Education: A Very Short Introduction

Very Short Introductions #347

by Gary Thomas

Education is one of the hot-button issues of our time, heatedly debated by parents, teachers, local school boards, and national politicians. But despite the many measures taken to overhaul the educational system, student math and reading scores rarely seem to improve. Taking the reader from the schools of ancient times to the present day, this Very Short Introduction explains why education has followed the path that it has taken-and what we might do to improve it. Education expert Gary Thomas delves into some of the big questions of education and the twists and turns the field has taken over time, looks at the work of such key thinkers as Piaget and Vygotsky, and examines such recent innovations as the introduction of progressive education in the 20th century and the marketization of schools over the last few decades. Thomas repeatedly returns to the question of why education has recently become so test-orientated and he explores the consequences of this obsession with testing for children. He also looks at moves that teachers and policy-makers have made to try to improve what goes on in schools, from changing teaching so that it mirrors the way children learn, to making schools more inclusive and meaningful for a broader range of students.
About the Series:
Oxford's Very Short Introductions series offers concise and original introductions to a wide range of subjects--from Islam to Sociology, Politics to Classics, Literary Theory to History, and Archaeology to the Bible. Not simply a textbook of definitions, each volume in this series provides trenchant and provocative--yet always balanced and complete--discussions of the central issues in a given discipline or field. Every Very Short Introduction gives a readable evolution of the subject in question, demonstrating how the subject has developed and how it has influenced society. Eventually, the series will encompass every major academic discipline, offering all students an accessible and abundant reference library. Whatever the area of study that one deems important or appealing, whatever the topic that fascinates the general reader, the Very Short Introductions series has a handy and affordable guide that will likely prove indispensable.

Genres: Education, Nonfiction, Philosophy, History, Psychology, Audiobook, Academia

129 pages, Paperback

First published March 28, 2013

About the author

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Azat Sultanov · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a good introduction into educational matters. A must read for any educators as well as students. Gives a historical discourse and an overall picture of the theories dominating the field. Nice bibliography.

[Anita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Почему её стоит прочитать? Чтобы... :
1. Вновь осознать, насколько плохая система образования
2. Провести параллели между мировым образованием и российским и понять, что неправильно присуждать все грехи одной России
3. Усилить угрызение мозга вопросом: "Как стать учителем что надо?"
4. И, конечно же, вновь удостовериться, что учителем быть - не дрова рубить.

В силу того, что я до сих пор никак не могу понять, куда поступать, поняла, что с радостью пошла бы на факультет образования с элементами когнитивистики, если бы он существовал. Сугубо опираясь на мои взгляды в столь юном возрасте, считаю, что, чтобы преподавать, нужно пройти курсы, осознать, что ты делаешь, и чувствовать детей (тут только опыт поможет). А чтобы понять, КАК преподавать, надо изучать систему образования и инновации в ней. Пора бы в дополнение к педу открыть и факультет конкретно образовательной системы.

[Cathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Given its brevity, a highly readable and remarkably comprehensive book on education, schooling, and teaching. Thomas presents presents the perennial questions about education and schooling, and captures the competing perspectives clearly enough that any one new to education could quickly be brought up to speed.

[❀ Diana ❀ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nu este o noutate să aflăm că organele guvernamentale și alte higher social classes și-au băgat nasul acolo unde nu au nicio competență: din păcate, educația nu a fost și nu este o excepție. Această cărticică ne prezintă momentele în care politica a modelat activitatea școlară și a dictat curriculum elevilor, însă niciodată nu au existat rezultate satisfăcătoare. Din contră, au făcut mai rău.

Problemele descrise în această scurtă introducere despre educație sunt prezente la nivel internațional, unde se pune un accent excesiv pe testare, notare și predarea de standarde decât pe explorare, gândire critică și posibilitatea de a alege. Bineînțeles, reforme în învățământ s-au făcut în lung și-n lat, dar performanțele elevilor și dorința lor de a „învăța” s-au tot dus în jos. De ce? Nu îl forțezi pe copil să-ți învețe materia și să-l amenți cu note proaste, ci încerci să-i pavezi drumul spre cunoaștere, prin stimularea curiozității. Îl înveți să învețe.

