Wonder and Moral Education

Many authors have claimed a moral and educational significance for wonder. In this article Anders Schinkel assesses these claims in order to address the question whether we do indeed have reason to stimulate the sense of wonder and to provoke experiences of wonder in education with a view to its moral effects or importance. Are there moral effects of wonder — or does wonder have a moral significance — that give us a (further) reason to promote children's sense of wonder and to attempt to elicit the experience of wonder in children? And if so, will any experience of wonder do, from a moral perspective, or do only some experiences of wonder — in specific contexts, or with a specific object — have the desired effect? Schinkel argues that, although there is certainly a case to be made for wonder's moral (educational) importance, it needs to be made cautiously. Wonder coheres more easily with some emotions and attitudes than with others, but in the end its moral significance depends to a large extent on how we interpret or make sense of our wonder and what we wonder at. In moral education, therefore, the value of wonder depends on how it is framed and morally charged.     

The Educational Importance of Deep Wonder

That wonder is educationally important will strike many people as obvious. And in a way it is obvious, because being capable of experiencing wonder implies an openness to (novel) experience and seems naturally allied to intrinsic educational motivation, an eagerness to inquire, a desire to understand, and also to a willingness to suspend judgement and bracket existing—potentially limiting—ways of thinking, seeing, and categorising. Yet wonder is not a single thing, and it is important to distinguish at least two kinds of wonder: active wonder(ing), which entails a drive to explore, to find out, to explain; and deep or contemplative wonder, which is not inherently inquisitive like active wonder and, as a response to mystery, may leave us lost for words. Claims for wonder's importance to education and science often do not distinguish between the two, but whereas for active wonder that importance seems obvious, this is much less so for deep wonder, which by its very nature rather seems to be anti‐educational. Yet in this paper I explore exactly the educational importance of deep wonder. This importance is found to lie, not just in its motivational effects—real though they are—but in making us attend to the world for its own sake, and making us aware of the limits of our understanding.     

Fostering a Sense of Wonder in the Science Classroom

This paper reports on a study undertaken with the primary aim of investigating the role of wonder in the learning process. The study was carried out by a 9th grade science teacher in collaboration with a university professor. The teacher taught two classrooms of 27 and 30 students respectively, by trying to evoke a sense of wonder only in one of them. To this end the teacher identified ideas and phenomena as potential sources of wonder and initiated the instruction through these ideas and phenomena. Observation and especially student optional journals were the main instruments of the research. A quantitative analysis of journal entries made by the students of both classrooms, provided evidence for higher involvement for the students??both males and females??of the classroom where the teacher evoked a sense of wonder. Also an analysis of students?? comments provided evidence that wonder, experienced as astonishment and a shock of awareness can help students change their outlook on natural phenomena. Moreover two paper-and-pencil tests administered at the end of the school year provided additional evidence that wonder had an effect on students?? ability to remember ??wonder-full?? ideas and also an effect on better understanding, of at least, three phenomena. This empirical evidence of better retention and understanding is evidence of the role of wonder as an attention catcher and generally of the role of affective factors in the learning process.     

Accountability report from the USA

An exploration into the phenomenology of existential wonder invites reflection upon life, self and other. Wonder suspends our habitual views of things, revealing them in a ‘new light’, and as a consequence, propels us into, and establishes anew, our relations with the world/other. Moreover, by bringing us to a conceptual ‘stand‐still’ wonder exposes our vulnerability, thereby putting into question the nature of identity. Attentiveness to wonder, and to the many dimensions of experience it reveals in our lives, can cultivate a sensitivity to the emergence of wonder in others, and therefore, has significant implications for the way in which we can be pedagogically oriented towards students.

