ABSTRACT
Education has been pushed to the forefront of social and political agendas in our fast-changing world. In Great Britain the current Labour Government has placed education at the top of its priorities, hoping to shape a society better equipped and prepared for the future. This has been expressed in terms of raising standards for all pupils in schools and establishing systems to support life-long learning. Parents and teachers have a special responsibility to promote learning and attainment. The culture of education has become dominated by the brave new language of high expectations, challenge, targets and effectiveness. Teachers are expected to become more expert in the processes of teaching and learning. We hear evocative phrases like ‘pedagogical wizards’ and ‘alchemists of the mind’ to describe the challenges of finding new and more effective pedagogies. When teachers are being exhorted to adopt new pedagogies which make use of what we know about the brain and learning processes, it is timely to review the relationship between psychology and education. Current debates are about education becoming a more research-based profession supported by evidence-based teaching. This raises longstanding questions about a science of education and psychology’s relationship to education. From its inception as an independent field of study and practice, psychology has been promoted as a foundation science for education. In this context it is useful to reappraise the relationship between education and psychology.