Modul în care copiii trebuie educați este dezbătut de zeci de ani încoace, de la teoriile lui Piaget, la Vîgotsky, Illich. Voi încheia cu o idee prezentată de Ivan Illich în cartea sa Deschooling Society:

He said that we confuse teaching with learning, grade advancement with education, a diploma with competence. He posed a challenge about learning: ask anyone to specify how they acquired what they know and value and they will very often, even those who reject progressive ideas, admit that they learned it outside school rather than within it. ‘Their knowledge of facts, their understanding of life and work came to them from friendship or love, while viewing TV, or while reading, from examples of peers or the challenge of a street encounter’.

[Jesse Field · Rating 5 out of 5]

In this concise but comprehensive overview of the subject, Gary Thomas conveys as much as an MA in a graduate school of education — maybe more. After an illuminating look at the history of the modern classroom, which was already essentially in place by Shakespeare’s day, he briefly describes the back and forth between this formal approach and more progressive approaches. Thomas repeats John Dewey’s crucial insight that neither progressive nor formal methods constitute a viable school of thought, and any professional teacher is likely to use a mix of methods. As with many systems, the biggest problem has historically been the establishment of bureaucracy and regulation that ignores or even snuffs out the discretion of experienced teachers.

Thomas is the first writer I have seen in the field who frankly acknowledges that much of the social science research of the 20th century only seems to find and defend propositions obvious to any experienced school teacher. Children who play more, learn more. Children in highly formalized classroom settings rapidly blunt their sense of imagination. And the complex of children’s mental models goes up as they get older, but not according to some universal structure of timing. Thus telling a student they are “not ready” for certain material based on social science research is likely to miss the tree for forests.

This general condescension toward the research is a very healthy attitude, and refreshing in a world where ‘research-based’ has become a facile shibboleth. I was intrigued to discover that psychometrics was early on concerned with some questionable research goals, such as the inheritability of intelligence. Walter Lippman warned against the use of psychometrics to divide society into an “intellectual caste system” as early as the 1920s.

Even more fascinating was one area where the research does play out: children’s success in school does quite often turn on their ability to switch ‘codes,’ as sociologist Basil Bernstein argues:

The problem for working-class children, said Bernstein, is that they have little experience with the elaborated code, so when they get to school they are instantly alienated from much that goes on there. They don’t understand, literally, what teachers are talking about. Middle-class children, by contrast, are familiar with both codes and are able to switch between the one and the other. What do working-class children do in this situation? They may pick up the elaborated code, and if they do all is fine and dandy: they benefit from the acquisition. Often, though, they simply withdraw, opt out, or rebel. However assertive the retreat from school becomes, its inevitable consequences are in the markedly poorer achievements of these children at school—they comprise the 57 per cent who don’t even reach adeptness in basic subjects.

To me, the clear conclusion is that we must teach the children the codes — we can help them stage their entry past the gates of privilege to do whatever it is their young minds set to. We can teach them other things, too, and need hardly worry the subject matter, since most knowledge that has become curricular has some value, although not the transfer power that is often promoted, “learn the great books, learn critical thinking!” I’m fascinated that Neil Postman advocated an intended curriculum taken from “the three A’s”: astronomy, archaeology, and anthropology. But Confucius also has a point in simply wanting students to learn to be polite, to be gentlemen and ladies.

We could always aim education at preparation for life in democracy. For giving voice to minds previously silenced. In Kerala, improved health outcomes could well be the result of improved female education outcomes.

Caldwell’s conclusion was that women’s education is important not just because women will know more about, say, nutrition and development for babies, but also because women are valued and included—something more intangible but just as significant.

