Analyzing Ohara Kuniyoshi's Educational Thought

Ohara kuniyoshi, originator of one of Japanese noted colleges called Tamagawa institute, is an educator devoted himself to practicing theory of Zenjin education throughout his life. His educational ideology and practices are the centralized embodiment of democratic education thoughts in Taisyo period and early Showa Period. Meanwhile, they are also outcome of "New School Movement" occurred contemporarily both in European and American countries from world war One to 1920s and 1930s. His theoretical system is wide and profound, touching upon the contents of various fields from politics, economics, to philosophy, etc. Moreover, his educational ideology is abundant and abstruse, combining the essence of western and Chinese culture. Based on the reality of Japanese modern and contemporary education, he has obtained plenty of creative ideas., particularly embodied the modern Japan society's all roundly culture pursue. Although his theoretical foundation is idealistic, which is evidently out-of-dated, the virtues and merits of his thoughts could not be obscured by those defects. Its significance that has undertakes embodied the culture selection and value decision of whole society;Even today, his profoundly illustrated accounts and penetrating opinions are still sparking the rays of rational lights. This dissertation is probed from the following five chapters.Chapter one is an introduction, elaborating on the significance ofchoosing the topic, the generalization of research and on the thoughts of investigation in this paper.Chapter two expounds the form of Ohara Kuniyoshi's educational thoughts. Kyushu, the original place of "Meiji Restoration", is also the birthplace of Ohara, because of which he was constantly influenced by what he sees and hears in childhood. During his study in Kyoto Empire University, he broadly touched upon a large number of western classics, which laid a solid foundation for the generation of his ideas. Critically, he absorbed the ideas of those westerners like Plato, Rousseau, Dewey, and especially paid homage to Pestalozzi. Moreover, Confucius's ideology exerted deep influence on him.The third chapter mainly focuses on his educational ideas, including the theory of founding a nation by education, the theory of education reforms, theory of religious education, theory of art education, theory of teacher, theory of oral education, and theory of mother education. It also delves into and accumulates many creative illustrations.The fourth part discusses the essence of Ohara kuniyoshi, theory of zenjin education, which is the crucial part of Ohara's thought and runs through the whole exposition. He brought in the ideas of western and European education that comprehensive development resists the modern society to one-sided forming personality, and take those thoughts "Harmony is kindness" brought forward by Plato, "developing educationharmoniously", advanced by Pestalozzi and so on as his theory bases. In addition, he regarded that education are composed of six aspects: knowledge, morality, art, religion, body and life, which respectively means truth, kindness, beauty, holiness, health, and wealth. And he compares these six aspects with six petals flowers big cosmos which are in full bloom in autumn, in order to explain the theory person's harmonious and comprehensive development in various aspects. In the article, the modern value system of the theory is ^lso-commented and evaluated.Chapter 5 expatiates on the educational ideas of Ohara kuniyoshi and the educational reform in our country. In terms of the present situation and problems occurred, and seeking facts from reality, this thesis points out school education should be omni directional and center on cultivating students to develop their moral, intellectual, physical, artistic and laboring abilities, and also on fostering students to own ideas, virtue, knowledge and discipline. We should lay stress on quality-oriented education, ethnic education, fully developing the dominant role of teachers, and building up the educational ideology of lifelong study and making great efforts on creating a study-style society.This article systematically combs and elaborates the Ohara's educational thoughts from the multi- fields of vision angle by using methods of literature laws and comparison tests etc. The essence,characteristic and philosophy spirits of the educational thought are thoroughly excavated and simultaneously carried on the critical appraisal. In the end, it combines with our country's present education situations and existed questions, explores inspiration from the Ohara's educational thought. Hope that this article' efforts could deepen and push forward the research and exploration to Ohara kuniyoshi' educational thought.