[Philosophy] Course Review

[Richard O'Donovan]

Hi Clare & Greg & Ian - thought I'd combine response here.  Yes, sorry I forget to say that I'm on the review panel.  I went to the first meeting last Thursday and will go to another next Thursday.  It all feels quite rushed to me as the preliminary report on changes is supposed to be finished by the end of this term from memory - which is why I'm keen to get as many responses/suggestion ASAP.
 
Thanks Greg - I now have another metaphor for philosophy; intellectual tennis - banging arguments from one side of the net back to the other.
 
I think there are also a drastic shortage of secondary sources as part of the course - I think that if we're going to have originals that it would also be useful to have a bit of modern scholarship based on the extracts included too... at least there'd be less of a vacuum for newcomers like Ian - it's no mean task to get Philo up and running from scratch.  
 
I believe that VCAA is keen to keep Philosophy rigorous - the Specialist Maths of Humanities (although you can't do Specialist without doing Maths Methods in Yr 11) - but I'm concerned that we are trying to squeeze in too much; which is ok for schools who can afford to run Philosophy camps and the like, but less realistic for the poorer resourced sites... and I don't think anyone would want to restrict access to something like philosophy based purely on socio-economic background.
 
Richard

 

________________________________

From: philosophy-bounces at edulists.com.au on behalf of Murphy, Clare I
Sent: Wed 22-Feb-06 9:03 AM
To: Year 12 Philosophy Teachers' Mailing List
Subject: RE: [Philosophy] Course Review
Hello Richard,
My name is Clare McKay and I teach @Eltham High School. I am on the mailing list and can now reply. Generally I agree with your recommendations. Are you on the review panel?
Clare
 
From: philosophy-bounces at edulists.com.au on behalf of Greyruin
Sent: Tue 21-Feb-06 11:09 PM
To: Year 12 Philosophy Teachers' Mailing List
Subject: Re: [Philosophy] Course Review
I do agree, Richard. The King is great - but irrelevant, and I have to
confess that the Murdoch just seems murky. Right, let's get back to
practising philosophy, not just memorising stuff. I know, it hurts the kids
who can only memorise, but, then, I've always felt uncomfortable about
tennis. Seems that all that attention to ball skills and being able to belt
the jolly thing back at 250 m per second, or whatever, basically
inconvenienced us skinny intellectual dudes with thin wrists and spaghetti
arms.

The Turing is good - but leave out the objections, right. My kids thought
that was pointless. I'm not sure about dumping Aristotle altogether, though.
We could look at his logic, perhaps. Yes, on Kuhn. Find something more
closely connected with Popper. That's a bit strained at the moment. How long
do we have to make a plea?

Greg

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