Assignment Description
Collect six articles from peer-reviewed academic, professional journals. Articles are to be on topics as outlined below. All six articles are to be new to you, meaning that you have not used them in any previous assignments in this or another course. Annotate each article in a paragraph or two of at least 300 words. The annotation is to include a brief summary of key ideas in the article and a sentence or two of critical analysis. The critical analysis must be through the lens of course textbooks, video presentations, and/or biblical principles. Cite sources accordingly.
ARTICLE TOPICS: Your articles will be collected in two sets of three each.
-For the first set of three articles, you will select articles related to an educational thinker from the Gutek textbook that aligns closely with your personal beliefs about education. This individuals ideas should resonate with you more strongly than any of the others you have studied so far in this course. You need not fully embrace all of the individuals ideas, and you may certainly have points of disagreement. Overall, however, you should be drawn to this individuals philosophy of education more so than any others in the Gutek textbook. To clarify, all three articles in this first set should be on the topic of the same educational thinker.
-For the second set of three articles, you will select articles related to an educational thinker from the Gutek textbook that represents ideas to which you are opposed. This educational thinker should be in a different philosophical camp than the first one you selected for your first set of articles. (For example, if your first set of articles is on John Dewey, your second set should not be on Jane Addams because she is in the same progressive camp. A better selection for your second set of articles would be Aquinas or Bagley because they are from opposing philosophical camps than Dewey. See the chart at the bottom of these directions for guidance if you are confused by this.) Though you may agree with and support some of the ideas or actions of this second educational thinker, there is a key element that you rejectsomething that is antithetical to your own core values or philosophy of education. All three articles in the second set will be on the topic of this same second educational thinker.
Focus on philosophy and not educational practice. Do not address specific instructional practice or the learning environment in this thesis statement. That may be discussed later in the body of your Philosophical Model Analysis to support and illustrate your thesis statement. Here are some suggestions for your preliminary thesis statement:
Address the purpose and outcome of education rather than its process or practice.
Consider the long-range impact education should make on individuals and on society.
What knowledge is most worth learning and why?
What values are most worth teaching and why?
Based on observations of society, what outcome should education have on society?
The above suggestions are not offered as a formula for you to follow. Most importantly they are presented to help you avoid the most common error in the upcoming Philosophical Model Analysis, which is to focus on instructional practice rather than on philosophical ideas. Because instructional practice should flow out of philosophical beliefs, you are to start with a preliminary thesis statement that addresses philosophy.
Avoid first-person pronouns as much as possible. To do this, think in terms of ought and should and write in third-person plural as much as possible.