Custom essays on Classical Education and Its Benefits to Students

Talking about the way of learning students (or the education as a whole) people should be careful and accurate, especially when choosing the methods and aims. The level of education in the country is too important factor of success not to pay to it attention. Therefore, I believe government should take in account the type of education in the country in order to make country’s general level higher. According to the one source, classical education rests on the concept of the trivium – grammar, logic and rhetoric – not as subjects, although these subjects are studied, but as the structure of every subject and discipline:
• Grammar is the foundation of a subject;
• Logic is the organization of these parts into a whole and an understanding of the relationships among the parts;
• Rhetoric is the ability to apply the foundational knowledge and logical understanding of a subject purposefully and creatively to solve a problem, express an opinion with clarity or create something new
Strictly talking, contemporary schools do not study the classical-medieval studies’ organisation (it is known as trivium). Definitely, even in the ancient times people knew that every age of a student should filled with different information (different levels of it) according to the age. The youngest people must start with the beginning – the grammar that is a basis of future education. It includes learning to write, to read, to use the words’ parts. Students learn grammar of their language (the language they are talking on), word usage and spelling.

The trivium part of learning contains learning about the history events, people, places, and number sense, then music, singing and playing different musical instruments, at last, listening different music genres. Planets, galaxy, physical universe are usually learned in this part of education. Memory is a thing that is relied by this education. Next is the “logic” stage of education. A student becomes an adolescent that gained information about grammar and next he must argument it. Thus, this stage is also called “argumentative”. On this stage student gain new information about different disciplines, as he did on the previous stage, but in the contrast to it, student (having the intellectual capacity) calls those facts into various questions. Students learn how to wrestle facts they have gained with the questions, to analyze and argument facts.
The last stage is needed to be considered by high schools. It is the last part of trivium – the “rhetorical” part. According to Moore, having the facts at their disposal and being able to wrestle with them, students will now be able to express themselves with increasing grace and at considerable length, both in speech and in writing. They will learn to make coherent literary, historical, mathematical, and scientific arguments. They are ready to tackle difficult readings and problems (Moore, “The Classical Trivium Remains the Best Course of Learning”, 2003, pg 1).  It is obvious that in our country people wait that college can challenge students, numbing students’ minds with worksheets.
Rasmussen stated the quadrivium was the basis of advanced education: Arithmetic taught the science of number; Geometry, of form; Music, of sound (and of “harmony” in the most general sense of the word – “number in motion”, as it was often put); Astronomy, of time (of “form in motion”). Moreover, from the very beginning, whether openly acknowledged or carefully alluded to, each of the Quadrivial sciences was accompanied by its complementary metaphysical art (1996, pg 1). However, this way is not total classical one, because it is rather a 12th-13th centuries’ development, definitely including classical elements. I believe students need to have an education according to the classical system. Otherwise, how can we make them ready to face with the injustice and real world, to make them ready for decision – making and solving problems, reaching their aims?
Public schools will only have benefits from the classical system of education. Hinrichs has stated that the study of the great books has been the backbone of good education for centuries. These books were required of most pupils until the rise of Dewey and the democratization of education through the public school system. The public school system saw these books as elitist, not easily comprehensible by the masses, and therefore not appropriate for public education (pg 1). In the conclusion, I must admit that the benefits, which classical education brings to students, are important and significant in our life. Otherwise, will young people learn how to deal with world and life?
Constructivism is needed factor in students’ education. First, student independence or autonomy and initiative must be accepted and encouraged in the classroom through his or her classmates and teachers. As a philosophy of learning, constructivism can be traced at least to the eighteenth century and the work of the Neapolitan philosopher Giambattista Vico, who held that humans could only clearly understand what they have themselves constructed. Students’ ideas and thoughts should be respected and encouraged in order to help them attain their own intellectual identity. To start solving problems and being responsible for own thoughts and actions, student should be confident that his or her issues and ideas are listened to. Therefore, that student can answer the question correctly. Constructivism is a theory – based on observation and scientific study – about how people learn. However, it says that people construct their own understanding and knowledge of the world, through experiencing things and reflecting on those experiences. When we encounter something new, we have to reconcile it with our previous ideas and experience, maybe changing what we believe, or maybe discarding the new information as irrelevant. In the classroom, the constructivist view of learning can point towards a number of different teaching practices. It usually means encouraging students to use active techniques (experiments, real-world problem solving) to create more knowledge and then to reflect on and talk about what they are doing and how their understanding is changing. The teacher makes sure she understands the students’ preexisting conceptions, and guides the activity to address them and then build on them.