Mortimer Adler: The Paideia Way of Classical Education (Giants in the History of Education)

It would seem that a primer wouldn’t be necessary for an approach to education that covers three slim volumes. And yet this primer does a superb job, capturing the essence of the Paideia Proposal and situating it in the landscape of Adler’s entire bibliography and the general educational milieu of his time.Adler’s ideas are timeless and priceless. This primer is a very worthy overview and will enhance understanding and appreciation of Adler’s proposals by those who study them assiduously.

And the Paideia model of classical ed. I was looking for something short, sweet, and substantive, and this was it.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I was provided with a free copy of this work in response for an honest review.Dr. Robert Woods has delivered a concise and approachable overview of the educational theory of Mortimer Adler. As a PhD student in a program that is oriented around Adler’s Great Books of the Western World, this book opened my eyes to a broader picture of Adler. After beginning the work with a biographical sketch of Adler and an overview of the context in which he was writing, Woods progresses to describe Adler’s perspective on the nature and purpose of education. Adler emphasizes the fact that education is a great deal more than just the acquisition of information (12). Humans are, by nature, philosophers, and they desire to learn the truth about the world around them (13). In order to pursue truth most effectively, learners needed to acquire the tools of reading, listening, and speaking (16-17). Upon gaining these necessary skills, learners are ready to enter the “great conversation.” Adler sought to canonize that conversation and spearheaded the compilation of the Great Books of the Western World.With this background established, Woods advances to the meat of the book, an examination of The Paideia Proposal, Adler’s 1982 work which proposes an approach similar to classical education yet more driven towards primary texts and more away from the centrality of teachers (30). He outlines what a Paideia teacher, school, headmaster and student will look like. Beyond that, Woods emphasizes how these programs differ from what has become commonplace in American public education. One of the most insightful qualities that this type of education rejects but is present in a majority of schools in America is what Woods calls “the quantity-over-quality idol” (48). Reflecting on my own experience, I did relatively well in school because I was able to memorize things and am able to regurgitate that information on a test with a reasonable degree of accuracy. While that type of skill set afforded me a great deal of success, that Paideia system emphasizes that the development of learning skills as far more important than rote memorization. It allows students to apply those skills in a wide variety of contexts. After this application, the student is able to gain understanding, a truly superior outcome. Coaching and helping students develop their skills comes from the teacher, but, again, the teacher is not central. Teachers help students learn to understand the text. That is the important part of the learning process.Another interesting application of this type of education is that it emphasizes the importance of proper citizenship, and a good citizen is one that is committed to lifelong learning (72). In a country that seems to be falling apart without some type of shared commitment to the common good, is this type of education perhaps a remedy? Woods does not hypothesize on how this applies to the social state of our nation, but that is where my mind went, and I think it is a pertinent question that makes Paideia education attractive. If it can produce students that turn into good citizens, perhaps that outcome in and of itself, even if it did nothing else, is worth serious consideration.Woods concludes his work by suggesting that perhaps there are ways to apply this method of learning to our educational system. Even if it is antithetical to much of what is in place today, might be status quo be worth challenging?In whole, this is a quick read. Woods covers a great deal of territory, and he asks provocative questions that force all of us to reconsider not only our educational system but our own attitude towards lifelong learning.

Classical Academic Press has added another jewel to its collection of books, and Mortimer Adler: The Paideia Way of Classical Education, written by Dr. Robert Woods, is of that quality one expects to find in this delightful series. The book’s greatest feature is that it is both rich and concise. To say Adler’s publishing career was prolific and his contribution to educational reform was immense would be understatements. Yet, in this brilliant primer on Mortimer Adler and his Paideia approach to education, Woods coalesces the salient attributes of the educator and his reform proposals in a way even the most unfamiliar with Adler would benefit.Woods opens with a brief biography of Adler before describing his life-long project as making “a persuasive case for liberal education through reading, studying, and discussing the great books. As pubic philosophers (Adler worked closely with Robert Maynard Hutchins), both were intellectuals committed to a vision of teaching and learning that robustly engages the masterpieces of the past with a democratic impulse to cast a wide net for education for kindergarten through grade twelve and adult learning.”[1] In other words, Adler’s was a noble pursuit of educational reform that was meant to provide “the same quality of schooling for all.”[2]Next, Woods offers an enumeration of the standard of education for which Adler argued, one he called the Paideia approach. Adler’s approach to the classroom essentially consisted of a three-column structure. The first column is formal didactic instruction. In this column, students received a short engaging lecture that would improve the mind “by the acquisition of organized knowledge.”[3] The second column is academic coaching or skill development. In this column, students are taught the basic skills of listening, speaking, observing, reading, writing, estimating, measuring, and calculating. Practically speaking, they observe and imitate the teacher and then receive critical feedback in the “know-how of the skill” they are learning.[4] This is not, however, the stage in which students develop “the deeper abiding understanding of the skill” they are learning. That will come once students can practice the skill successfully. As Woods notes, “Knowing how to do something and understanding what one is doing are very different even though they are of course intricately connected.”[5] Adler calls the third column, The Socratic Seminar. This method of teaching is valuable, according to Adler, because “the interrogative or discussion method of teaching … stimulates the imagination and the intellect by awakening the creative and inquisitive powers. In no other way can children’s understanding of what they know be improved, and their appreciation of cultural objects be enhanced.[6]”Finally, Woods’ own optimism for Adler’s ideas, combined with his clear classic writing style, made the book a joy to read. He not only outlines the big ideas of Adler’s Paideia trilogy with concision and uniformity, Woods’ captures Ader's passion for classical education with his claim that, “If Americans do not read, cannot write, and forget how to converse in a manner informed by truth, then the civitas is lost.”[7]Anyone interested in understanding the importance of the liberal arts tradition or more about Adler’s unique approach to classical education would benefit greatly by reading this book.