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29"Despite a dramatic rise in average income in the last 40 years, people are no happier. Since the millennium personal well-being has recently shot up the political and educational agendas, with schools in the UK even including "Personal Well-being" as a curriculum topic in its own right.This book takes teachers, student teachers and parents step by step through the many facets of well-being, pausing at each step to look at the educational implications for teachers and parents trying to make our …Read more
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62Education, Work and Well‐beingJournal of Philosophy of Education 31 (2). 1997.The paper explores relationships between work and education. It begins with the meaning of 'work' and critically examines the claim in Richard Norman and Sean Sayers that work is a basic human need. After a section on the place of autonomous and heteronomous work in personal well-being, the paper finishes with comments on education and the future of work.
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11Education, Work and Well-beingJournal of Philosophy of Education 31 (2): 233-247. 1997.The current crisis in the ‘work-society’ has implications for future educational policy. This paper explores some of the philosophical issues of relevance here. It starts with the meaning of ‘work’ and the claim that work should be central to our lives. It then examines the arguments that Richard Norman and Sean Sayers have provided for work as a basic human need, concluding that the case has not been made out. A section on the place of both autonomous and heteronomous work in personal well-bein…Read more
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31Education and nationalityJournal of Philosophy of Education 30 (3). 1996.The paper argues that nationality and national sentiment have been, until fairly recently, neglected topics in liberal, as distinct from conservative, political and educational philosophy. It claims that the promotion of national sentiment as an educational aim is not incompatible with liberalism, and may indeed be desirable for reasons of personal and cultural identity as well as for redistributive reasons. It then explores a remodelled conception of British nationality in particular; and final…Read more
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4Do Howard Gardner's Multiple Intelligences Add up?British Journal of Educational Studies 48 (1): 107-108. 2000.
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12Can education for democratic citizenship rest on socialist foundations?Journal of Philosophy of Education 26 (1). 1992.The paper examines two recent arguments, by Keith Graham and Richard Norman, to the effect that a liberal individualist foundation is insufficient for a socialist conception of democracy and needs to be replaced or supplemented by collectivist notions [I]. It concludes that these arguments are unsound and that a defensible education for democratic citizenship on socialist lines should be based on liberal values, not least that of personal autonomy. At the same time it concedes to collectivism th…Read more
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92Methods in philosophy of education (edited book)Routledge. 2001.This book gives a comprehensive account of methods in philosophy of education, it also examines their application in the 'real world' of education. It will therefore be of interest to philosophers and educators alike.
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59Five Critical Stances Towards Liberal Philosophy of Education in BritainJournal of Philosophy of Education 37 (1): 147-184. 2003.In this paper John White argues that there has been a decline in interest in and support for liberalism in British philosophy of education. He provides examples of work by leading figures in the field that demonstrates scepticism about the key liberal value of autonomy and offers an analysis of new influences in the field that have contributed to this decline. In particular he notes the increase of work from a religious perspective. Doubts are expressed about the practical relevance to education…Read more
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17Accountability and School Inspection: In Defence of Audited Self-ReviewJournal of Philosophy of Education 35 (4): 667-681. 2001.Accountability involves not only schools answering to society, but parents and governments doing the same. In particular, governments should answer for the appropriateness of the educational aims they seek to promote. Making schools accountable to society through examination results is fundamentally flawed. Teachers must be able to account for how the specifics of their job relate to wider educational and social aims. The best approach to holding schools to account through external inspection is…Read more
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45Patriotism without obligationJournal of Philosophy of Education 35 (1). 2001.Should we educate for patriotism? The issue has exercised many political philosophers and philosophers of education over the last few years and produced radical divisions among them. This paper comments on two recent contributions to the debate, by David Stevens and David Archard. While both these essays oppose education for patriotism, the present paper supports it. It argues that David Stevens's essay wrongly assumes that patriotic sentiment must be based on obligations to one's fellow-nationa…Read more
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60The philosopher's contribution to educational researchEducational Philosophy and Theory 1 (2). 1969.
