Codifying Intuition for the Educator

Purpose:

This project is meant to contribute to progressive reform in education by framing intuition in formal terms. Heretofore, intuition has remained a cursory notion in pedagogical thought because of its enigmatic status. By its formal description, intuition might be incorporated into theory more productively, to the benefit of curriculum design, methods and praxis. In using the quantum mechanical phenomenon of "complementarity" to develop and substantiate the proposed theory of intuition, it is intended to apply the philosophical implications of deep physics to the advancement of education.

Methodology:

Part One challenges the stance that rational structures are the singular standard of knowledge, arguing that this is inhibitive to education. Part Two delineates a formal theory of intuition in terms of part-whole relations and applies this framework to education theory. Part Three reviews the pedagogical literature pertaining to brain hemisphericity; the reciprocity of rational and intuitive thought; and the hierarchical structure of the conceptual domain. Part Four explores educational methods and praxis in light of the proposed theory, and a curricular model is presented. The scholastic areas of emergent literacy and fractions are examined from an intuitive standpoint. Part Five reflects upon the main pedagogical insights generated by this theoretical view.