Relationships between Educational Philosophies and Attitudes toward Learner-Centered Instruction

Abstract

The primary purpose of this study was to determine patterns of relationships between the philosophical views and learner-centered instructional attitudes of teachers in 10 public high schools of a large southeastern urban school system. Two attitudinal scales, the Brief Scale I from Kerlinger's Education Attitude Scale 7 and the Instruction Subscale from the McREL School Practices Survey, were utilized. The sample of 435 teachers indicated their opinions on philosophical views and learner-centered instruction during scheduled faculty meetings. There was considerable heterogeneity in teachers' philosophical attitudes and their degree of acceptance of learner-centeredness within schools. An item analysis of the philosophical and learner-centered scales produced weak positive correlations. The progressive philosophical items correlated more strongly with the learner-centered items than did the traditional philosophical items. Teachers may have expressed traditional philosophical attitudes while espousing learner-centered attitudes because they felt ambivalent about both traditional and progressive views. What appeared to be incongruent may have been an expression of moderation. Or, the demands of the teaching environments were such that teachers' progressive beliefs were swamped in favor of traditional beliefs. Appendices include data from Kerlinger's Education Attitudes Scale 7 and the School Practices Survey. (Contains 66 references.) (Author/ND)