If there is some way to make more people feel valued in their society, to take up roles in that society, than the institution known as ’school’ is able, then we should ditch school and move to the next institution. Ivan Illich seems to have anticipated back in the 1960s that social networking could convey necessary skills more effectively than any school. As Thomas sees it, Paolo Freire’s practical pedagogies serve as a case defending Illich’s call for overturning the traditional school structure entirely:

Illich had admired the work of the Brazilian educator Paulo Freire, who provided for Illich something of a case study in the way that education should be conducted. Like John Locke and John Dewey, Freire saw education as an integral and necessary part of a healthy democracy: people had to understand their political situations for a society to be truly open and democratic. To this end, Freire had devoted his life to the education of his country’s impoverished peasant population and through a process he described as conscientização (awareness) sought to help his compatriots become literate while at the same time working for their freedom.

The literacy and the freedom weren’t separate but, rather, knotted together. In his Pedagogy of the Oppressed he suggested that traditional forms of education served only to maintain the oppression of the poor. Literacy, he said, should not simply be used to ‘improve’ the peasants for the benefit of the people who were oppressing them: enhancing workers’ literacy wasn’t a way of producing better workers and more compliant consumers. Rather, education should help to elevate them, and help free them from oppression: it should be at the heart of the democratic process.

Freire got his hands dirty: he worked down among the people, and this is why his work has earned the admiration of so many educators across the world, in his combination of high ideals with nitty-gritty practice. His solutions to the issues he identified were not merely rhetorical or theoretical. He designed a highly practical scheme for teaching reading to illiterate adults based on words and phrases that were important to them in understanding their lives. In this sense, his work was consistent with the advice of Bruner and his spiral curriculum: start where the learner is and make it meaningful.

Freire seems to provide proof of Illich’s point about the inappropriateness of school as an institution for education, for his out-of-school teaching programmes met with great success. A US secretary for health, education, and welfare, John Gardner, in 1965 made the controversial assertion that everything a high school graduate learns in twelve years of schooling could easily be learned in two years. Freire’s adult learners, working outside the formal school environment and with a curriculum that was highly relevant for them, proved Gardner’s point, as they acquired basic literacy in a matter of weeks. If this could be done, the wisdom of devoting several years of primary education to the same purpose—a project that often fails—was surely questionable. Here was evidence for Illich’s argument that people learn best outside school.

This is surely strong stuff for any teacher to read. The best recommendation we can make for students is to try to find some practical interest in what they are learning. And if they can improve their lives more directly by not going to school, then they shouldn’t.

[Jayney · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent!!!! Such a good introduction. Inspiring and easy to read. I read the whole book on commuter trains in Tokyo & nothing was difficult to concentrate on due to the simple style of writing. So concise a wide range of theorists were covered and both sides of the arguement was given.

[Skyler · Rating 5 out of 5]

A really well-written and clear overview of the history, theories, and traditions surrounding education.

[Rebecca Reid · Rating 4 out of 5]

Education by Gary Thomas (Oxford University Press, 2013) is one of the newest additions to the Very Short Introduction series, a series I’ve spoken highly of in the past simply because each book does such a wonderful job of introducing a topic, the issues surrounding the topic, and the people involved without overburdening the reader. Education is no exception. In 120 slim pages, Thomas introduced me to a general history of the processes of education, the people involved in various philosophies, the different schools of thought in education, and the contemporary issues that surround the complex topic.

I read the book once. As a new homeschooling mother, I assure you that this was only a preliminary read of a book that I need to revisit. I’ve been mulling over it for a week now, pondering how to approach a review of the book. Because it is a slim introduction, it is a basic overview. And yet, reading it provided me with motivation to improve my own teaching, along with a desire to encourage change throughout mainstream education today.

More on my blog

Note: I received a copy of this book from the publisher for review consideration.

[5H3MS · Rating 4 out of 5]

Переехал к Рустику на Московскую и на след день скатавшись туда и обратно таки дочитал эту книгу)

Отличная книга для начала, есть много ссылок на литературу по которым можно продолжать разбираться с насущными вопросами образования.

Рекоммендую к прочтению всем кому интересно образование, да и тем кто в нем уже не первый год.

