Week of October 5th

Each blog group select a chapter of Experience and Education (ch 1-4) on which to lead a text-based discussion. Come up with guiding questions for the discussion. Blogs should be used to arrive at a deeper understanding of your chapter (and the book as a whole), tying in other sections of the book and other materials from class.

Nick, Kendra, Matteo

Ch. 1 - Traditional vs. Progressive education

Binaries/dichotomies run rampant in mankind in general. 

Within education specifically, those either/or’s are based on nature vs nurture - recognizing and appreciating our natural endowments vs a process of overcoming natural inclination and substituting in its place habits acquired under external pressure.  

Rejecting the old without being thoughtful about the new doesn't solve any problems.

*There is always the danger in a new movement that in rejecting the aims and methods of that which it would supplant, it may develop its principles negatively rather than positively and constructively.  Thus there must be an intimate and necessary relation between the processes of actual experience and education." 

Dewey often asks questions to support the reader in following his logic.

What is the place and meaning of subject-matter and of organization within experience?  How does subject-matter function?  Is there anything inherent in experience which tends towards progressive organization of its contents?  What results follow when the materials of experience are not progressively organized?

How shall the young be acquainted with the past in such a way that the acquaintance is a potent agent in appreciation of the living present?

This seems to be Dewey’s key interest. Rather than providing history packaged in an unmoving box, he wants to investigate how he can bring history and information and skills to the present so they are relevant and meaningful to youth. 

Traditional education defined by Dewey.

Dewey outlines the origins and hallmarks of “traditional education,” describing it as an inheritance handed down by teachers as “organs.” Group Discussion Question: Does the language here suggest that teachers act as sensory/perceptive organs, and that education is sensible to them and made so to children through them? Could teachers rather be seen as the communicators of knowledge and skill? This inheritance exists at a great distance from the pupil, meaning they cannot truly participate in it. This leaves leaves students to mere acquisition of “what is already incorporated in books and in the heads of elders.” 

Progressive education defined by Dewey.

Dewey again states the importance of locating necessary elements and structures of education (like subject matter) within education without rejecting them outright: “I take it that the fundamental unity of the newer philosophy is found in the idea that there is an intimate and necessary relation between the processes of actual experience and education” (p.30). Dewey frames learning from experience as being in opposition to learning from texts and teachers. The value of this and other principles depends on its enactment and interpretation.  In rejecting an existing movement, new tenets may be framed in opposition to existing ones - creating a philosophy that relies on an unreconciled dialectic. ““A philosophy which proceeds on the basis of rejection, of sheer opposition, will neglect these questions.” Dewey warns against dogmatic approaches to new education. A pragmatic approach to progressive education relies on an accurate understanding of experience.

Ch. 2 - Theory of Experience - “education of, by, and for experience” p.41, bound to be simpler than traditional theories because it does away with artifice. 

Experiences can be educative or miseducative. 
“Young people in traditional schools do have experiences; and, secondly, that the trouble is not the absence of experiences, but their defective and wrong character—wrong and defective from the standpoint of connection with further experience” (p. 38). ‘“The central problem of an education based upon experience is to select the kind of present experiences that live fruitfully and creatively in subsequent experiences.” These experiences will not always have self-evident value -- the effect of the experience is not borne on its face, leaving the educator to sort out which activities are beneficial beyond the immediate pleasure provided while also not being aversive.  Dewey breaks these experiences down into quality (agreeableness or disagreeableness) and effect (visible only pragmatically). He states that “materials, of methods, and of social relationships” are components to be considered in developing a philosophy of experience.

Ch. 3 - Criteria of Experience 

Progressive education is more democratic - and why that is better.

According to Dewey (p. 33), the progressive movement is more in line with democratic ideals in comparison to traditional school which is more autocratic. Also its methods are more humane than the harsh policies of traditional school. Dewey then discusses why democratic practices should be preferred.  He highlights there is a difference by the reason we are accustomed to preferring democracy (media, social practices) and the reason why it is the best practice.  Dewey asks 3 questions to the reader to explain why democracy is important to Americans - 1) focusing on higher quality of life being more accessible, 2) the belief that regard for individual freedom and for decency and kindness will more likely lead to higher quality of life than repression or coercion, and 3) that mutual consultation reached through persuasion is the way to obtain higher quality of life. 

All experiences fall on the experiential continuum

This is defined as “discrimination is made between the inherent values of different experiences”( p.49). He states that habits are one's expression of experiences. Dewey defines habits insofar as the way that every experience acts on the individual and the way in which the individual meets future experiences by virtue of changing the individual. In this way habit informs our attitudes (emotional and intellectual) as well as our sensitivities (ways of meeting the world). This is such an important concept for

We are not separate from our habits

Dewey writes that, “The basic characteristic of habit is that every experience enacted and undergone modifies the one who acts and undergoes, while this modification affects, whether we wish it or not, the quality of subsequent experiences.  For it is a somewhat different person who enters into them” (p. 35). This is representative of critically sustaining pedagogy to me and reminds me of my partner's favorite quote: “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it's not the same river and he's not the same man" by Heraclitus.

