Pedagogy is a discipline that is responsible for researching and offering intervention options in one of the pillars on which any society is based: education
As much as educational systems may be criticized or questioned, teaching models are factors that have a direct impact on the values that we internalize, the thinking patterns that we prefer to adopt and the way in which we relate. That is why opting for a university degree related to Pedagogy is, on many occasions, the favorite option of a large number of young people (and not so young) who plan to build a professional career in this field.
As is the case in practically all university courses and master’s and postgraduate training modes, before deciding to study Pedagogy, a series of factors must be taken into account in order to be able to decide with the greatest possible knowledge.
These are some of the points to consider.
1. What is Pedagogy?
Pedagogy is the science that studies education to be able to direct it through certain designs and strategies towards the achievement of certain goals. It has a strong philosophical component, since it must explore what the priorities of education are and how it should benefit society, but it also has a scientific-technical component, since through it it investigates what methods and theories can be better understood and intervened more effectively in education.
Learning and teaching have long been considered to go far beyond facilities designed specifically for teachers to teach classes. Education is increasingly understood as a collaborative network in which teachers, the management of educational centers, parents and families in general of the students and, in many cases, psychologists and social workers participate.
3. Pedagogy is an interdisciplinary science
Within Pedagogy many social sciences come together which, together, provide a basis to better study, understand and intervene in education. This means that it has multiple communicating vessels with other disciplines, which allows interests to be directed towards specific areas of other sciences.
4. Pedagogy and Psychopedagogy have differences
Although they have a close relationship, These two disciplines are not the same and contain many differences While Pedagogy studies the phenomenon of teaching and education in general terms and in relation to many other social sciences such as Sociology or Anthropology, Psychopedagogy focuses on the pedagogical area related to psychological theories that explain the development of mental faculties and that use psychological tools for measurement and intervention to improve attention to students.
5. It doesn’t have to be an easy career
In some countries, university degrees linked to education appear to be very easy. However, this depends on political-administrative criteria, of each region and each university, on the one hand, and on the capabilities and interests of each person, on the other. A science or discipline is not easy in itself; it depends on the strengths of each student and the filters that educational entities are willing to put in place to demand a minimum degree of skills and preparation.
A person with training and experience in Pedagogy can be a teacher and instruct students, but it does not necessarily have to be that way You can also focus on the other side of the coin: learning, and understand how it occurs. The next point follows from that.
7. Pedagogue and teacher are not synonyms
Pedagogues can work away from the classrooms and without acting as teachers to the students, working in research teams. They have relative freedom of choice in this regard, since their scope of work is broader than the work that is basically done in a classroom.
8. Pedagogues do not teach children and young people
Traditionally, there has been a tendency to believe that education is something that only concerns young people and their teachers, but this is not the case. Education is a phenomenon that occurs at all ages which is increasingly demonstrated by the need for adults to retrain and educate themselves to continue expanding their skills and training areas.
In some way, this profession highlights the fact that behind the basic work with students there is a large amount of research and intellectual work that must also be valued as an integral and important part of the educational process
That is why what is done in schools, academies and universities is not based on arbitrary criteria or the whims of educators, but rather on methodological principles that seek to establish useful and effective learning techniques.
9. Pedagogues are not psychologists
Although both sciences are in contact and exchange knowledge, there are clear differences between the two Pedagogy focuses on education, while Psychology studies behavior and mental processes in general, being a bridge discipline between biology and neurosciences, on the one hand, and social sciences, on the other.
When it comes down to it, learning is still one of the behaviors that can be studied by psychologists, but pedagogues specialize in this and not in others.
10. Pedagogy is not about knowing how to transmit information to the student
Currently it is considered that education is a process in which students should be active agents in their own training and development of skills. This idea of classes as places where teachers recite and students memorize is considered outdated: Today we try to get students to participate in classes at least as much as the teachers
