Educators Books

This title by the Reverend Thomas E. Dubay, S.M. was originally published by the Bruce Publishing Company of Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1959, and sold for $5.95. This title was pioneering in giving a thorough philosophical analysis of the many questions that arise when one ponders the State's function in education, such as: What exactly IS the function of the state in education? By what "right" do state schools exist? What obligations, if any, does the State have to support private education? Can private education legitimately supervise or exercise other control over state education? What is the relationship between the family as educator and the state as educator? How answer these and related questions?

After a brief statement of the notions of natural law, society, and the State, the author examines at length the major historical positions regarding state participation in education: individualism (especially as elaborated by Mill and Spencer), the various forms of statism ranging from out-and-out Communism to typically ill-defined, but more or less corporatist, attitudes adopted by secularists, and finally what Dubay calls the Catholic position.

Dubay's gradual elaboration of a complete philosophic foundation prepares the way for a detailed discussion of more immediate practical matters: Must the State teach morality? Can the State teach NO morality and thus tacitly canonize amorality? How are tax victims' monies gotten in the name of education to be distributed? Can non-users be taxed to support state schools? Can the State ignore the religious needs of students in state schools? What international obligations does the State have with regard to education?

These and other questions are given good treatment by the author. His penetrating philosophical analysis of the issues is nicely complemented by data on real-life situations. The statistical information pointedly reinforces the discussion. Lastly, this book renders a great service to all who are forced to pay taxes to support state schools and are interested in the moral questions surrrounding this act of taking. Teachers and school administrators will also find this text to be a valuable reference.

This is a quick read but very good information. You can get a lot of information and how to defuse power struggles. Good for experienced teachers and the first year staff.

This series is very good for beginning readers. It starts with one syllable short vowel sound words, and expands in sequential order up through long vowel sounds and eventually multi-syllable words. I've used it to help tutor. I don't give it five stars because it's not perfect, but it's very good.

The name of R. L. Moore appears throughout the mathematical literature, primarily for the Moore method of teaching, secondarily for the achievements of his mathematical progeny and thirdly for his mathematical output. Since his output was considerable, this order says something for the significance of the first two. The Moore method of instruction involved no textbooks, no lectures and no conferring between the students. The naïve person would argue that it is inappropriate to refer to it as a method of teaching. However, it did involve a great deal of instructor involvement, largely directing the students by asking appropriate questions and critiquing student work. As would be expected with any unusual teaching strategy, the students who succeeded praised it and those who didn't generally have a negative opinion. The best way to evaluate it is to examine how well his students did in their profession, and in that area, he has no peer. Three of his students served as president of the American Mathematical Society and three others were vice-president. Five of his students served as president of the Mathematical Association of America, which makes him the equivalent of the founder of a political dynasty.
While Moore was indeed brilliant in his work, he was also very cantankerous. He had strong opinions on many things outside of mathematics, and he did not hesitate to make them known when he felt it necessary. Being a man of the south, he was opposed to many of the liberal trends of the late fifties and sixties, putting his arguments forward in a states rights context. The story of his last years as a professor and how the administration tried to remove him is amazing. There was point/counterpoint, devious manipulation and some of the most obfuscated doubletalk that has ever appeared in an academic setting. Moore was also in the middle of many of the internal political battles that took place at the University of Texas, and some of them had national ramifications.
R. L. Moore was a powerful figure in the American mathematical community of the twentieth century. He is arguably the most powerful that was not imported, and he was involved in research, training high quality mathematicians and fought many political battles against anyone who disagreed with him. This biography is an honest appraisal of the man and the many ways he impacted the mathematical profession.

Published in Journal of Recreational Mathematics, reprinted with permission.

This is a great book for people outside Critical Pedagogy to warm up to Peter Mclaren. Start with this and then jump into his other works.5 star ideas are to be found within this book.Bring your brain cells.You will not skate by with this writer.Read this and see if you think "Education" is evolving, or not! Does throw a tidal wave on "No Child left behind". Relax, you will not have to pass a "STATE" written test afterwards!
God Bless America,Inc.
Peace!

A good follow up to his previous book. Yet again many lessons to be learned from a wise medical educator.

This was the original SAT review book back when the College Board kept its tests a secret. The author apparently asked students who had taken the test to remember words on the test that stood out. The book has 1,000 words formally listed. The questions in the book do not necessarily correspond to the questions the SAT or ACT ask, but they should improve your thinking skills. Unlike the large mass-market SAT review books, this focuses on the vocabulary and does it well. One study showed that learning 200 NEW words from a test-oriented word list would increase your verbal score 50 points; 400 new words, 100 points; and so on. That alone should make it worth considering a focused vocabulary list like this one.

