Educational sciences
By Educational Sciences is understood a group of diverse disciplines that study education and educational practices. In this sense, each discipline provides theoretical-methodological perspectives to analyze, understand and explain the complex problems that occur in educational spaces -formal and non-formal-.
With the aim of building relational (or integral) and multidimensional knowledge, that is, from various dimensions of analysis of educational processes, it is necessary to establish dialogues from a collaborative attitude and build links of reciprocity, in pursuit of achieve a deeper understanding of these processes and, thus, develop more appropriate intervention proposals.
Object and classification
If this is a study of past, present and future educational situations. The main factors that must be taken into consideration to analyze and understand educational facts and situations can be classified into two broad categories:
- Factors that depend on general conditions of the educational institution within society.
- Factors that depend on the “local” conditions of the educational institution and that determine their realization.
The pedagogue Gastón Mialaret proposed in his book Introduction to Educational Sciences at the end of the 1970s a classification into three main categories:
- Those who study the general and local conditions of education:
- History of education and pedagogy
- Sociology of Education
- School demography
- Economics of education
- Comparative pedagogy
- Those who study the educational situation and the educational facts:
- The disciplines that study the conditions of the educational act from the angles:
- From physiology
- The Psychology of Sociology Education
- Communication Sciences
- The didactics and the theory of programs
- Sciences of methods and pedagogical techniques
- Evaluation sciences
- The disciplines that study the conditions of the educational act from the angles:
- The reflection and the future:
- The philosophy of education
- Educational planning
Discussions
In the debate between Pedagogy and Educational Sciences, the positions of the French sociologist and pedagogue Emile Durkheim and the American philosopher, educator and pedagogue John Dewey stand out.
For Durkheim, pedagogy is a theory-practice, a way of reflecting on education, these reflections take the form of theories, which are combinations of ideas, whose purpose is to direct action, he considers Pedagogy necessary because it guides, but It cannot be confused with science. That is why he postulates that a Science of Education should be developed, which would try to describe, analyze, interpret and explain events of the past or present, in which he investigates their causes or effects.
The science of education has not yet been elaborated and, while it is not elaborated, knowledge from other social disciplines will be the basis on which pedagogy is based; not in a speculative, scholastic type of knowledge, but in a scientific knowledge, because this technology must have basic scientific knowledge in order to be applied.
From Durkheim's perspective, the study of education can be considered a scientific discipline, the science of education, since it has the three characteristics of science:
- It refers to observable facts
- They are facts that can be categorized, not isolated
- It seeks to know these facts in an unselfish way, and without judging them (neutrality): a methodological rule is to eliminate prejudices
The science of education can study two types of problems: that of the genesis and that of the functioning of educational systems. This contribution from Durkheim is the one that will lay the foundations for the emergence of the sociology of education with Parson, while he conceives education as a social fact, which prepares the younger generations for social life. Education, in these terms, deserves to be studied by Sociology, understanding education as a socialization process, which prepares subjects to become members of the social order.
For his part, for John Dewey, he will deal specifically with the problem of education, focusing his interest on how it should be linked to reality, Philosophy or theory, and not be pure reflection. He raises the possibility of a Science of Education, which must be a pragmatic, positivist and scientific knowledge, for which contributions from Sociology, Psychology and Economics must be taken. Dewey, does not speak of a Science of Education apart from these disciplines, but rather that the Science of Education will be constituted with the contribution of the same.
The way he conceives of Educational Science is quite close to Durkheim's conception of pedagogy, as theory-practice. This idea is reaffirmed if one takes into account that, for Dewey, there is no separation between Science and Philosophy of education. From a Deweyan position and despite its references to an Educational Science, the nomenclature of "Educational Sciences" is acceptable, since Educational Psychology, Educational Sociology, Economics of education, are constituted as such from the respective sciences that they involve and the object of study to which they resort.
Academic traditions
The name and characterization of the disciplinary approach is problematic, given that various sciences claim the ability to understand the object of education. In the morphology of the academic field it is possible to distinguish different denominations Pedagogy, Educational Sciences and Education.
Pedagogy as a science of education
There is little clarity regarding the definition of pedagogy. The German tradition supports the need for a disciplinary unit, presided over by philosophy as a normative source linked to the tradition of idealist and historicist philosophy, conceived the possibility of constituting Pedagogy in educational science. Pedagogy studies the educational phenomenon with the intention of guiding its practical development, above all at a normative level; reflects on educational problems from ideological and philosophical commitments. This definition is close to what is proposed by Salazar (2006, 146p) who points out: "Pedagogy has as its object the raising, study and solution of the educational problem: or it can also be said that pedagogy is a set of norms, laws or principles that they are in charge of regulating the educational process.”
