In spite of all his trash talking, Peter Ramus presents an interesting Argument in Rhetoric Against Quintilian.  Ramus seems to be quite opposed to Quintilian’s muddling of the definitions of artistic domains.  Specifically, he wants to distinguish the art of rhetoric from the art of dialectics.  The reason he states, “…if the arts were taught with greater conciseness they would certainly be more easily understood, and once the true method for their use was revealed, they would be more easy to practice”(2).  This idea is quite prevalent today in education.  I think of the newfound elevation of the word “engagement” and the art of student engagement in teaching.  An array of theories stemming from brain research, motivation studies, as well as, teaching and learning studies contributes to the definition and practice of engagement.  Yet, school districts across California and beyond have developed and implemented engagement policies and programs in schools as if they can be isolated from other aspects of teaching.  In my school, particular teaching strategies (school wide norms practiced across disciplines) such as random selection, short responses written on white boards, and specific objectives for every lesson (explicitly explained to students) are expected of all teachers.  Our district also adopted a program called “Learning Centered Schools” which promotes teaching practices based on brain theory and learning theory.  In addition, our faculty is reading through the book Quality Questioning by Sattes and Walsh, and we are expected to report our experiences and implementation of the ideas in our department meeting minutes.  For all the good intentions of these programs, teachers in general are quite critical of them.  One reason is these school wide norms don’t always fit with the subject matter being taught.  Another source of frustration seems to be the contradictory messages teachers receive from these programs and the reality of the test-driven, calendar-restricted curriculum mandated by state and federal policies.  Ramus seems to be saying let the math teacher do his thing and the philosophy teacher do her thing and you don’t necessarily have to be schooled in philosophy to be a good math teacher.  Quintilian believes virtue and art are interrelated, so practitioners must be experts in both. 

I personally don’t agree or disagree with Ramus or Quintilian views, but observe the difficulty of defining art, science or virtue.  These issues plague us today in education as we wrestle with how to simplify and practice complex knowledge derived from various disciplines.  I wonder if simplification and conciseness should be our goal as educators, or if we should just admit we don’t know everything and enjoy exploring the complexities of knowledge and life with our students.