Five basic educational philosophies: traditional-conservative versus contemporary

Theory · All theories
Evidence · 1 claim (1 mixed) · 1 study (1 associational), q2 · 0 of 1 report an effect size · 1 claim rests on one study

Description

The article frames teachers' educational beliefs with five basic approaches: "perennialism, essentialism, progressivism, existentialist education and reconstructivism". It groups perennialism and essentialism as "traditional-conservative educational philosophies" and the other three as contemporary, tracing perennialism and essentialism to idealism and realism, and reconstructivism and progressivism to pragmatism. It uses this axis to interpret its survey findings on physical education teachers.

Design Implications

Context

Requirements

• The article adopts these five as the basic approaches for the study, citing Sönmez (2008).

Constraints

• The article states that the number of educational philosophy approaches in the literature varies; the five-way scheme is the one this study adopts.

Target Learners

• Teachers and prospective teachers whose beliefs about education are being characterised; here physical education and sports teachers

Target Learning Objectives

• Describing and comparing teachers' philosophical beliefs about the aims, content and methods of education

Claims

• Critical thinking disposition subscales jointly explain about 14% of contemporary educational philosophy preference, with innovation the only significant predictor [~W]

Related Theories

• Essentialism And Perennialism Educational Philosophy
• Existentialism Educational Philosophy
• Pragmatism And Progressivism Educational Philosophy
• Idealism Educational Philosophy
• Realism Educational Philosophy
• Taxonomy of five educational philosophies for adult education
• Taxonomy of educational philosophies: Perennialism, Essentialism, Pragmatism, Reconstructionism, and Existentialism
• Taxonomy of four general philosophies organized by the three basic philosophical questions
• Traditional versus modern philosophies distinguished by who determines ends and means

Examples

-

Key Sources

• Isikgoz, Mustafa Enes. (2020). Analysis on Philosophical Beliefs of Physical Education and Sports Teachers towards Education in Terms of Different Variables. TOJET: The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology, November 2020, Special issue. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED608853

Page metadata

Field	Value
type	theory
title	Five basic educational philosophies: traditional-conservative versus contemporary
description	The article frames teachers' educational beliefs with five basic approaches: "perennialism, essentialism, progressivism, existentialist education and reconstructivism".
status	review
canonical	True
generated	by claude/unspecified on 2026-09-24
trust	unverified — no one has confirmed this page's content
sources	1 — isikgoz-2020

Frontmatter is the page's machine-readable record — see the Schema & Guide.