Educational Sciences
The French tradition defends the need to sustain multidisciplinary (or multireferentiality ) with respect to the object of education using the name of Educational Sciences. Starting from the distinction formulated particularly by Durkheim (1858-1917), he differentiated Pedagogy from Educational Sciences in its beginnings. Therefore, we will understand Education Sciences as all the disciplines interested in the scientific study of the different aspects of education in certain societies and cultures. Educational Sciences (“as opposed to pedagogy”) cover the educational problem from multiple objects and methodologies, due in part to the desire to specialize and also to the interest that other disciplines showed in educational issues (sociology of education, psychology of education, economics of education, anthropology of education, educational policy, educational administration, pedagogy, and even didactics as a separate science and at the level of pedagogy), emerging, consequently, multiple approaches, which soon demanded their own space although not a differentiated epistemological foundation.
From Educational Science to Educational Sciences
In the middle of the 20th century, French society experienced deep debates about what would be the field of knowledge of education. Two opposing positions that differ around the singularity or plurality of education. On the one hand, those who support a "science of education" that it came from positivist psychology and that it was limited to the set of techniques necessary for the development of intelligence. On the other hand, those who saw a complexity in the educational fact and educational act, which included a set of institutions, practices, modes and forms of teaching, therefore betting on some "educational sciences".
Educational theory
Characterized by an evolutionary, empiricist and pragmatic perspective, it frames as a science an educational theory deeply related to experimental psychology and functionalist sociology. The Anglo-Saxon tradition unites under the name education the practice and the discipline that studies it, they conceive the need for a theoretical discourse that at the same time a practical commitment.
Based on the French tradition, the conceptual map —on these lines— illustrates some Educational Sciences, although not all; as well as some theories of knowledge.
Areas
Philosophy of education
The philosophy of education is a relatively modern discipline that studies the educational phenomenon and the theories about it from a rational perspective, with the desire to offer a final explanation, about human education and its teaching pedagogy.
Although it is something recent, elements and anticipations of the philosophy of education in the ancient world can be found, in authors such as Plato, Aristotle, St. Augustine and St. Thomas. In the modern world a series of scholars are important that prepare the birth of pedagogy, such as Luis Vives, and new educational theories, such as Rousseau, Herbart, Dewey, Piaget, Maritain and other authors.Sociology of education
Sociology of education is a perspective for the analysis of the educational phenomenon that uses the concepts, methodologies and theories of sociology to understand education in its social dimension. Its central concern is the study of the social context of education. This has given it a strong emphasis on formal education, although there are also important studies on informal education and non-formal education. It has been nurtured by sociologists, pedagogues, psychologists, anthropologists and economists, becoming an interdisciplinary field.
The great concerns of sociology of education do not differ too much from the generic concerns of sociology as social science. In other words, the sociology of education has studied the links between education and social equality, equity, social mobility and other traditional sociology issues such as the links between education and social power. On the other hand, it should be mentioned that there is some discussion about whether the sociology of education is a discipline in itself or whether it is specifically the study of education by the general sociology.The philosophy of education is a meta-discipline of knowledge, insofar as it goes beyond the educational phenomenon itself. The central idea is the rational reflection of education.
Educational psychology
Educational psychology, psychology of education or educational psychology is the branch of psychology that studies the processes of change that arise in the person as a result of their relationship with formal educational institutions or not (schools, family, etc.). Unlike psychopedagogy, which is dedicated to the study of psychological processes involved in human learning and teaching throughout life; it therefore includes the analysis of the ways of learning and teaching, the effectiveness of educational interventions in order to improve the process, the application of psychology for those purposes and the application of the principles of social psychology in those organizations whose purpose is to instruct. Educational psychology studies how students learn, sometimes focusing attention on subgroups such as superdotted children or those who suffer from specific disabilities.
The current that currently receives greater acceptance considers educational psychology as an independent discipline, with its own theories, methods of research, problems and techniques, may be partly understood by its relation to other disciplines and being strongly linked to psychology, being this relationship analogously comparable to that existing between medicine and biology, or engineering and physics.
Although the terms "educational psychology" and "school psychology" are often used as synonyms, theorists and researchers prefer to be identified as synonyms. educational psychologists, while professionals who specifically carry out their work in schools or in school-related tasks are identified as school psychologists.
Its fundamental purpose is to direct its scientific-disciplinary efforts to seek to improve these practices and processes. That is, it seeks to understand on the one hand, in the subjective development processes and the different psychological models of learning, it supports its proposals for intervention in the knowledge it possesses about human development, language, learning, motivation, memory and complex cognitive processes. In the psychology of education there are several alternative paradigms that emerged preponderantly during the 20th century: the conductist, the cognitive, the psychogenetic, the humanists, the sociocultural and the psychoanalyst, and therefore it stands out as a multipadigmatic discipline.
