Polish realistic philosophy of the twentieth century and its educational implications

Abstract

Polish Thomism has developed an original philosophy of education and pedagogy (Stefan Kunowski, Jacek Woroniecki, Feliks Wojciech Bednarski, Mieczysław Gogacz and others), which correspond to particular varieties of this philosophy. In traditional thomism emphasis is placed on education of virtue. In exsistential Thomism philosophers focus on “becoming a man”, to achieve full humanity, and in consistent Thomism philosophers focus on the effect of education and the issues of personal relationships and standards of education. Thomistic Pedagogy is the study of the choices in the principles of education. That’s why M. Gogacz believes that „there is only the philosophical education”. On the basis of recent studies in this field I carried away the impression that classic division designated by Plato's philosophy (idealism) and Aristotle (realism), can also be adopted for the purposes in the classification of education and upbringing theory. Through the analysis on idealistic and realistic anthropology and ethics I have attempted to show that a realistic paideia is still current and should be re-read. Novelty of this work is to "enter" the existing among pedagogues and philosophers standards of education into a specified philosophy of esse and resulting from it philosophy of man and ethics focused on protecting people and the theory of speech of the heart (sermo cordis). In my opinion, this is an innovative approach to the education and philosophy of education, and pedagogical implications arising from the so-understood recognition of man, his cognition and behavior may prove to befruitful on the pedagogical and educational level. All that is required by realism at the level of education are proper arrangements among educational strategies and the determination of who is a man.