Humanism theory

principles of Humanistic Education

There are five basic priniciples of humanistic education:

1) Students should be able to choose what they want to learn. Humanisticteachers believe that
students will be motivated to learn a subject if it'ssomething they need and want to know.

2) The goal of education should be to foster students' desire to learn andteach them how to learn.
Students should be self-motivated in their studies anddesire to learn on their own.

3) Humanistic educators believe that grades are irrelevant and that onlyself-evaluation is
meaningful. Grading encourages students to work for a gradeand not for personal satisfaction. In
addition, humanistic educators areopposed to objective tests because they test a student's ability to
memorize anddo not provide sufficient educational feedback to the teacher and student.

4) Humanistic educators believe that both feelings and knowledge areimportant to the learning
process. Unlike traditional educators, humanistic teachers do not separate the cognitive and
affective domains.

5) Humanistic educators insist that schools need to provide students with anonthreatning
environment so that they will feel secure to learn. Once studentsfeel secure, learning becomes
easier and more meaningful.

Summary:

The five basic principles of humanistic education can be summarized asfollows:

1) Students' learning should be self-directed.

2) Schools should produce students who want and know how to learn.

3) The only form of meaningful evaluation is self-evaluation.

4) Feelings, as well as knowledge, are important in the learning process.

5) Students learn best in a nonthreatening environment.

start with making you teaching more human(istic) the following implications can help:

Allow the student to have a choice in the selection of tasks and activities whenever possible;

Help students learn to set realistic and challenging goals;

Have students participate in group work, especially cooperative learning, in order to develop social
and affective skills;

Teacher act as a facilitator for group discussions when appropriate;

Teacher be a role model for the attitudes, beliefs and habits you wish to foster.

HUMANISM IN EDUCATION
Posted on September 3, 2011 by admin
Dr. V.K.Maheshwari, M.A(Socio, Phil) B.Se. M. Ed, Ph.D
Former Principal, K.L.D.A.V.(P.G) College, Roorkee, India

ccording to Gage and Berliner (1991) some basic principles of the humanistic approach that were
used to develop the objectives are:

Students will learn best what they want and need to know. That is, when they have developed the
skills of analyzing what is important to them and why as well as the skills of directing their behavior
towards those wants and needs, they will learn more easily and quickly.

Knowing how to learn is more important than acquiring a lot of knowledge. In our present society
where knowledge is changing rapidly, this view is shared by many educators, especially those from a
cognitive perspective.

Self-evaluation is the only meaningful evaluation of a student’s work. The emphasis here is on
internal development and self-regulation. While most educators would likely agree that this is
important, they would also advocate a need to develop a student’s ability to meet external
expectations..
Feelings are as important as facts. Much work from the humanistic view seems to validate this point
and is one area where humanistically-oriented educators are making significant contributions to our
knowledge base.

Students learn best in a non-threatening environment. This is one area where humanistic educators
have had an impact on current educational practice. The orientation espoused today is that the
environment should by psychologically and emotionally, as well as physically, non-threatening