Defining Education: Exploring Ancient Insights and Modern Perspectives

Question: TEXT: Education The word 'education' has its origins in the Latin word educere, which means 'to bring_ out that_which is within'. It is particularly concerned with eliciting the human values that are latent in every human being and must be drawn Education can be seen as the act or process of imparting or ac;quiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and preparing individuals intellectually for mature life (Schofield, 1999: 2). Education is not a statie..phenomenon, but a dynamic and everchanging process (Dhiman, 2008: 104). In a broad sense, education serves as a form of socialisation. It is the means through which knowledge and learning skills are acquired for the purpose of servicing society and maintaining order (Siyakwazi & Siyakwazi, 1999: 4). . The topic of education has been the subject of great debate and argument for thousands of years. Philosophers and intellectuals have '·expressed strong opinions on education throughout history. In the fourth century sc, Greek philosopher Plato emphasised the importance of a just society in his dialogue 'The Republic' . According to Walker & Soltis (2004: 16), Plato 's vision 'involved using education to produce a balanced, smooth functioning, just society and the individual had his proper place in · serving society 's needs' . In his novel Emile, a treatise on education for freedom, French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau emphasised the worthiness of the individual and the need for freedom in education so that the individual could achieve individuality and personhood (Stewart & McCann, 1967: 28). Writing in the 1890s, American educator and philosopher J_ohn Deweyemphasised the importance of a form of education that would serve as a prime fashioner of individual growth and a progressive democratic society . He maintained that 'education is a fundamental method of social progress and reform' (Dewey, 1897: 93). He . also argued that schools play an important role in the shaping of children's characters , thereby transforming the whole society . According to Dewey (1897), schools provide a relatively controlled environment that can effectively shape the course of a child's development. He acknowledged that 'the school system has always been a function of the prevailing type of organization of social life' (Dewey, 1897: 285). Twentieth-century historian Robert Westbrook (1993: 1) believes that Dewey's ideas were overly ambitious . His view of education is that most schools are not designed to transform societies, but rather to reproduce them. He makes the point that if schools were to become agencies of social reform rather than agencies of social reproduction, they would have to be thoroughly reconstructed. The key argument that emerges from this analysis of education by different authors is that education is a form of learning that is transferred from one person to another, leading to individual growth and intended to serve society 's needs. Question 1 1.1. read the text above and define the concept of education