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Master of Arts in Education
Educ. 201- Advanced Philosophy of Education
PERENNIALISM
Educational Theory
In the 1930s, Robert Hutchins and other leading perennialist educators were given an
opportunity to practice what they had been preaching. At St. John’s College in Annapolis,
Maryland, they established what they considered to be the “ideal” perennialist liberal arts
curriculum. They intended for it to serve as a model for other colleges and secondary
schools. The Great Books Curriculum at St. John’s consisted of no textbooks at all, but
instead the 100 greatest books of the Western world. The list included The Illiad by Homer,
The Elements by Euclid, Summa Theologica by St. Thomas Aquinas, Principia by Isaac
Newton, Logic by Hegel, Das Capital by Karl Marx (not related to “Groucho”) and
Maxwell’s Electricity and Magnetism. The list of books did not contain any that were written
by contemporary authors. The entire emphasis was upon Western civilized thought. Students
would study about 25 books per year in seminar type classes taught by instructors from
several academic disciplines. The idea behind this curriculum was to give a thorough
saturation in the greatest thinking of the greatest minds. In this manner, the intellect would be
trained. In other words, by studying what St. Thomas Aquinas wrote, one could see how he
thought. In this way, one could develop his own powers of reasoning by emulating his
masters. Perennialists like Hutchins claim that our greatest failure in contemporary American
education is our retreat from pure reason and rigorous intellectual discipline.
Faculty Psychology:
Perennialists hold to a theory of learning that many consider outdated. All modern
educational psychology texts repudiate this theory. It is considered faculty psychology. This
view says that the human mind is divided into distinct functional parts or “faculties.”
According to this theory, the three main faculties are Reason, Memory, and Will. Each
“faculty” has sub-divisions, but these three main faculties represent the central powers of the
intellect. Of these three, perennialists view reason as the dominant human faculty.
Perennialists believe that whatever we do in school should exercise our faculties and thereby
strengthen them. This is analogous to strengthening a muscle by exercising it. Examples of
this kind of “intellectual workout” abound in practice. For example, one strengthens his
faculty of memory by memorizing the multiplication tables or “memory lines” from classical
poetry. In a similar way, a course in logic or plane and solid geometry can help strengthen
the faculty of reason. A very difficult or distasteful course - lets say Greek - can help
strengthen the will (will power). The author once was persuaded to take Latin II by a
perennialist educator even though he protested that he hated Latin I. This educator argued
that if you can make yourself do something well that you are pre-disposed to hate, then one
gains by developing self-discipline and a strengthened willpower.
Seating Arrangements:
Ability Grouping:
Subject Matter:
The perennialist shares the essentialist’s concern about teaching “the basics” in our
schools. However, he wants to emphasize those subjects that are primarily intellectual and
disciplinary in nature. This is so that the chief faculty of our minds – reason - can be
exercised and strengthened. Therefore, the perennialist wants to emphasize such subjects as:
logic; all kinds of mathematics, but particularly geometry; all kinds of foreign languages, but
particularly the classic ones - Latin and Greek; the sciences - particularly the “hard” (sciences
with very predictable natural occurrences) ones such as physics and chemistry; and finally
history. Subjects such as these - if properly taught - are supposed to help us learn how to
think and reason! This is because each of these subjects has a logical “structure” to it. For
example, in some languages verbs always begin the sentence and adjectives come after nouns
that they modify. In a similar way, there is a logical outcome to a chronological sequence of
historical events. Mathematics has certain “properties” such as commutative and associative
which always apply to various mathematical operations such as addition and multiplication.
Thus, by dealing with logical things, a student can learn to think logically in the abstract.
Like the essentialists, perennialists use a lot of teacher telling. In other words, they
like the lecture method. However, it is not their favorite method. Perennialists frequently use
catechism. This is simply a refined version of the recitation method where the student
“lectures back” to the teacher. All of the questions relevant to the subject matter are ordered
and organized in a published list. Each question has one and only one correct answer. The
student commits both the question and the answer to memory. After this, there is a
catechetical recitation, which is basically a testing device to see if a student has memorized
his lesson. Although this method is used mainly in parochial schools (Ecclesiastical Neo-
Thomism), you can find evidence of its application to some extent in nearly every school.
For example, what else is memorizing the multiplication tables for the digits 0-9? The
student deals with certain ordered questions (e.g., what is 9 times 6; what is 9 times 7, what is
9 times 8?), which have only one correct answer. He memorizes both the questions and the
right answers for quick recall.
Perennialists also use a lot of drill as a teaching method. The assumption behind this
method is that we develop the mind just like the body - through exercise. Thus, we can
strengthen the mind by giving it “mental calisthenics,” according to perennialists. An
example of this is putting math problems on the board and having students work 2 or 3 every
day at the start of the period to develop their “thinking muscles.” This method is used a great
deal in plane geometry.
Perennialists generally don’t use demonstrations and they tend to think that the pupil
project method is a complete waste of time.
As far as teaching materials are concerned, perennialists, like the essentialists, use
books a great deal. About the only other kind of teaching material they use a great deal is the
chalkboard.
Discipline:
The perennialist view on discipline is the same as that of the essentialist. They both
seek to impose a system of control on the student and back it up with an assortment of
punishers. They say that they must do this in order to facilitate learning.
With the regard to testing and evaluation, perennialists tend to use both essay and
objective written examinations to see if their students’ minds have been disciplined to clear
thinking. In addition, perennialists do oral quizzing as, for example, when they listen to a
student recite a catechism.
Sometimes on their quizzes, perennialists like to use complicated word problems.
These problems combine mathematical skill and verbal reasoning. For example, the
following is a standard test question for 5th graders in Switzerland, where the educational
system is heavily influenced by perennialist ideology. See if you can solve it.
“A stock of pamphlets is in three piles. The first pile contains 1/6 of them, the second
pile contains several fifths of them; the third pile has 6 pamphlets. What is the total
number of pamphlets in the three piles combined?”*
*[“Some Lessons from Swiss Education,” by Harold Clapp, in Modern Age, II., No.1,
(winter, 1957-58), 10-17.]
As far as grading is concerned, perennialists and essentialists are alike in their
philosophical view. They both want to “maintain standards” and they will measure a
student’s performance against standards imposed by the teacher. Both perennialists and
essentialists are only concerned with grading and evaluating intellectual tasks. They have no
interest in making personality and trait assessments. They don’t evaluate a student’s social
and emotional development or his physical conditioning. These kinds of assessments are
beyond the role of the school.
References: