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The purpose of this study is to explore a teacher as social practitioner. In order to study this, I focus primarily on the active or performative character of teaching. Teaching is itself a social practice in the sense defined by A. MacIntyre. That is, the teaching involves internal goods and standards of excellence as well as obedience to rule. Therefore the teacher is social practitioner. The teacher as social practitioner has some educational aims constructed by himself or herself and endeavors to sustain them. And the teacher efforts to share the educational aims with others. The teacher as social practitioner has to record teaching activities and make subject matter for himself or herself. The teacher has to cultivate some moral virtues, and to construct a community of teachers.

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the biases and stereotypes on moral subject matter and textbooks in secondary school, and to suggest basic information to the practical educators. In this paper, some misunderstandings relating to moral subject matter is examined and the cultural cognition of character education is analyzed critically. Schooling contributes to the shaping and construction of character education. But it is an unique idea that moral character is constructed by subject matter in school. The essence of character education depends on all the system of educational activities in which students are nurtured, not simply on the specific program called moral education as a subject matter. Life is a process of education, and education is the very process of character education in which it tries to shape a man's character through the process of his life. The students are equipped involuntarily by education and social norms and they are matured voluntarily through his will and effort. In this point of view, we need philosophical perspectives about moral subject matter and character education. Many people maintain that no logical connections can be made between philosophical perspectives and the areas of educational endeavor. Many of us assume that to build moral character through subject matter to be true and obvious without any clear idea of why. Thus, this paper is relevant to scholars and practitioners, particularly those involved in history and cultural foundations of character education.

This study is designed to enhance the effectiveness of moral education by systematically describing how to improve moral education based on the correct understanding of current moral curriculum. Moral philosophy reflects the needs of our society very well. And the practical ways of moral education in schools have been studied in various ways. Actually, the 7th revision of moral curriculum is based on the problems of the effectiveness of moral education, and it is rated high because of diverse efforts to solve the problems of moral education. In this study, some directions of moral education, which are related to formation of character and behaviour, are suggested by describing the difficulties of moral education ― definition, curriculum, contents and instruction of moral education ― in the moral classes: First, moral education can be habituated. Second, not only moral theory but also moral behaviour should be taught together. Third, moral education should be related to our living. Fourth, teacher's qualification should be emphasized. Fifth, effective moral education should be related to all the other classes. In conclusion, moral curriculum should be revised and improved based on our real living.

The purpose of this paper is to present the educational beliefs and principles that must be protected by the teachers, and to justify them. The problems in education in our schools have a variety of causes and reasons; however, it could also be caused by the teachers who might have a poor sense of philosophy of education or do not even have one. Every teacher must have a personal philosophy of education. Teachers can overcome external forces and temptations, provided that they have their personal beliefs on educational aims, curriculum, and teaching methods. If the teachers' personal philosophy of education receives a large number of agreements, its idea can be developed to a public philosophy of education. The researcher examined the opinions of the great scholars which dealt with important problems in the elementary and secondary education, and presented his own opinion as well. Although the researcher's opinion is personal and tentative, it is possible to be thought as a guide to the teachers who get easily affected by the external forces.

This study aims at examining, from the perspective of teacher, the reason of why educational philosophy does not have relevance to current educational situation, and discussing about the reasons of why teachers need philosophy of education, and suggesting a way of how philosophy of education can attain relevance to educational situation. The research points out that a fundamental reason of why philosophy of education disconnected with educational situation is the fact that teachers are alienated from decision making on educational matter which they perform everyday. Every teacher needs his/her own philosophy of education. Because it contributes distinctively for teachers to change educational situation in right direction and to practice their educational works with a holistic understanding of education. This study suggests the idea of “situated philosophy” and “educational philosophy by teachers” to realize a healthy and desirable philosophy of education. It is for reciprocal benefit and growth both of philosophers of education and educators to pursue a relevant philosophy of education. It is almost impossible for teachers to reflect on educational matters with their own educational philosophy, because they are alienated from the process of policy making on their educational problems in the current educational situation. Therefore, it is necessary that philosophers listen to what teachers say about their situation and tries to communicate with teachers on educational matters in order for educational philosophy to regain its audience.