The beginnings of educational psychology are intertwined with scientific psychology because it was beneficial to be applied to the educational sphere and to the professional sense. And even the affection with so much crisis for the COVID pandemic-19.Economics of education
The economy of education is the study of economic issues related to education, including the demand for education, funding and provision of education. Since the first work on the relationship between education and results in the labour market, the field of the education economy has grown rapidly to cover virtually all areas related to education.
The economy of education is probably one of the newest education sciences. While it is always possible to find distant backgrounds, it is only at the end of the 1950s that was constituted as an autonomous discipline, with a solid theoretical support and with the development of many research teams that have multiplied scientific production in that field. The initial theoretical support was the theory of human capital, which accentuates the "investment" aspect of education expenses, which were previously considered rather as private and public consumption.
As a result, two types of work were carried out: on the one hand on the microeconomic level, that is, from the individual's point of view, research was carried out in many countries on the performance rates of the different levels of education. On the other hand, on the macroeconomic plane, the contribution of education to economic growth was sought. In both cases, the checks of the hypotheses emitted have revealed a high level of economic profitability of expenditure on education.
In a second time, the economy of education has questioned certain initial hypotheses, particularly taking into account the contributions of the sociology of education. This, in fact, had shown that individual decisions on education in general were not determined by a cost-benefit rationality: the continuation of studies was due to numerous factors, of which the most important is, according to this approach, the social class to which individuals belong and not their free will as equal individuals who make the optimal choice according to their own views. Always according to this approach, educational systems act in such a way that they "organize" social reproduction, that is, simplify the hereditary transmission of the positions of socio-economic power. Numerous empirical works have confirmed that in fact, the rates of performance of a given level of education differed according to social origin but that individuals from modest classes could, through education, access to age-winning profiles much higher than those who had arrived without education.
The theory of human capital could thus reintegrate into its model the fundamental criticism of the sociological theory of reproduction by replacing it with a sociological theory of "discriminations" not limited to social belonging, but also extended to the ethnic, sexual or other characteristics of individuals. Discrimination is social demands, which are imposed on economic agents, even if they are not legitimate (then the law will make the corresponding correction) and individuals in accordance with the expanded theory of human capital optimize it under pressure.Anthropology of education
The anthropology of education is a field of anthropology and frequently associated with George Spindler's pioneering work. As the name itself indicates, the focus of Education Anthropology is education, although an anthropological approach to education tends to focus on the cultural aspects of education, both formal and informal.
Since education implies the understanding of who we are, it is not surprising that the main opinion of Education Anthropology is that it is a field primarily interested in cultural transmission. The transmission or learning of culture implies the transfer of a sense of identity between generations, sometimes called endoculturation and also the transfer of identity between cultures, sometimes known as aculturation. According to all this, it is not surprising that the Anthropology of Education has increased its focus on ethnic identity and ethnic changes.
The main concern and occupation of anthropology has been to understand from particularity, to learn from sharing the senses with the other, to objective processes of subjectivation, to question the everyday, to ask about the origin of diversity and the sense that humans give to their existence. The anthropology of education has produced a knowledge of the basic characteristics of the processes of acquisition and cultural transmission of which education is a basic process, and of the contexts of socialization and education, of culture. By providing the necessary tools for a better knowledge of the educational reality to which it will face in professional life through the methods of anthropology, the knowledge of the ethnography of the classroom, the relevant parameters of family anthropology and the budgets and problems of multicultural education, then we can say that we try to find that education is equitable for everything not mattering culture. It is more: we try to rescue past cultures to teach them to those of our time and thus not to lose our native cultures.Comparative Education
Comparative education is an academic field of study that examines education through the comparative method in order to contribute to its improvement. It seeks to discover, study and compare the complex that represents the educational process in each people. It is a discipline provided with a dual character: a basic one in the sense of knowing educational phenomena as complex entities that are part of reality; and one applied because through analysis seeks to seek solutions to the problems that afflict global educational systems.