[Ana · Rating 3 out of 5]

This little guy concludes with a reminder that education and schooling are two different things. It is funny that I decided to start with this book on my search for histories of how education has been delivered to populations —aka schooling.

My interest skews much more on what has been done and how it has been measured and what research there is today, than, in contrast, towards theories or writings on what learning is and how it feels and works. I don’t think there’s as much value to the philosophy of learning as there is to examining the history of how people have been taught and what has been deemed worth teaching. As a result, I could take or leave chapters summarizing Piaget and Plato and so forth and I loved the chapter on curriculum.

This is a good overview and made even better for examining both UK and US education and sprinkling notes of world education, too. (Shoutout to the wonderful fact of how Kerala in India has a great education system and how that impacts quality of life in relatively poor population.)

It’s also not even a bad thing that this book is clearly biased against mainstream schooling and high stakes testing because when a bias is clear it’s easy to handle. I just think it strawmans accountability and testing; I think you can give tests that do accurately assess student ability to think deeply about ideas, not just reproduce shallow knowledge. I also think it did not go into enough depth about how oftentimes poverty or cultural difference is the cause of what gets flagged as “learning disabilities” — that’s nice and all, and important and true on population levels, but I get upset when the counter reality isn’t also presented, because I’ve known rich kids and twins with very different abilities at academics in ways that suggest not an issue of poverty or culture but of a real cognitive difference from the norm, and I hate how this book suggests that’s a fiction.

So, while good and well organized, just a little too heavy on history of ideas rather than history of implementation, which is what I was looking for (more my problem than the book’s). The real reason it’s 3 not 4 stars for me though is that it suggested there’s no such thing as learning disabilities and didn’t do special education justice there.

[Ben Scobie · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book goes through a lot of the various theories seen in education, which were naturally interesting. What I found more interesting was the role of politics and how much of what we see today in education and schools was defined by politicians rather than educationalists and outcomes from studies, but perhaps this is a good thing, as apparently there is no proven outcome between education spending and economic growth. The author seemed to enjoy how terrible and ineffective much of education is and spent a lot of time discussing the disparity between education and learning.

Something that will stick with me was the point about asking people where they acquired what they know. "Their knowledge of facts, their understanding of life and work came to them from friendship or love, while viewing TV, or while reading, from examples of peers or the challenge of a street encounter."

The references and list of further reading resources is great!

[Elisha Lawrence · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thomas looks into education historically and how it came to the form it resembles in America today. He does include the differing systems that exist in a few European countries to contrast. The general theme is that education in schools needs to be reformed. Compulsory schooling extinguishes a desire to learn, in his view. Despite evidence that schools are not producing the desired outcomes, we continue in much the same fashion that has existed for the last century.

Interesting ideas and certainly a critique that shows the shortcomings of our educational system. I am a proponent of reform, though, I don't expect the wide-ranging changes Thomas views as necessary to take place. What is clear is that students, by in large, like school less the longer they attend. Suggestions I find helpful are starting school later, providing more space for exploration, and offering different choices for children and parents.

[Marwa · Rating 4 out of 5]

How can you write a ‘very short introduction’ on ‘EDUCATION’, I ask? That’s the precise reason why I read this book: coming from years of experience as an educator and currently reading a masters degree in education. Despite that, I think Gary Thomas has done a good job here in managing to summarise theories and practices in education in such a concise book. What I would argue though, is that the title should really be ‘Western Schooling’ or ‘Schooling in the West’ rather than ‘Education’. Firstly, as there are virtually zero references to the influences on education and of knowledge from the East (par a couple one random point on Confucianism). Secondly, I attest that the book is focused on schooling mostly and the framework in where ‘education’ is taught.

[James · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a phenomenal starting point for anyone who is interested in dialogues about education, particularly its English-infused spread. Seemingly conversational in tone, it still packs a nuanced method for such a brief work. I have studied and taught the history of higher education for many years and continue to teach on that and other topics of higher education and I found this to be one of the finest works being both approachable and brief enough for an audience not seeking an in-depth study, yet packed with enough meaning and history to enable one to become interested in the topic. This is well done.