This study chose the concept of ‘environment’ for looking into educational practices including schools, and asked ‘Is school environment in Korea capable of promoting genuinely ‘educational’ activities?’ This study aims to investigate the meaning of ‘humanistic’ and its educational implications, which can be regarded as a pre-step for constructing an appropriate theory of ‘educational’ environment. First of all, this study brought a careful and critical judgment to three kinds of literature on educational environment, which literatures are in serious lack of thought on environment. Therefore, this study proposed a new methodology on educational environment that can be called ‘humanistic’ point of view. In order to justify ‘humanistic’ point of view, this study tried 1) to examine the concept of ‘humanistic’ with its various meanings and related concepts, such as human, anti-human, humanism, humanity, and 2) to inquire into why the concept of ‘humanistic’ is needed in discussing educational environment and into what implications the concept of ‘humanistic’ has. The implications can be expressed as follows : 1) participation and communication, 2) person-centered, and 3) intellectual and moral atmosphere. In conclusion, ‘humanistic' educational environment means, though it's still provisional, a kind of intellectual and moral atmosphere presupposing person-centered ‘participation and communication’.

This study is intended to research coherence between Dewey's Empirical Knowledge and Modern Philosophy. Chapter Ⅱ introduces the meanings and position of postmodernism through comparing vocabularies which are used in explaining postmodernism and modernism respectively. Generally, modern thoughts feature the languages such as Reality, Truth, Representation, Universality, Identity, Logics, Transcendence, Objectivity, Foundation. Modernism is also a way to construct the world of truth or knowledge, and to understand the world from a viewpoint free from medieval theological view with transcendental languages. Their languages are, however, proved to be false because they are mainly used in order to construct metaphysical system which is not related to real human life. To supplement the limit of modern languages, new languages are needed, such as variety, locality, micro-narrative, difference, otherness, practice, experience, solidarity, context, conversation, and so forth appears, which can express more humanistic thoughts including human life and desire. We call it postmodernism. These postmodern vocabularies are closer to humanism than modern languages which are blind to practical human needs. That's why we can call postmodernism as all-attacks against reason which is the basis of modernity and modern languages' birth. The most prominent postmodernists are Foucault, Rorty, Lyotard, and Derrida who use the vocabularies which are related to real human being free from metaphysics. Chapter Ⅲ tries an analysis of the structure of Dewey's experience which is very important in his thoughts. Dewey's thought is called in various names, such as Pragmatism, experimentalism, instrumentalism, naturalism, progressivism, and so on. In my opinion, however, the reason for the various names on his study is due to his empiricism which is contrast to the traditional metaphysics. In my understanding, his experience is shown to be the extension of our whole life. Also it can be described as life-itself, human-nature, and the world-system. It is directly inferred from our lives and determines human nature, and composes the world where we live in. Contrary to still and transcendental reason, his experience is always moving and changing. It has principles of reconstruction, continuity, transaction, and totality, all of which are related to dynamic process of experience. In chapter Ⅳ, clarification is tried on the characteristics of postmodernism and Dewey's empirical knowledge to compare postmodern thinking and Dewey's study. Although we can find a little gap between the major postmodernists and Dewey, humanism, pluralism, and constructivism are shown to be the main features in both postmodernism and Dewey's study in common. In conclusion, Dewey's empirical knowledge seems to be in accordance with postmodern features, such as humanism, pluralism, constructivism. Thus, it can be concluded that Dewey's empirical knowledges are coherent to modern philosophical trends.

This study intended to re-interpret the Confucian ethical education on the basis of the core contents in the tentative plan for seventh revision of moral education curriculum. The core contents of this revision plan include “establishment of identity of ethics”, “emphasis on Korean context”, “moral subjects and relationships”. Based on these core contents, this study examined the Confucian relationship ethics with the scholastic approach. Findings from this study are summarized below. Firstly, the ultimate goal of Confucian ethical education is not cultivation of virtue, but making relationships(human imperatives). This study revealed that the ideology of “making relationships” is the coexistence of “difference” and “oneness” and interpreted this ideology from the perspectives of natural laws and human nature. Furthermore, the relation between making relationships and cultivation of virtue is that the making relationships is the goal of the cultivation of virtue, and the cultivation of virtue is a means of making relationships. Secondly, the content of Confucian ethical education is love and respect for others as a virtue for making relationships, and the methods of implementing it are ‘孝悌’, ‘忠恕’, ‘尊德性’ and ‘道聞學’, and ‘內聖外王論’. This paper re-interpreted these methods from the perspective of communication. Thirdly, as a method of Confucian education of communication ethics, the teacher practiced by the principle of Confucian communication to help learners understand the virtue of communication. As specific content, the educational methods of 人才施敎 and 敎學相長 were introduced. 人才施敎 represents respect for students in that the teacher teaches differently depending on the quality and character of learners. 敎學相長 represents the need for coexistence of teacher and student.

