Educational Theory and Practice in an Aristotelian Perspective

Despite a historical distance, Aristotle's discussion of different forms of knowledge, in particular in the Nicomachean Ethics, offers a novel perspective on the modern understanding of the relationship between educational theory and practice. In the world of education today, it is a convention that theory and practice should enter into a fruitful exchange process with each other. However, a retrospective look at Aristotle's discussion of knowledge and his three categories of knowledge, which concern a theoretical, a productive and a socio-ethical domain, can serve to illuminate that educational theory and practice belong to qualitatively different categories and therefore do not immediately enter into a fruitful relation. A look back will show that scientific propositional knowledge does not have a knowledge monopoly and relevance in all of life's conditions and also that theoretical, general knowledge is not in itself applicable to action. Finally, in tune with more recent learning theories, as for instance situated learning theory based on apprenticeship, Aristotle points out that different forms of knowledge are learnt in different ways.