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Applied Philosophy for Health Professions Education pp 9–21Cite as

Philosophy of Education: Towards a Practical Philosophy of Educational Practice

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Abstract

In this chapter, we deal with philosophy of education. Since ancient Greece, philosophers have dealt with educational themes—we first offer some examples of this. We then describe the rise of pedagogy in the nineteenth century, and the philosophy of education in the twentieth century. Subsequently, we focus on the practical philosophical concept of pedagogy as developed by the French educationalist Philippe Meirieu. In doing so, we express the view that health professions educators can learn lessons from his practical philosophical concept of pedagogy. Finally, we describe the similarities between educational and health professions. Today, educational and health professions are informed by a wide field of scientific disciplines. Sciences describe and explain, but do not describe the meaning of what takes place in educational and health care practices, nor what the ultimate purpose of it is. In this chapter, we defend the position that both educational and health professions need philosophy as a clarifying and ‘meaning-producing’ discipline.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

    Wouter Pols & Joop Berding

Authors
  1. Wouter Pols
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  2. Joop Berding
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Correspondence to Wouter Pols .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Imperial College London, London, UK

    Dr. Megan E. L. Brown

  2. Erasmus University Medical Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands

    Dr. Mario Veen

  3. The University of Manchester, Manchester, UK

    Prof. Gabrielle Maria Finn

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Pols, W., Berding, J. (2022). Philosophy of Education: Towards a Practical Philosophy of Educational Practice. In: Brown, M.E.L., Veen, M., Finn, G.M. (eds) Applied Philosophy for Health Professions Education. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1512-3_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-19-1512-3_2

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