor's Re: Marks

Профессионально-личностная рефлексия педагога-музыканта: операциональный компонент

The article deals with the specificity of professional reflection of the future music teacher in the light of the development of the ideas by E. B. Abdullin. The accumulation of one’s own experience of entering the world of music, the art of teaching, its comprehension and analysis allow a thoughtful student to look at the process of musical education through the eyes of students, their parents, that is, to take the reflective position of a teacher-researcher. The search for ways and means of solving professionally significant tasks requires a music teacher to think reflectively, understand the actions of his students and colleagues, and penetrate their feelings and thoughts. The importance of reflection in solving problem situations, pedagogical tasks, in mastering critical thinking by a future music teacher is substantiated. The conceptual foundations for professional reflection development of a future teacher-musician have been worked out, the structure of reflective analysis and the conditions for the effectiveness of its development by students have been revealed. The techniques and methods of preparing future bachelors and masters of music education for professional reflection in the process of studying at a university, during school practice, in various types of independent, research work of students are considered. The authors have adapted special reflexive techniques (artistic-pedagogical tasks, search games, storytelling, reflective life story, musical reflection, reflective analysis, interviews, pedagogical essays, creative portfolio). The article analyzes the experience of Dutch specialists, the author’s methods of foreign researchers (ALACT – model, “Wall”, “Arrows”, “Visiting card”, a system of reflective questions, etc.). Adapted for use by students in music lessons in the course of pedagogical practice, they become effective means for introspection, self-assessment of the activities of future bachelors / masters of music education. Based on the material of autobiographies and interviews of great musicians-performers, actual problems of music education, ways of spiritually reflexive entry into the world of art and artistic creation are analyzed.

Recepcja idei korczakowskich

Janusz Korczak (the pen name of Henryk Goldszmit), writer, doctor, but above all one the best tutors and teachers. Korczak fought for improvement of children’s lives. By his life and convictions he tried to prove that a child is a complete human being, not only a person in the making. Struggling for human dignity of a child, he concentrated his efforts on three areas: dignity of children, the rights of children and their place in a society. We can learn his stance on the situation of children, in the context of the European Children’s Rights Movement at the beginning of the 20th century, when he says: „wzywam o magna charta libertatis, o prawa dziecka” – (“I call for Magna Charta Libertatis, for children’s rights”). The voice of Janusz Korczak in his famous pedagogical essay “Jak kochać dziecko” – (“How to Love a Child”) has retained its significance to the present day. Fighting for children’s rights, the “Old Doctor” (his second pseudonym) concentrated on the position of children in the adults’ world and their mutual relationships. That is why the analysis of the main spheres of activity of the adults and children (family, school, society) is so important today, and consequently, finding the answer to the questions: To what extent are the Korczak’s objectives in the abovementioned spheres realized today? How children’s rights are respected?

Historical and pedagogical essays on the technique and technology of silicate painting. Part II

Historical and pedagogical essays on the technique and technology of silicate painting. Part II

Historical and pedagogical essays on the technique and technology of silicate painting. Part I

Historical and pedagogical essays on the technique and technology of silicate painting. Part I

I is for Agency: Education, Social Justice, and Auto/Biographical Practices

In this polyphonic pedagogical essay, six members of the Department of English at the University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez discuss their incorporation of auto/biographical acts into course syllabi for the purpose of facilitating social justice in and through education. Drawing from disciplinarily diverse faculty members holding different contractual positions within the university, this essay demonstrates the widespread need for creating space for student voices as means of supporting agency on- and off-campus, especially in times of disaster, tragedy, and crisis.

АКСІОЛОГІЧНИЙ КОНЦЕПТ НОВОЇ ОСВІТНЬОЇ СТРАТЕГІЇ ПІДГОТОВКИ ПЕДАГОГІВ

We consider the education of the 21st century as a process of preparing a young generation for life and work and as a means of productive changes in the state and the world dimension as a whole. The development of the education system in Ukraine is characterized by internal public inquiries and external factors that are actualized in the context of European integration. At the time – training of an innovative specialist, ready for intercultural communication and conscious protection of human virtues: individual freedoms and respect for it, culture of peace, etc. According to the results of the analysis of philosophical, historical and pedagogical sources, the status of pedagogical practice, the axiological concept of a new educational strategy of teacher training in a higher education institution is generalized and substantiated. Education is seen as a factor in harmonization in systems: man – man, man – nature, man – technology. The article gives a summary of the results of the study of the status of the identified problem in the practice of training the teachers of the first educational level (Bachelor) specialties «Preschool education», «Primary education». The revealed tendencies are characterized: divergence, which leads to the destruction of ties that could ensure the formation of a system of knowledge about man, nature, technology (technology) and society. Education directed towards the future should deviate from the rudiment of the knowledge-normative strategy of the Soviet model and build on values based on philosophical, ethical, aesthetic concepts. According to the results of the analysis of the study, the opinions of students, pedagogues-practitioners regarding the correspondence of the content of professional disciplines (pedagogy, psychology) to the needs of the individual, community and society are determined. A set of methods (poll, interviewing, questionnaires, pedagogical essay, mathematical statistics) allowed to reveal the dominance of moral values in the educational process (professional activity).