Rather than see a child's question as something that needs a quick and simple answer, the adult should try to help in his or her natural inclination to live the question. I wonder why the sun is so hot? I wonder how the earth was made? I wonder where I came from? I wonder why the leaves turn colour and fall off trees? Each of these questions is worth pausing for. True wonderment does not ask a thousand questions. I truly wonder when the question I ask is returned to me somehow, or when it lingers and envelopes itself with a stillness, the stillness of wonder,

(van Manen 1986: 40‐41)

     

W(h)ither the sense of wonder of pre-service primary teachers’ when teaching science?: A preliminary study of their personal experiences

This preliminary study seeks to explore whether wonder-based reflections are sources of inspiration for our future teachers of science. What experiences have brought them personally a sense of wonder and when, if at all, do they employ scientific explanations of those events? In all 140 pre-service primary teachers, when questioned, described 240 separate events or occasions in which they had participated or observed that evoked a heightened sense of wonder. Three different types of wonder described all the events cited: physical, personal and metaphysical wonder. Analysis of extended interviews with 15 of the pre-service primary teachers illustrated that such events can transform heuristic responses.     

庄子与伽达默尔:忘己与体道

把庄子"忘己以体道"的思想同伽达默尔"一个人只有失去自身才能发现自身"的思想加以比较.伽达默尔发展了海德格尔的一个观点:与一件艺术作品遭遇,就是接受一次"冲击".运用伽达默尔的思想走近庄子,可以得到一种道家诠释学."冲击"的哲学意蕴何在?柏拉图认为哲学始于惊讶,亚里士多德进而认为,哲学始于惊讶,但"并不终止于惊讶的对立面",即惊讶的消失.庄子与伽达默尔把我们带到了哲学思想的开端.我们发现自己处在哲学的源头处:一种惊讶的状态.在惊讶的状态中,我们陷入未知领域之中,失去了置身于熟悉领域之时的确定感.无论是在庄子的认识论,还是在他的伦理学与美学思想中,忘己都是体道的核心.     

鲍姆嘉滕的惊奇理论

惊奇是对灵魂的突然占有,以致灵魂沉浸在对那种在它看来是罕见的和非凡的对象的观照之中。惊奇是手段,而不是目的。惊奇的表象可以是有诗意的,也可以是没有诗意的。创造惊奇的表象要把熟悉的和生疏的东西混合起来,以使诗意更浓。鲍姆嘉滕的惊奇理论全面、辩证、深刻,且富有独创性。     

Editorial: On behalf of children

Conclusion When you think about it, many of the things we do are expressly designed to maintain a sense of wonder because once it is lost, childhood is lost. I still vividly recall a class discussion with one of my teachers about the existence of Santa Claus when I was 10 years old. By that time, nobody in the class was a believer. Sister Christopher told us that she still believed in Santa until she was 13. When we asked her how she could have been so gullible, she said that just about the time she was beginning to question the myth, her father (she later found out) climbed up on the roof in the middle of the night to make “reindeer tracks” and lines from the runners of the sleigh. Now that was a man who really wanted to keep the wonder alive! If you reflect on all of the people you know and love, I'll wager that most of them are individuals who have managed to keep some sense of awe intact despite its erosion throughout life. Early childhood practitioners are fortunate because we have the best possible role models of wonder to follow. Being in the company of young children whose sense of wonder is at a lifetime high helps to keep us from becoming jaded and disaffected. For if we allow children to show us the way, they can lead us back to wonder.     

Using Nikola Tesla’s Story and His Experiments as Presented in the Film “The Prestige” to Promote Scientific Inquiry: A Report of an Action Research Project

This paper reports on an action research project undertaken with the primary aim of investigating the extent to which situations that evoke a sense of wonder can promote scientific inquiry. Given the intense interest, curiosity, and wonder that some students had begun to develop after seeing the film The Prestige, a science teacher used this film, which showed Tesla’s demonstrations on the wireless transmission of electrical power, as a source of curiosity and wonder. The class that participated in this action research project was an 11^th grade class in a rural area of southern Greece. Through an analysis of students’ journals, observation, informal discussions, and paper-and-pencil tests, it was found that students (a) became involved with Tesla’s life and work, thus developing an interest in current electricity; (b) learned about the skin effect, the biological effects of AC and DC currents; and (c) better understood Ohm’s law in their attempt to find out the degree of damage or injury a certain measure of current can cause. Moreover, some students began to develop scepticism and open-mindedness, in addition to their sense of wonder. The paper also presents a planning framework for teaching the Tesla story.     

