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25. Social Practice / E. Policies / 5. Education / c. Teaching

[virtues and principles of good teaching]

19 ideas
Let your teacher be a god to you [Anon (Upan)]
     Full Idea: Let your teacher be a god to you.
     From: Anon (Upan) (The Upanishads [c.950 BCE], 'Taittiriya')
     A reaction: Yes indeed. The problem in the west is that we are committed to encouraging a critical and questioning attitude. A high value for knowledge must precede a high value for a teacher.
We learn language, and we don't know who teaches us it [Anon (Diss)]
     Full Idea: We learn language, and we don't know who teaches us it.
     From: Anon (Diss) (Dissoi Logoi - on Double Arguments [c.401 BCE], §6)
Education is channelling a child's feelings into the right course before it understands why [Plato]
     Full Idea: I call 'education' the initial acquisition of virtue by the child, when the feelings of pleasure and affection, pain and hatred, are channelled in the right courses before he can understand the reason why.
     From: Plato (The Laws [c.348 BCE], 653b)
     A reaction: A precursor of Aristotle's view (Ethics 1104b11). A profound, simple and important insight.
The best way to educate the young is not to rebuke them, but to set a good example [Plato]
     Full Idea: The best way to educate the younger generation (as well as yourself) is not to rebuke them but patently to practise all your life what you preach to others.
     From: Plato (The Laws [c.348 BCE], 729c)
Only a great person can understand the essence of things, and an even greater person can teach it [Plato]
     Full Idea: Only a man of very great natural gifts will be able to understand that everything has a class and absolute essence, and an even more wonderful man can teach this.
     From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 135a)
Compulsory intellectual work never remains in the mind [Plato]
     Full Idea: Compulsory intellectual work never remains in the mind.
     From: Plato (The Republic [c.374 BCE], 536e)
Didactic education is hard work and achieves little [Plato]
     Full Idea: With a lot of effort the admonitory species of education accomplishes little.
     From: Plato (The Sophist [c.359 BCE], 230a)
Intellectual virtue arises from instruction (and takes time), whereas moral virtue result from habit [Aristotle]
     Full Idea: Intellectual virtue owes both its inception and its growth chiefly to instruction, and so needs time and experience; moral goodness, on the other hand, is the result of habit.
     From: Aristotle (Nicomachean Ethics [c.334 BCE], 1103a15)
     A reaction: If one adds to this his idea of practical reason as the intellectual virtue that makes the moral virtues possible, one has a good formula for running a school. The formula: 1) instruction about theory, 2) practical experience, 3) drilling good habits.
Wise men aren't instructed; they instruct [Aristotle]
     Full Idea: The wise man should not be instructed, but should instruct.
     From: Aristotle (Metaphysics [c.324 BCE], 0982a20)
     A reaction: I take this to refer to the duties of a wise man, as well as to his (or her) superior rights.
Men learn partly by habit, and partly by listening [Aristotle]
     Full Idea: Men learn partly by habituation and partly by listening.
     From: Aristotle (Politics [c.332 BCE], 1332b10)
     A reaction: Habit is almost an education of the body rather than of the mind, like a pianist making their fingers learn to play a piece.
One joy of learning is making teaching possible [Seneca]
     Full Idea: Part of my joy in learning is that it puts me in a position to teach.
     From: Seneca the Younger (Letters from a Stoic [c.60], 006)
     A reaction: This doesn't quite distinguish between bad learning and good learning, but I take a commitment to wanting to teach what you know as an essential part of wanting to know.
Both teachers and pupils should aim at one thing - the improvement of the pupil [Seneca]
     Full Idea: A person teaching and a person learning should have the same end in view: the improvement of the latter.
     From: Seneca the Younger (Letters from a Stoic [c.60], 108)
     A reaction: [He cites a philospher called Attalus for this remark] This is worthy to be up in the hall of every educational institution in the world, and especially in the staff rooms.
The best use of talent is to teach other people to live rationally [Spinoza]
     Full Idea: There is nothing by which a person can better show how much skill and talent he possesses than by so educating men that at last they will live under the direct authority of reason.
     From: Baruch de Spinoza (The Ethics [1675], IVApp 09)
     A reaction: Speaking as a retired philosophy teacher, I think this is an excellent idea, but then I would, wouldn't I? What if you turn a nice warm-hearted friendly young person into a chillingly detached heartless reasoner?
Teaching is the best practice of the general virtue that leads us to love everyone [Montesquieu]
     Full Idea: It is when we instruct others that we can best practice that general virtue which teaches us to love everyone.
     From: Baron de Montesquieu (The Spirit of the Laws (rev. 1757) [1748], Preface)
     A reaction: A very nice thought. One tricky issue is that some people dislike, and even resent, being taught. If we all just adored both teaching and learning, we would be in a sort of paradise, but it doesn't seem to happen.
If the pupil really yearns for the truth, they only need a hint [Novalis]
     Full Idea: If a pupil genuinely desires truth is requires only a hint to show him how to find what he is seeking.
     From: Novalis (Logological Fragments I [1798], 02)
     A reaction: The tricky job for the teacher or supervisor is assessing whether the pupil genuinely desires truth, or needs motivating.
One repays a teacher badly if one remains only a pupil [Nietzsche]
     Full Idea: One repays a teacher badly if one remains only a pupil.
     From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Ecce Homo [1889], Fore)
Teachers only gather knowledge for their pupils, and can't be serious about themselves [Nietzsche]
     Full Idea: A teacher is incapable of doing anything of his own for his own good. He always thinks of the good of his pupils, and all new knowledge gladdens him only to the extent that he can teach it. He is a thoroughfare for learning, and has lost seriousness.
     From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Human, All Too Human [1878], 200)
     A reaction: Oh dear. I look in the mirror. Do I only delight in finding all these quotations so that I can stick them in the database and pass them on to someone else? Are they actually impingeing on my life? Could I meet an idea that made me abandon this project?
There is a need for educators who are themselves educated [Nietzsche]
     Full Idea: There is a need for educators who are themselves educated.
     From: Friedrich Nietzsche (Twilight of the Idols [1889], 7.5)
Without a teacher, the concept of 'getting things right or wrong' is meaningless [Davidson]
     Full Idea: Without a 'teacher', nothing would give content to the idea that there is a difference between getting things right and getting them wrong.
     From: Donald Davidson (Davidson on himself [1994], p.234)
     A reaction: Seems right. A group of speculators with no one in the role of 'teacher' would seem to be paralysed with uncertain (except where judgements are very obvious).