Is Failure the Best Option? An Untimely Reflection on Teaching
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.1825-8670/16396Keywords:
Teaching, Teacher demoralization, Gert Biesta, Thing-centred education, Existential view of educationAbstract
After outlining the renascent interest in teaching within contemporary educational theory, the present paper engages with a reflection on teaching beyond the predominant learnification and the related emphasis on efficacy as a primary value. In this endeavour, the theme of teachers’ demoralization is introduced in a philosophical-educational key, by deploying an existential perspective. Within this horizon, a special focus is on failure construed as intimately linked with the ‘essence’ of education qua an encounter of free beings and as a possibility inherent to the dignity of teaching. In conclusion, some implications of this recognition of the ‘significance’ of failure are indicated in regard to teacher education.
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