J.J. ROUSSEAU'S PERSPECTIVE ON “NATURAL EDUCATION” FOR CHILDREN UNDER 12 YEARS OF AGE

Abstract

J.J. Rousseau proposes two paths of education as defensive education and active education.In the period that the children are under 12 years old, the knowledge and experience that children achieve is not from the strict learning process at school but from activities of their own experience. The teacher plays the role of arranging the children into a free environment for the child to develop naturally. Learning to be a human is a lifetime process, that is, learning about human fate, when the defensive phase is completed, the child will actively enter civil society as himself, not as the others. The educational purpose of J.J. Rousseau is towards the child's natural development, let the child be themselves, not the image of another. The knowledge and the life experience must be drawn from the child's own experience, not from books or dogma; so that the child understands the value of themselves and the value of life. Given the current state of Vietnamese education for children under the age of 12, the views of natural education will have implications for educators, the school and families.