Exposure and Expertise: Philosophy for Teacher Education

Abstract

What can educational philosophy contribute to teacher education? Answering this question, Chris Higgins presents a solid critique of Donald Schön’s reflective practice. Higgins demonstrates that reflection for Schön is a form of Aristotelian techne that is wholly unsuitable for teaching. What teaching requires, Higgins maintains, is better captured by Aristotle’s notion of practical wisdom (phronesis). Not only must teachers flexibly adjust means and ends. Teachers must also conceptualize and act on appropriate goals and adjudicate between worthwhile ends when they conflict. This is difficult, because practical situations always confront us with problems that are unfamiliar, different, or new. Thus to make wise decisions with respect to educational purposes, teachers must recognize that situations may not conform to their expectations. Failing to see what is different or new in a situation, teachers do not simply lack artistry or skill. More perniciously, they succumb to repetition: a form of moral blindness in which one perpetuates what one already knows at the expense of recognizing and learning from the “other.”