The purpose of this study is to elucidate the ecological meaning of Hyegang Choe Han-gi’s(1803-1877) thought and its application to educational principles. The results can be summarized as follows. At the outset, it should be noted that there are three perspectives on ecology in Korean traditional thought. First, there is the understanding that all the myriad beings and things are fundamentally equal. Second, traditionally people thought reflectively on humanity and civilization from the standpoint of all beings. And third, they would have argued that the natural way and human life are unified. Next, we investigated the ecological worldview in Hyegang’s thought. Although nature(the way of Heaven) and man(the way of man) have an organic relationship, fundamentallythey are separate. Hyegang’s worldview is mechanistic in that man and all things are alike in their matter(gi) and in their function. In this case, man is not the only subject capable of cognition and neither is he a chosen being. All beings possess equivalent responsibility and rights before nature’s dispensation. Finally, from the viewpoint of ecological education, we have understood Hyegang’s thought through the principles of ‘great equality’ (daedong) and ‘communication’(sotong). His ‘great equality’ philosophy is an act of benevolence towards man and all beings. In an era of ecological crises, the educational principle of ‘great equality’ is a more appropriate ideology than holistic or humanitarian education. As for his ‘communication’ theory, it is a matter of the exchange of gi between man and man, man and nature. The educational principle of ‘communication’ restores the relation of equality and peace between the self and the other.

The examination of ‘educational theory’ lies in the centre of the inquiry on what education really does. The nature of educational theory should be minutely scrutinized either if education discipline is to be considered as one discipline which cannot be reduced to any other discipline or if educational theories are to improve the educational practices. The study has tried to tackle two aspects of ‘educational theory’. The one is the educational theory whose main function as an academic activity is to describe and explain the phenomena of education. The other is the educational theory to improve the practices of education. Whereas the former is the ‘explaining theory’ dubbed as E-theory, the latter is the ‘guiding principle’ as G-theory. The arguments for and against the both have been found in the classical debates between D. J. O'Connor and P. H. Hirst. As a result of examination, G-theory is quite adequate for the educational theories, which are composed of practical knowledges. The practicability of educational theory is the most significant feature among others. For this, the Greek notion ‘arete’ and the Zen Buddhist notion ‘correct function’ have been examined so that the nature of educational theory consists in the notions such like ‘practices’ as MacIntyre has asserted and ‘practical knowledge’ in the post-Hirstian theory. Despite its difficulties of non-articulation, however, the educational theory cannot exist beyond the area of languages to be articulated. There is no even guarantee for practicability of educational theories without any aids by articulated languages. The modes of representation, as shown in the theories of J. Piaget and J. S. Bruner, are the quite examples for this case that always requires the articulated codes, languages and the like for grasping the practical theory. In a conclusion, as the paper has demonstrated, the practicability of educational terms and the articulation of practical knowledge are the necessary requirements for the educational theories that actually work in the practices of education.

The Gabe, a highly organized thought of Early childhood education crystallized by Fröbel should be a symbolic textbook for children who don't have ability to decode letters in children of school of tender age and early child age. The thought should offer, completely organized by rule and line, the logic and mathematical cosmic laws. The logic and mathematical cosmic laws is an attribute of God exactly and children have ability to understand it by nature. It should be a standard of authenticity and value of all nature. Therefore, the researcher analyzed the theory pursuant to its manner Fröbel determined that a recognition standard is form of beauty, form of life and recognition as an important recognition mode. It has a special meaning for the educational contents and curriculum that the thought of GABE and animism of children should be about same. When children are in their play, they go into the geometrical form and at same movement, their inward an attribute of God will be definite through interaction between outward(GABE) and 3 kind of forms finally. The process is development of children and the purpose of the childhood education. It's only to discover cosmic order laws and construct Nature newly according to the objective laws of Nature that Children to be human construct. When it consider that a feature of modern infrastructure escape from an attribute of God, they can answer a fundamental question about a concept of creativity for the early childhood education and human nature to be realized by the early childhood education.

This study aims to investigate the tracks going to ruling class in the Japanese imperialism. The findings of this study are as following. First, Japanese colonialism direcily drafted officials by test. Japanese colonialism substituted recommendation for test as official drafting system which selected ‘loyal officials for imperialist Japan’. Japanese colonialism pretended test as a merit system and fair competition. Japanese colonialism legislated the central examination management organization to control test. Second, Japanese imperialism produced many of official reserves through school education. Japanese imperialism forced school entrance examination through test. It functioned as ‘the mechanism of selection’ that classify and filter ‘loyal subjects for imperialist Japan’. Japanese imperialist legislated the employment structure that ‘the hierarchy of public employment paralls to the hierarchy of school education’. Third, Japanese imperialism fostered practical technicians through short training school, which aimed to train special technical competency. After graduating the training schools, they became junior clerks and servant officials of low rank.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the significant meaning of the process between teacher and learner. In Semiology, education is the enlarging process of conveying the meaning in the classroom as a field of sign. In that sense, Semiology is not only present a science of interpretation of text, but also means methodology with respect to the understanding of social and cultural phenomenon. It is the hermeneutics activity to student, which enables them to learn from the teacher and the text. It means students don't just take the meanings itself in direct way, but rather in translating way as their own meaning of the structures. Similarly, we can say that teachers don't convey the meaning directly to students. They instead translate the meanings for students, allowing them to represent their own individual understanding of the structures. It can be said that the teaching and learning process is the relationships of hermeneutic cycle. The meaning of text and the pre-understanding of interpreter constitute the situation of interpretation. So, we can say that the teaching-learning process is of the message interpretation in regards to curriculum knowledge. In Semiotic point of view, educational texts are not just merely the tools for transmitting the information. We can also recognize the educational texts as the dynamic products of the meaningful actions between two educational agents. These kinds of Semiotic views can direct us to the new vision to clarify the educational communication between teachers and students in the classroom.

