Jean Jaques Rousseau Case

Jean-Jacques Rousseau

"Jean-Jacques Rousseau was one of the most important philosophers of the French enlightenment."(European Graduate School, 2012). According to Gambrell in Learning from the Past, (2007), Jean-Jacques was born in Geneva, Switzerland in 1712. When he was only nine days old his mother Suzanne Bernard died, so he and his brother Francois were raised by their father Isaac Bernard (Wolfe, 2002, p. 35). When he was growing up he had a great interest in reading, and was able to read by the age six. "He remembered reading at his father's knee the novels that had belonged to his mother and the impact that early reading had on his love of books and reading." (Wolfe, 2002, p. 35). In addition, His father, who was a fiddle player, and his aunt, a theorbo player and singer, were the reason for Rousseau's love of music (Wolfe, 2002, p. 35). By the age of ten, Rousseau's father fled after a quarrel and became an exile, his brother also ran away, and being alone, he was sent to live with relatives of his mother in France. (Wolfe, 2002, p. 36). Also, Rousseau had a few jobs that failed and after leaving his one job as an engraver, he lived the life of a beggar where he then tried out many different jobs such as a secretary, tutor, and music teacher (Wolfe, 2002, p.36). "Jean-Jacques Rousseau eventually moved to Paris, in 1742. There he met Denis Diderot and served as a contributor for his Encyclopédie, a radical magazine at the time." (European Graduate School, 2012). Additionally, EGS (2012) stated he started composing operas, and was rejected but continued to compose, and eventually composed operas that made him famous. At the age of 33, Rousseau met a 24 year old woman and waitress, Therese Levasseur, whom he had 5 children with. This relationship was unstable, however it lasted 35 years. (Wolfe, 2002, p. 36). Also, Wolfe (2002) mentioned that all of their children were given to a home, because they lacked good parenting skills. When Rousseau turned 37, in 1749, he wrote an essay that addressed the question "Has the progress of science and the arts tended to the purification or the corruption of morals?" he won the prize, and it made him instantly famous (Wolfe, 2002, p. 36). "He argued that human beings had been corrupted by society and progress, creating "wants" that tied people down." (Wolfe, 2002, p. 37). After this essay he started to live a simple life, and people listened to what he had to say. Also, he continued to write and published his famous novel in 1762 called Emile, which expressed how he felt about child rearing and education (Wolfe, 2002, p. 38). Additionally, Wolfe (2002), stated that Rousseau developed the Social Contract. (p. 38). "Given their radical and innovative nature, both the Contract and Emile caused major scandals and were burned in public. As a result, Jean-Jacques Rousseau had to flee" (European Graduate School, 2012). When he fled to England in 1766, he started to write his autobiography Confessions, and a year later returned to France and changed his name to Renou. As the years went by he became ill, depressed, paranoid, and was extremely poor. Rousseau then and died in 1778 in Ermonville France, and never knew the impact he had on education. (Wolfe, 2002, p. 38-39).

According to Wolfe (2002), Rousseau's philosophies were all within in his novel Emile and were based on how education is effected by nature, and how children are born with knowledge and it just needs to be drawn out. This is known as the natural child. This view is different than any other view at this time, and childhood was not even seen as a stage of development. (p. 39). I agree with Rousseau, that children have that knowledge, and we just need to bring it out of them. Knowing this about children, as a future educator, I can use this to my advantage. As educators, we need to provide our students with a good learning environment. According to Wolfe (2002),

"Rousseau saw the child as the centre of the educative process. The child's potential was unrealized, and the child needed education to foster growth and learning. Education would therefore be the environment that would allow the child to reach his potential, developing his talents and supporting his individual nature."

Rousseau put much emphasis on the importance of childhood, and wanted people to see his point of view. Also, Rousseau made it clear that a child needs to be a child before they are forced to be anything else, that childhood must be lived, and that the was the center. (Wolfe, 2002, p.40).

Rousseau suggested different stages in which children would pass through during their lives. In his book Emile, he mentioned five stages that all have distinct characteristics and patterns (Wolfe, 2002, p. 41). "His views may not fit our current theoretical conceptions, but his focus was on knowing that there were stages." (Wolfe, 2002, p.41). Even if his stages aren't exactly right, it is helpful to know children go through stages. Since