Idealism School of Philosophy

The first and the oldest school of philosophy of education is idealism. Mahatma Gandhi, Tagore, Spinoza,Kant and Hegel are the famous idealists who propounded this philosophy of education.

It has a meaning, essence, curriculum, method of teaching, the relation between the teacher and the student and relevance to the society. This article tries to cover all these aspects of idealism in brief.

Salient Features:

·        In Idealism, utmost significance is given to an idea and not the physical matter.

·        The entire universe is considered as a mere manifestation of an idea in human mind.

·        The human spirit or soul is also given equal priority over the material world.

·        This is because the word idealism encapsulates two words, namely idea and ideal.

·        Here imparting of morals and values is given a lot of importance during the interaction between the teacher and the student.

·        The mental world is more important than the material world as the latter is a mere external existence of the former.

·        The realization of the self and the welfare of the society are the aims of education of idealism.

·        These aims of education are realized through the framing of an appropriate curriculum.

·        The curriculum focuses on the appreciation of values like the truth, beauty and goodness which ultimately leads to spiritual perfection.

·        Apart from the training of the mind, equal emphasis is given to physical education.

·        The humanities are given more importance over physical and biological sciences.

Demerits:

·        The methods of teaching the curriculum are not specific in idealism.

·        Some of these methods are question method, logical method, inductive-deductive method and self activity method, with no method being the superior one.

·        For classroom practice, discussion and lecture methods are prescribed.

·        With regard to the relationship between the teacher and the student, the former should teach and the latter should learn.

·        The teacher is held in very high reverence and in mostly the  learners are not more than passive listeners of the lectures under very strict discipline.

Educational Implications:

·        The modern education system is believed to be materialistic in nature and destroying the moral and aesthetic fabric of the society.

·        A teacher coming from the school of idealism can provide a sense of human touch and mental peace to the education system of India.