Gerald Gutek's "Philosophical, Ideological, and Theoretical Perspectives on Education" uses a systems approach to help readers examine the major schools of philosophy of education; consider the relationship of education to major ideologies including Nationalism, Liberalism, Conservatism, and Marxism; and analyze the impact of philosophy and ideology on educational theory and practice through the theories of Essentialism, Perennialism, Social Reconstruction, and Critical Theory. The concepts are made clear through the book's helpful chapter organization, which includes definitions of terms; historical contributors and antecedents; a general discussion of the particular philosophy, ideology, or theory; and relationship and application to education, especially to schools, curriculum, instruction, and to teachers and students.
The hardest textbook I've ever had to get through. You can totally tell that a history buff wrote this because you get about 20 pages of history per chapter before he gets to the philosophy and how it looks when applied in a classroom setting.
I really did enjoy learning about philosophies, theories and ideas in an educational setting but god, this book was soooo boring.
I have a feeling that this author had to meet a certain quota for the number of pages written. I say this because the author would start by introducing a topic then essentially just repeat everything over and over again for the rest of the chapter. I swear the author just tried thinking of different ways to write the same information.
The author spent a lot of time writing about the history behind the concepts. It was only the last page of each chapter that really discussed how to implement it into education.
This is the book that will help to make sense of the these subjects for any education student. Information is presented in an accessible format; definitely a ‘go to’ resource.
Thorough AF, painfully detailed. All the examples of examples of critical theory and social reconstruction are example of white savior media. The Help? Freedom Writer… come on Gutek.
This text is a wonderful resource for any BA, BSE, or MA class in philosophies of education. Some of the writing was tedious and repetitive, but the easy-to-read format and section headings made finding desired information nearly instantaneous.