The Research On Jean Jacques Rousseau's Liberal Education Thought

Jean Jacques Rousseau(1712-1778),a famous French enlightenment thinker,writer and educator in the 18th century,has made outstanding contributions in many fields of society.Starting from the relationship between politics and education,this paper takes Rousseau's philosophy of liberal education as research object,and systematically discusses the connotation and main content of liberal education.The goal of Rousseau's liberal education is to realize true freedom of citizens.To achieve this goal,children must be educated at birth.With regard to the connotation of free education,Rousseau elaborated the three forms of the concept of freedom and the relationship between political freedom and educational freedom based on sensualism and empiricism,philosophy of natural law and natural humanism against the backdrop of the dark social background.On top of that,he proposed that free education,regarding freedom as starting point as well as destination,began with natural education and ended in cultivating citizens.With regard to the content of liberal education,Rousseau advocates that students should receive natural education,moral education and political education.In terms of natural education,kids should preserve their natural qualities in their childhood,do senses and physical training and receive labor and knowledge education.From the perspective of moral education,teenagers should undergo friendship and romance,learn history and fable,and cultivate strong will to gain moral quality.From the angle of political education,freemen could acquire political ideas by travelling,and convert into free citizens through constructing ideal political community at general will.Patriotic education should be attached importance to maintain contract and general will,and civil religion should be established to safeguard moral freedom of free citizens.Rousseau's philosophy of liberal education took freedom as starting point and destination.By means of natural education,moral education and political education,citizens could therefore achieve real freedom through combining moral freedom as an individual and as a citizen.Rousseau's philosophy of liberal education not only exerted profound influence on the feudal education system in Europe at the time,but also greatly affected the thoughts of later educationalists as well as education practice in Europe and America and China.