Nietzsche's SCHOPENHAUER AS EDUCATOR is an early work, available in other translations of a set of four works known as UNTIMELY MEDITATIONS or UNFASHIONABLE OBSERVATIONS. The small paperback version that I have with an Introduction by Eliseo Vivas, published by Regnery/Gateway, Inc. in 1965, was actually translated by James W. Hillesheim and Malcolm R. Simpson, with the help of Carl H. Hamburg, Department of Philosophy, Tulane University. The introduction quotes Nietzsche on how ideal education, made possible by someone with Schopenhauer's wisdom, is not merely training or inane indoctrination. "Education is rather liberation, a rooting out of all weeds, rubbish and vermin from around the buds of the plants, a radiation of light and warmth, . . ." (p. xviii). Eliseo Vivas must have looked long and hard to find anything so flowery in the works of Nietzsche, and applying such thoughts to Schopenhauer could "be open to a charge of irresponsibility," (p. vii), as the first sentence of his introduction admits.

There is a Chapter IV in this book, beginning on page 34, which has, in the middle of the chapter, a distinctive quotation from Goethe, of Jarno addressing Wilhelm Meister, which is easy to locate in the other translations which I have. I am interested in the paragraph following the quotation for a clue about the main emotions underlying philosophy.

"Thus, to be quite frank, it is necessary for us to get really angry for once in order for things to improve. And the image of Schopenhauerian man gives us courage for this. The Schopenhauerian man voluntarily takes the pain of truthfulness upon himself, and this suffering serves to kill his individual will to prepare that complete revolution and reversal of his being, the attainment of which is the actual meaning of life. This assertion of the truth appears to other people as a sign of malice, for they look upon the preservation of their imperfections and pretenses as a duty of humanity and think that anyone must be malicious to break up their childish games in this way. They are tempted to call out . . ." (pp. 43-44). A few pages later, still in the same paragraph, "He tortures himself and sees how no one else tortures himself in such a way, how rather the hands of his fellow men are passionately stretched out after the fantastic events on the political stage, or how they themselves strut about in a hundred masks, as youths, men, old men, fathers, citizens, priests, officials and merchants, thinking only of the comedy they are playing and not at all of their selves." (pp. 46-47).

My copy of J. R. Hollingdale's translation of UNTIMELY MEDITATIONS, with an Introduction by J. P. Stern (1983, reprinted 1989) does not have an index, and the Glossary of Names at the end of the book does not include Goethe, though "The man of Goethe" (p. 151) is a major topic in Chapter 4 of SCHOPENHAUER AS EDUCATOR. Goethe, Rousseau, Faust, Mephistopheles, and the Devil are names that fill the paragraph in which Jarno is quoted as telling Wilhelm Meister: "You are vexed and bitter, that is very good; if only you would get really angry for once it would be even better." [In WILHELM MEISTERS LEHRJAHRE (1795-6), Book 8.] (UM p. 152). Hollingdale's translation of the next paragraph begins with:

"Thus, to speak frankly: it is necessary for us to get really angry for once in order that things shall get better. And to encourage us to that we have the Schopenhauerean image of man. The Schopenhauerean man voluntarily takes upon himself the suffering involved in being truthful, and this suffering serves to destroy his own willfulness . . ." (UM, p. 152) The part of that paragraph, "or how they strut about in a hundred masquerades, as youths, men, greybeards, fathers, citizens, priests, officials, merchants, mindful solely of their comedy and not at all of themselves." is on pages 154-155.

UNFASHIONABLE OBSERVATIONS, Translated, with an Afterword, by Richard T. Gray (Stanford University Press, 1995), was published as volume 2 of THE COMPLETE WORKS OF FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE, Edited by Ernst Behler. The paragraph quoted above runs from line 13 on page 203 to line 17 on page 207, which is the end of Chapter 4.

"Thus, to be quite frank, it is necessary for us to get really angry for once in order for things to get better. And the image of Schopenhauer's human being ought to encourage us in this. The Schopenhauerian human being voluntarily takes upon himself the suffering inherent in truthfulness, and this suffering serves to extinguish his individual will and to prepare the way for that complete revolution and reversal in his being whose achievement is the true meaning of life. This outspoken truthfulness appears to other human beings as an outpouring of malice, for they consider the preservation of their insufficiencies and lies to be a duty of humankind, and they believe that anyone who wrecks their games must be malicious. They are tempted to shout out to such a person what Faust said to Mephistopheles: `To the eternally active, healing, creative power you oppose the cold fist of the devil.' And anyone who wanted to live in a Schopenhauerian manner would probably resemble Mephistopheles more than he would Faust--at least to myopic modern eyes, which always sees in negation the mark of evil. But there is a kind of negating and destroying that is nothing other than the outpouring of that powerful longing for sanctification and salvation, and Schopenhauer appeared among us desanctified and truly secularized human beings as the first philosophical teacher of this principle." (UO, p. 203). Later, "or how they themselves strut about in a hundred different disguises, . . . all entirely preoccupied with their common comedy and not with themselves in the least." (UO, p. 206, lines 2-6).

Trevelyan is well worth getting to know. He seemed to know everyone. A great, kind man.

Intended for limited circulation among family and friends, David Waters' autobiographical essays are, nonetheless, well worth reading, even if you've never met the man. For one thing, the short essays give a model of how one might go about writing one's own memoirs. For another, David Waters has been places and done things that are interesting in themselves and, here, well-described.