I strongly feel that my purpose as your instructor is to teach you to do
without me. We will provide basic information on the history, literature,
philosophy, religious orientation and political orientation and background
information for most of the author’s we study; in fact, each of you will be
responsible for not only researching and providing this background but also
leading your own seminars (see below) throughout the semester. The reading
assignments and other projects we do in class will be developed and executed in
order to promote your own opinions and analytical skills. You will rarely hear
my opinion about something that we are doing in class. I expect you to learn to
analyze literature and come to you own supportable conclusions about what we are
studying. If you can support your opinion, it’s right.
Our primary objective is to become Critical Thinkers. Just what is a critical
thinker? According to Richard Paul (1990), a critical thinker is someone who is
able to think well and fair mindedly about his or her own beliefs and viewpoints
as well as those which are diametrically opposed. The critical thinker does not
just think about these beliefs and viewpoints, but explores and appreciates
their adequacy, cohesion, and reasonableness. Attitudes and passions are
included. To become a critical thinker is not to be the same person you are now,
but only with better abilities; it is to become a different person. We will do
this through our writing, our discussions, our reading, our seminars and our
private thinking. (Thoms, Karen J. St. Cloud State University, http://www.ucet.ufl.edu/ProgramService/topic3-1.htm,
accessed July 16, 2002)
The general structure of the class will be centered on the Paideia Seminar
(see below), a discussion that uses the techniques of Socrates. Contemporary
Socratic Dialogue has its roots in Socrates' dialogues (as found in Plato's
works) and in the works of the twentieth century German philosopher, Leonard
Nelson. This is a system of learning based on inquiry, questioning, exploration,
and discovery. It is a drawing out of ideas and thoughts that build toward
"self-realized" hypotheses about the world.
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