Historical change of educational metaphors and its relation to politics

Straipsnyje aprašomos trys metaforiškai įvardijamos ugdymo sampratos: antikinė ugdytojo kaip skulptoriaus, naujųjų amžių ugdytojo kaip sodininko ir mūsų laikais besiformuojanti ugdytojo kaip vedlio. Visos ugdymo sampratos pateikia konkretų atsakymą į ugdymo problemą, kuri kyla iš žmogaus apspręstumo būti neapspręstam, todėl nuo ugdytojo priklauso žmogaus formavimas. Ugdytojas kaip skulptorius šią problemą sprendžia priverstinai primesdamas ugdytiniams iš anksto suformuotą ugdymo sampratą. Ugdytojas kaip sodininkas priima kiekvieną mokinį ir jį arba ją ugdo atsižvelgdamas į individualius gabumus. Ugdytojas kaip vedlys suderina skulptoriaus ir sodininko ugdymo būdus: kaip skulptorius turi ugdymo vyksmo viziją, o kaip sodininkas stengiasi, kad kiekvienas mokinys šį kelią nueitų pats. Ugdytojo kaip skulptoriaus ugdymo samprata yra socialistinė, o ugdytojo kaip sodininko - liberali. Ugdytojas kaip vedlys atitinka mūsų laikais besiformuojančią politikos sampratą, kurios uždavinys - suderinti socializmą su liberalizmu.The article attempts to classify the change in the conceptions of education in the Western culture from antiquity to the present day. This is done through the metaphors of the sculptor, the gardener and the guide. The first section of the article, "The Problem of Education", states that each conception of education provides a finite and limited answer to an educational problem while this problem is universal. It consists of the recognition that a human is biologically determined to be undetermined, therefore, what a growing person will become depends on how he or she will be formed by the educators. Therefore, education is not a natural but a cultural completion of the human. In ancient Greece, education παιδεία (paideia) was considered to be one of the main tasks of schools of philosophy and was therefore a discipline of philosophy. Plato formulates the problem of education in the dialogue Republic. In this work, Plato raises a question of what a just state is, and discovers that a just state cannot be created without a proper education of young people. Therefore, another question arises from the question about a just society: "What is the right education for young people?" Plato writes: "Education (paideia) is the art of rotating that tool (namely, the human sight from the opinion to the truth - A.D.) and by tracing how it can be rotated most easily and effectively - not to give the vision, because he or she already has it, but to figure out how to turn it correctly, after it has been turned wrong, and not looking where it should" (Plato, Republic: 518 d). Thus, the human nature, according to Plato, is this: at first a false vision of things is given, and later a person is taught through education to move from the opinion to the truth. The metaphors of the sculptor, gardener, and guide describe a concrete and finite way of human education. The section "Educator as a sculptor" states that, in antiquity, the sculptor method of education prevailed. The human education was understood as a modelling of an adult sculpture. In antiquity, the condition of a child had no independent value, it had to be overcome by modelling an adult sculpture. Here, the child was understood as a future adult who must overcome a child’s condition as quickly as possible by modelling his or her sculpture as an adult. In the case of a sculptor, we start with the universalities of thinking. They are forcibly imposed on the realm of individualities by formation of this sphere. The educator in the process of education often finds himself or herself in a situation where he or she stands in front of a student as a sculptor in front of a piece of marble or clay, having a lesson plan or a more general educational project as a sculptor in his or her mind, and attempting to introduce this knowledge to the pupils to assimilate. Thus, the educator, as a sculptor, has conceived an educational project that specifies how the youth should be educated, and monologically, deductively, without taking into account the individual needs of the learners, introducing them to the educational situation. The section "Educator as a gardener" states that in the case of a gardener, it starts with an insight and in listening to the differences, which in turn form the communality of thinking. The educator in the course of education often finds himself or herself in a situation where he or she cares for a particular learner, developing his or her talents and abilities and compensating for shortcomings. Like a gardener takes care of a specific tree in his or her garden, starting not so much with a general educational model or a project for all learners without exception, but rather with individual educational needs arising from that particular educated individual and his or her uniqueness. With the Christianity, the attitude unprecedented in the Greek culture appeared in the West that only those who are children in their spirit would inherit the otherworld. However, Christianity was still subordinated to the conception of original sin, and it was believed that even a child is born corrupted by sin. Therefore, it was only in the new centuries with the conception of Rousseau's return to nature that a child's condition was inherently privileged and superior in its own way to that of an adult, because the child is born innocent, undamaged and not corrupted by human customs and culture. As a result, for a modern man, a child and a childhood stage in general embody a certain ideal of being. The section "Educator as a guide" states that if an educator wants to perform quality educational work, he or she cannot be merely a sculptor or merely a gardener because these are the two extremes of the educational process. The future educator should be a guide who would harmonise the educational method of the sculptor and the gardener in the course of education. According to the etymology of the Latin word educate - educere, which is a shorter form of the phrase ex ducere, meaning to lead to some new region, the educator is a guide. The purpose of education is to pull a learner out of the field of ignorance to the field of knowledge. The educator as a guide takes the learner from the region of ignorance and guides him or her to the region of knowledge. Therefore, a philosophically understood method of the guide as an educator is to lead the educator to the being. Education is leading young people from the opinion to the truth