The current study generalized Hakbong's educational methodology under three categories of the view point of human and educational methodology can be summarized into the following three points. First of all, he has diversity in width embracing moral philosophies including the view point of human, theory of academy, the theory of cultivation, the theory of economy, etc. of Neo-confucianism. At the same time, he recognizes Yang-Ming Philosophy critically and interpreted it in own unique way. In particular, his educational thought focuses on the theory of economy most. From the above points, his unique academic trend is confirmed that is distinguished from other academic traditions within Toigye Academic Community which inclined toward theory of academy and the theory of cultivation of Neo-confucianism. Secondly, he contains creativity of strict positivity and sharp penetration. He emphasized ‘yehak’ even for interpretation of the scriptures, so he is not restricted by the frame of Neo-confucianism. Therefore, the fact that he reviewed from positive interests not being addicted to ideological speculation of Neo-confucianism presents that his educational thoughts do not incline toward normative value consciousness of moral philosophy-Neo-confucianism. Thirdly, he has practical academic trend. He gave priority to human affairs(over the principle of heaven, and put emphasis on practicality for deciding issues brought out from human affairs. He is connected with the realist ideology at the beginning of the 17th century at this point, and his educational thoughts that presents his realist thoughts sprouted from moral science showed distinctive characteristics within academic development of Toigye Academic Community. This aspect can be considered as the clearest expression of his view on the time

The purpose of this thesis is to examine Postmodern theory of Discourse and its meanings in education. Specifically, the examination focused on construct of the theory of Postmodern knowledge and modes of meta-narrative and its implications in epistemology of education. Conclusions are as follows. The Postmodern theory of Discourse is an “open” one constructed in various discourse situations, and it is different from the knowledge based on modernism. Analysing the condition of “postmodern knowledge” in post-industrial society it counted on “language game theory” of Wittgenstein. This approach shows that it intended to nullify all trials that seek fallacious grand narrative by reifing rules which are supposed to function in a certain game, and to judge possibility of various discourse rules with the narrative. Modern scientific knowledge as a meta discourse, narrative knowledge can be characterized as sort of Petits recits(small stories). Narrative knowledge does not mean simply peripheral stories, like legend and tales. its transferring mode, as he said, can be featured as incommensurability among system of each knowledge. t accepts the possibility of various utterances and strengthens patience to tolerate difference. This is to construct a sort of a new ‘move’. Postmodern theory of Discourse permits us to see problems of meta narratives found in the various discourses of education. Also, it encourages us to criticize the practice of education embedded in so-called modernism with the pretensions to totality, and provides us with the base of theory to construct pragmatics we make in every real narrative situations. In this way, Postmodern theory of Discourse has meaningful implications in the practice of education

The purpose of this study is to re-conceptualize integrated curriculum based on Dewey's ‘Progressive organization of subject matter’. Dewey insists that ‘subject matter of educator’ and ‘subject matter of learner’ is related and different method in our schooling. In processing of this change from educator to learner, we found the significance between the subject matter and our life. Progressive organization of subject matter should be treated over analysis of simple dimension, and we must consider another dimension, that is, integrity at the same time. On the other hand, integrated curriculum is used to limited and narrow meaning without considering subject or personality of experience itself which become target of integration. Also, in the view of current Korea's school curriculum, we must pursue the nature of purpose or essence of integration in the study of integration That is, we need to conceptualize developing progressive organization of subject matter and experience according to the meaning of ‘dual integrity’ discussed as basis of reconceptualizing in this study. In these process, we can suggest that the approach to nature and essence of integrated curriculum should involve the understanding of progressive meaning and re-interpreted conception of subject. In the future we should consider the expanded conception of Dewey's ‘Progressive organization of subject matter’ and the nature of curriculum integration in curriculum study.