[Rolf · Rating 4 out of 5]

A solid intro to both the philosophers (Rousseau, Locke) and educational thinkers (Dewey, Piaget, Vygotsky, Illich, Freire) that have informed our contemporary school system, as well as a pretty solid introduction to the major historical moments that have led to our contemporary K-12/primary and secondary school system in the Anglophone world.

It gets a bit too broad by trying to incorporate both US and British school system history, focusing more on the US than England--but then, trying to write one of these Very Short Introduction books about the entire field of education is a pretty impossible task to begin with. Given the impossibility of the premise, this is a great attempt.

[Danil · Rating 4 out of 5]

Surely, very good book about education history, about brightest thoughts and ideas, but it seems to me, author is very selective... He is totally sure that best education is progressive. Of corse it is, but school is not only about education. Its about system too. If children are not at school, where are they while their parents at work? If parents will be with their children, who will work and get some money to live on? If we make smaller classes, more diverse afterschool programs, it will need more "teachers", place, time and money. Who will pay?

[Katherine · Rating 4 out of 5]

As an educator, this was a tough read. That’s only because the author is so thorough within the short 120 or so pages, that there’s no questioning the cyclical patterns of education theories and methods. Completely infuriating, but the author does a great a job with this topic. I read this in one night and really enjoyed it. I also appreciated the subtle hints of author opinion that didn’t take away from the facts of history. Good read, no doubt.

[Jonathan Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good book
The author details educational institutions and thought leaders over the past couple of thousand years.
He breaks the institution into two parts:
-progressives, who want less structure in classrooms
- and traditional, the people who want structured classes and lessons
I’ll have to listen to the book again to better break down these concepts but a good step for me into educational theories

[Christine Louis-Dit-Sully · Rating 1 out of 5]

More an essay where the author is constantly showing his opinions than a short introduction to education where one is trying to raise an interest in the readers as well as trying to impart some knowledge. I have read several books in the 'Very short introduction' serie and this is by far the worse book I read so far.

[Harry · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very readable, and an interesting approach to the history of, and discourse surrounding, education (basically and in the main in European and Anglo-American spheres). Quite a depressing tone throughout, and a voyage through the many incursions--often producing deleterious effects--into educational practice motivated by politicians keen on re-election.

[Largo Vanderkelen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A complete account of the history of (thinking about) education: questions established axioms and looks at the future of education. The book focuses on the US school system but the lessons to be drawn from it are (unfortunately) generally applicable.
Love how such a complex topic is made simple without compromising to mutch the depth of the book.

[商嘉琦 · Rating 5 out of 5]

VIS Series has never let me down. As I was going through this book, all of the key scholars and reforms and theories that mentioned in my Critical debates in education course are connected together. This is really a great quick review! Lucky I found this book

[Crystal Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this for a class, and honestly, it's a pretty good textbook. There were even a few sentences that struck me as worthy of texting my friends, so yeah, good book for anyone intending to do any teaching as a part of their career.

[Mitch Norris · Rating 5 out of 5]

"We confuse teaching with learning, grade advancement with education, a diploma with competence."

"Everything a high school graduate learns in twelve years of schooling could easily be learned in two years."

[Grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

Truly places education in perspective. Opened my eyes to why the system is how it is today and the irony of how traditionalists and innovators are neither actually succeeding due to economical and political factors taking precedence

[James Reynolds · Rating 5 out of 5]

Course book for MA

This has been recommended by University to use as a starting point for MA. Hopefully this turns out to be correct

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I am astonished by how much I learned from this little book about the history of education and some of the seemingly eternal struggles that take place in this arena.

[Love0 · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a nice summary about the importance of learning how to learn, not to know.

The child mind is special

[Josiah Richardson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Misunderstands the telos of education. A decent historical account of the process and evolution of education. Dry writing.

[Davide Recchia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Timeline of eduction ideas on pp. 124-125 was very helpful