Comparative studies in education have a long historical tradition that dates back to the beginning of the nineteenth century but which until well entered the twentieth century do not acquire their scientific and academic status. An important role in growth and interest in discipline has been played by international organizations both in cooperation and in the field of education. Many of these investigations are now inputs from comparative activities carried out from academic institutions or from governmental and non-governmental institutions. In this regard, comparative education emerges as a very useful discipline in the search for solutions to problems that in some way affect a number of countries globally: the poverty of the South and its impact on the North; the articulation between sustainable development and education; education and multiculturalism; education for peace, are examples of large-scale comparative projects that have taken place in the face of the events of this beginning of the century. Many universities around the world offer various courses and programmes of comparative education and relevant studies are regularly published in specialized journals such as Comparative Education, International Review of Education, Mediterranean Journal of Educational Studies,International Journal of Educational Development, Comparative Education Review and Current Issues in Comparative Education. Comparative education studies and research are supported from several UNESCO-related projects as well as from various ministries of education in various countries.Educational policy
Educational Policy aims at the study and interpretation of political phenomena that emanate from the socio-educational aspect, trying to reveal the educational implications of the ideological orientation of political power. It studies the set of social forces that are in charge of giving direction to the educational system within a historically configured social formation delimited in a certain national society.
Educational Administration
Educational Administration is a theoretical-practical knowledge about the educational organizations constituting the public space and a theoretical-practical knowledge about its government. That is to say, a political knowledge and an ethical practice.
Pedagogy
Pedagogy is a social and interdisciplinary science focused on research and reflection of educational theories in all stages of life, not just in childhood. This science is nourished by knowledge from sociology, history, anthropology, philosophy, psychology and politics. The term "pedagogy" has evolved to refer to a science dedicated to the study of education as a complex and multi-referential phenomenon.
The purpose of the pedagogue is to build theory concerning educational research. Education, for its part, is a permanent and unfinished process throughout life, which seeks the integral formation of the human being; it refers to the action of forming and perfecting, that is, a practical action that is given in all societies.
The object of study in pedagogy is “education”, in a broad sense, and has gained an institutional and legal status from the various international legislations, as the documents of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco) or the Organization of Ibero-American States for Education, Science and Culture (OEI) refer, in turn, to each country’s own (such as general or national laws on education). It is also possible to find the word "formation" as the object of study of pedagogy, being "education" and "formation" vocablos in debate, since they indicate different epistemological terms and positions related to the educational.
Pedagogy, as a science focused on the study of the educational phenomenon, has various areas of work and application such as: curriculum, new technologies applied to education, teaching, educational research, administrative or directive management focused on education, educational orientation, community development among others.Didactics
Resume
The field of the curriculum is an area where not only an object is produced, the curriculum (understood as curricular design), but also a discourse about it is produced: expression of problems, debates and issues that impact practices. In recent years its theoretical importance within educational studies has grown, there is a growing international trend, where the curriculum became one of the privileged ways of referring to education, displacing other languages and traditions.
Curriculum Theory in general, has dealt with, on the one hand, investigating the premises that support the development and promulgation of curricula in general or more specific planning in parallel, and on the other hand, in a historical analysis of the same in relation to national or international cultural policies. The curriculum refers to the entire field of experiences, educational phenomena and practical problems, where teachers exercise their trade and students live their school experience.
Educational Research
Educational research is linked to the birth of Pedagogy as a scientific discipline because it focuses on generating scientific knowledge of educational facts. Being able to observe the behavior of students and from them make inferences becomes a key aspect in the birth of educational research. The use of the scientific method is at the base of the birth of Pedagogy as a discipline, although its Beginnings is done through related disciplines such as medicine and psychology that use the scientific method to study educational issues. García Hoz (1978) states that there are three areas that are beginning to investigate educational issues:
- Doctor-pedagogical, focused on the study of physiological phenomena that are related to educational tasks such as memory and intellectual fatigue.
- Psychological-educational, focused on the scientific study of child development.
- Observation techniques, measurement and psychostatistics, with the development of mental tets (Cattel, 1890), instruction tets (Rice, 1885), intelligence scale (Binet and Simon) and the metric scale of writing (Thorndike, 1890).
Criticism of educational sciences
José Gimeno Sacristán has highlighted that educational sciences today are various small theories without internal coherence, and without their own theoretical scheme (because they have taken things from other sciences). They are inconclusive not only because they are sciences, but also because they are innovators of culture. The educational sciences are configured with three components: explanation, normativity and utopia. On the one hand, they try to explain the object of education through various theories; In addition, they are in charge of configuring a normative technology tending to achieve their own object, and finally, given their expansive nature, they seek to increase the limits of human capacities and of culture (utopia).
Characterization of educational sciences
When affirming about Educational Sciences, an isolated and individualistic conduct is not considered, nor does it establish certain links. All of them affect a specific issue that is education and education, exposing connection and incidence links. Its conception as a circular system that "attends to the necessary interconnection between the different fields, objects and methods capable of providing more appropriate schemes for the explanation of a reality, not fragmented, but interacting" (Pérez Gómez, 1978, 64).
That is why the Sciences of Education have a broad nature constituting this circular regime adapting an education system between the collaboration of the other sciences they propose to us.