“难怪”的词汇化

“难怪”最早出现在元代。在元明时期,“难怪”多带体词宾语,作为动词短语使用。到清代,出现了大量“难怪＋主谓短语”的用法,其中主谓短语表示消极意义。到清代晚期,“难怪”后面的主谓短语可以表示积极意义,这种用法的出现标志着“难怪”词汇化的完成。     

人与存在的契合——对立极和常星儿新作的一种审美惊奇论解读

审美惊奇论是在美学领域中新兴的理论,把它用于实践文本分析是一种新的尝试,也能给人们带来全新的审美感受。在《站在高高楼顶上》和《回望沙原》两篇小说中,读者对作品中的人、事、情、景的"片断的、零碎的"的感受,被一下子"接通为一个整体"了,让读者在作品中"发现"了惊奇。     

试论《西游记》的自然环境描写及其文化意蕴

《西游记》描写自然环境 ,有美境 ,也有恶境。但不管美境或恶境 ,山水风物均为主要描写对象。作者描写山水 ,重在表现山水的壮美 ;描绘鸟兽草木等风物 ,则突出风物的奇美。山水的壮美与风物的奇美相互交融 ,是《西游记》自然环境描写的显著特征。这种自然环境描写的文化意蕴是深厚的 ,它展示了东方文化的宁静与和谐。     

千古绝唱——白鹤梁

白鹤梁题刻是中华民族的一座水底丰碑，一帧山水画轴，具有极高的科学价值、思想价值和艺术价值。它有厚重的化底蕴，不愧为千古绝唱!     

关于圣诞的美丽传说

If you've ever gazed at the beautiful tinsel sparkling on your Christmas Tree and wondered who came up with idea of decorating the tree in this way,wonder no longer.According to German legend,it signifies a Christmas miracle from many years ago.……     

CHILDREN AND YOUTH IN TODAY'S CHURCH

There is an element of wonder, sometimes awe and sometimes curiosity, in children. This element comes to the fore in their relationships with nature, and in an exciting way with Bible stories. Even very young children have a surprising vocabulary. But there was a time when all of these attitudes of surprise and wonder were kept under strict control, as in the days of St. Jerome. And when these children become teen‐agers, some writers believe that the church has let them down badly. In this symposium, we do a quick job of looking at some aspects of children and youth

     

李渔小说“新奇同质”思想在喜剧风格中的体现

李渔小说的尚奇观理论在内涵上包含着三方面的内容：＂非奇不传＂、＂常中求奇＂和＂新奇同质＂。纵观李渔的白话小说集《连城璧》与《十二楼》,可以看出许多作品都呈现出一种强烈的喜剧效果,而这种喜剧效果的形成与李渔小说＂新奇同质＂的思想是密切相关的。本文试从李渔小说所选取的题材、所塑造的人物、设置的情节以及大团圆的结局等方面阐述李渔小说＂新奇同质＂的思想在喜剧风格中的体现。     

The study of butterflies

In this part, we examine some causes of congregations, look at courtship and wonder at migration.     

A Season for Birth

In this column, the editor of the Journal of Perinatal Education reflects on changing seasons and how birth remains a constant wonder. The editor also describes the contents of this issue, which offer a broad range of resources, research, and inspiration for childbirth educators in their efforts to promote normal birth.     

唐代判牍体例文辞研究

唐代判牍采用骈体，采绚烂，是中国古代法制史上判中的一朵奇葩。通过阐述唐代判牍的体例特点，分析其辞风格，指明了其对当今制作判决书的借鉴意义。     

唯美与功利的调和--早期创造社的文学功用观

早期创造社虽然强调艺术的自主性，反对功利主义的创作动机，但其文学观念只是沾染了一层唯美主义色彩，其文学功用观在本质上同样是注重社会功利性的。因此，创造社后来走向革命文学并非一百八十度的大转弯，而是有着内在的根据。