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479Wellbeing and education: Issues of culture and authorityJournal of Philosophy of Education 41 (1). 2007.The idea that education should equip people to lead flourishing lives and help others to do so is now becoming salient in policy-making circles. Philosophy of education can help here by clarifying what flourishing consists in. This essay examines one aspect of this. It rejects the view that well-being goods are derivable from human nature, as in the theories of Howard Gardner and Edmond Holmes. It locates them, rather, as cultural products, but not culturally-relative ones, drawing attention to …Read more
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28The aims of education: Three legacies of the british idealistsJournal of Philosophy of Education 12 (1). 1978.J P White; The Aims of Education: three legacies of the British idealists, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 12, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 5–12, http.
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749Elusive rivalry? Conceptions of the philosophy of educationEthics and Education 5 (2): 135-145. 2010.What is analytical philosophy of education (APE)? And what has been its place in the history of the subject over the last fifty years? In a recent essay in Ethics and Education (Vol 2, No 2 October 2007) on ‘Rival conceptions of the philosophy of education’, Paul Standish described a number of features of APE. Relying on both historical and philosophical argument, the present paper critically assesses these eight points, as well as another five points delineating APE in the Introduction to The B…Read more
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1This booklet is based on an inaugural professorial lecture given by Professor John White at the Institute of Education, University of London.
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72Autonomy, human flourishing and the curriculumJournal of Philosophy of Education 40 (3). 2006.This is a book in the ‘Thinking in Action’ series, which ‘takes philosophy to the public’. The review outlines the argument in the two halves of the book: on educational aims; and on controversial policy issues. In its assessment of the arguments it focuses on the following topics: problems in the relationships between happiness, flourishing, and personal autonomy; the justification of the traditional subject‐centred curriculum; the role of conjecture in the argument for state‐funded faith‐based…Read more
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1Philosophy of EducationIn D. Crook & G. McCulloch (eds.), The Routledge International Encyclopedia of Education, Routledge. 2008.A short encyclopaedia entry on the nature of philosophy of education
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33Teacher Accountability and School AutonomyJournal of Philosophy of Education 10 (1): 58-78. 1976.J P White; Teacher Accountability and School Autonomy, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 10, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 58–78, https://doi.org/10.1111.
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13An Aims-based Curriculum: the significance of human flourishing for schoolsInstitute of Education Press. 2013.An Aims-based Curriculum spells out a ground-breaking alternative to the familiar school curriculum constructed around a number of largely academic subjects. Its starting point is not subjects, but what schools should be for. It argues that aims are not to be seen as high-sounding principles that can be easily ignored: they are the lifeblood of everything a school does. The book begins with general aims to do with equipping each learner to lead a personally fulfilling life, and to help others to…Read more
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614What does it mean to be well-educated?Think (28): 9-16. 2011.A brief account of educational aims, focussing on preparation for a life of autonomous well-being
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EducationIn D. Crook & G. McCulloch (eds.), The Routledge International Encyclopedia of Education, Routledge. 2008.A short encyclopaedia entry on the nature of education
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13Who needs examinations? A story of climbing ladders and dodging snakesInstitute of Education Press. 2014.This short book is an interdisciplinary critique of conventional school examinations for older secondary students. Chapter 1 is about their multiple shortcomings. Chapter 2 asks why they have existed for so long, given that their deficiencies have been well-known for a century and more. It suggests that one factor in the UK has been their value to upper echelons of society as stepping stones to interesting careers; and documents attempts since 1900 to prevent other parts of society from using …Read more
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536Education and a Meaningful LifeOxford Review of Education 35 (4): 423-435. 2009.Everyone will agree that education ought to prepare young people to lead a meaningful life, but there are different ways in which this notion can be understood. A religious interpretation has to be distinguished from the secular one on which this paper focuses. Meaningfulness in this non-religious sense is a necessary condition of a life of well-being, having to do with the nesting of one’s reasons for action within increasingly pervasive structures of activity and attachment. Sometimes a life c…Read more
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2546What schools are for and whyPhilosophy of Education Society of Great Britain IMPACT pamphlet No 14. 2007.In England and Wales we have had a National Curriculum since 1988. How can it have survived so long without aims to guide it? This IMPACT pamphlet argues that curriculum planning should begin not with a boxed set of academic subjects of a familiar sort, but with wider considerations of what schools should be for. We first work out a defensible set of wider aims backed by a well-argued rationale. From these we develop sub-aims constituting an aims-based curriculum. Further detail is provided here…Read more
Areas of Interest
Applied Ethics |
Normative Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |