Educational Philosophies: Pragmatism, Idealism, Realism and Existentialism

A detailed Summary of Educational Philosophies: Pragmatism, Idealism, Realism and Existentialism


    Pragmatism emerged from the writings of John Dewey who believed that experimentation was the best approach for educating young minds. For example, pragmatists feel that field trips, educational excursions etc are more effective in teaching students about the world instead of audio-visual aids. Pragmatism includes such as thoughts as futurism, and educational humanism and Reconstructionism. Pragmatic education philosophy doesn't assign a traditional role to the teachers who are only seen as guides and not exactly more knowledgeable beings. George R. Knight in his book on education philosophies explained that pragmatism focuses on real life experiences as the main source of knowledge and education. They gives the example of field trips as he says that for a child to learn about dairy products, its better to take him to a barn and let him experience the whole thing himself instead of showing him a movie on the subject. (p. 75)

Idealism is an important philosophy that gained greater influence over education in t


Realism is more or less a reaction to idealism. This philosophy maintains that material and physical world exists independent of ideas and thoughts. Whether we think about a mountain or not, it does exist.  It will exist even if we don't think about it or have never had an idea of what a mountain is like.  Realist educationists would want students to learn through their senses of smell, feel, and taste since they believe in the existence of the natural world. They also maintain that the best way is to learn through experiencing the physical world. Nature plays an important role here as educationist would prefer to teach through observation of natural order. The teachers with realistic bend of mind would want students to development judgment and ethics by experiencing and observing the world. Behavior psychology is also one of the important branches of study for realist educationists.

he 20th century and was not so popular prior to that. It has been present in the educational field for a long time emphasizing the reality of ideas, t

Some common words found in the essay are:
Realism Realism, William Hocking, George Knight, John Dewey, Idealism Idealism, Reconstructionism Pragmatic, , idealism idealism, ideas mind, existentialism philosophy, field trips, idealism philosophy, physical world,

Approximate Word count = 700
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Science

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