1. Socrates 469-369 BC (Dialectical Method): Introduced dialogic method in teaching.
2. Plato 428-348 BC (Idealism): Founder of Idealism. Education is the key to create a new world. Education should be holistic.
3. Aristotle 384-322 BC (Realism) Logic is the essential tool for all enquiries.
4. Thomas Aquinas 1227-1274 (Theism) :Incorporated Greek ideas of education in to Christianity.
5. John Locke 1630-1704 (Liberalism): human mind is a sort of blank slate on which experience writes
6. Jean Jacques Rousseau 1712-1778 (Naturalism): all children are perfectly designed organisms, ready to learn from their surroundings so as to grow into virtuous adults. He advocates an education method which keeps the child away from society.
7. Edmund Burke 1729-1797 (Conservatism): Education is agency to transmit the cultural tradition to the young and preserve it through generations.
8. Johann Friedrich Herbart 1776-1841 : Believed that educational methods and systems should be based on psychology and ethics
9. John Dewey 1859-1952 (Pragmatism) :Education should be democratic. the only true education comes through the stimulation of the child's powers by the demands of the social situations in which he finds himself
10. William Kilpatrick 1871-1965 (Progressivism) : Advocate of the project method. Child should be in the centre.
11. William Bagley 1874-1946 (Essentialism): Return to the essential curriculum.
12. Ravindrantaha Tagore 1861 -1941: learning through activity. Moulding an Universal man. experiments at santhinikethan
13. Swami Vivekanandan 1863-1901: The end of all education is man making. Concentration is the only method. Knowledge is inherent in every soul. First condition for learning is the desire to learn.
14. Gandhiji 1869-1948 : Basic Education. Introduction of productive handicrafts in education. Self sufficient autonomous institutions.
15. Ivan Illich 1926- Deschooling: Critic of the institutionalised system of education. self directed education, supported by intentional social relations, in informal arrangements.