Dewey defines education as growth

“The educative process can be identified with growth when that is understood in terms of the active participle, growing.” Experiences and related decisions shape and select future environments in which one may train or practice while moving away from other stimuli at the same time. In a negative context, some experiences (like being spoiled as a child) can arrest development. Experiences can only be judged by what they move one forward or into. Every experience is a growing force. 

Teachers should use their wisdom to guide this process

The teachers role is to exercise their judgement and insight, from their more mature perspective, in the selection of these experiences. Not using this insight, or taking the teacher out of the process, denies the power of the educator’s own experiences as well as the fundamental truth that humans are social creatures. This is important in explaining why developmentalism approaches in education are not sufficient. How? A key part of creating these experiences is shaping the physical and social environment - “A primary responsibility of educators is that they not only be aware of the general principle of the shaping of actual experience by environing conditions, but that they also recognize in the concrete what surroundings are conducive to having experiences that lead to growth” (p.57).

The importance of paying attention to external-internal interactions

The trouble with traditional education is that it paid little attention to the internal experiences while being distracted by external experiences. The objective conditions must enter into the experience. "Attaching importance to external factors only by imposing control and limiting freedom of experience subordinates the environment to the experience" (p. 59). Situations are comprised of these external-internal interactions. “An experience is always what it is because of a transaction taking place between an individual and what, at the time, constitutes his environment” (p.62). “The environment, in other words, is whatever conditions interact with personal needs, desires, purposes, and capacities to create the experience which is had”

What does Dewey define as most important in education?

Continuity and interaction are the two axises of experience. Environment contains the instruments and materials of education as well as the social set-up of situations. “Objective Conditions” are within the control or influence of the educator. “Responsibility for selecting objective conditions carries with it, then, the responsibility for understanding the needs and capacities of the individuals who are learning at a given time” (p.65). Materials and methods must be included for a reason - they must be intentionally matched to the individuals engaged in the experience. Failure to match meant that some individuals were left to “get on as best they could” while others thrived - suggesting that certain subjects are more cultural or girding than others. Failure to match can create non-educative experiences. 

Attention and awareness around the past, present and future are all important 

“The future has to be taken into account at every stage of the educational process” - through/ because of continuity. “It is a mistake to suppose that acquisition of skills in reading and figuring will automatically constitute preparation for their right and effective use under conditions very unlike those in which they were acquired.” It is important to get all one can out of an experience at hand and not rely on a fictive future to drive students' motivations. “When preparation is made the controlling end, then the potentialities of the present are sacrificed to a suppositious future.” “Education as growth or maturity should be an ever-present process” driven by people with the maturity to know that the present and past interact, and who are empowered to create present conditions which will suit the future. 

Why does this matter?  Learning to read in the school environment is certainly worthwhile but may not prepare one for the ways they have to read outside of, or after, school. Dewey characterizes traditional schooling as occurring in isolation. Thus, it is not genuine preparation. 

The most important goal of education 

Another major fallacy is the discounting of collateral learning or the way enduring attitudes are formed. The most important of these attitudes is a desire to go on learning. If this attitude is not instilled there is a risk of robbing the individual of their “native capacities,” leaving them disinterested in learning from future experience. 

“There is no paradox in the fact that the principle of the continuity of experience may operate so as to leave a person arrested on a low plane of development, in a way which limits later capacity for growth” (p. 22). How can we read Dewey through a trauma-informed lens?

How does Dewey's “continuum of experience” fit into the American concept of destiny re: Frost’s road less traveled and Plath's fig tree passage in The Bell Jar? 

Isn’t the continuum of experience inherently flawed as a measure of value in that every experience inherently cuts of other possible experiences? According to Dewey, experiences are valued to the extent that they open up future experiences, but by choosing one experience, aren’t we of necessity forgoing all others? See fig tree. 

Questions for discussion:

1) What is it about experience that Dewey believes makes progressive education potentially more difficult to enact than traditional education?

2) How does Dewey suggest that objective conditions enter into the experience of education? In your history, have objective conditions in your educational environment created a dearth of quality, effective experiences as Dewey mentioned in Ch. 2?

3) How can the sometimes disparate needs of a cohort be accounted for in a matching process? Can you provide an example from your practice/experience?

4) How does this differ from deference to a suppositious future? Does experiential continuity stand in for the existing construct of future preparation as "the controlling end"? Is there a dialectic here waiting to be reconciled? What is the relationship between experiential continuity and preparation for life?

5) If educators are responsible for shaping the learning experience and environment, and education is the province of the educated (bachelors, masters, certified, etc), how do the experiences of educators (and their investment in/ confidence in learning) influence and uphold the status-quo of traditional education?

Agenda Item:

1) What is the plan with the new optional assignment? 

2) What were the outcome of Dewey's Laboratory School?  How did he measure "successs"?