Dewey’s Pedagogic
Creed
Video Reflections: Dewey would think that this “shy guy” is
standing on the “outside looking in” because he has self-consciously failed to
participate in the social situations forced upon him by transferring to a new
school. For Dewey, “school is primarily a social institution.” Richie knows
very little about his fellow classmates, their like and dislikes. He is an
outsider, one who has cut himself off from the “organic union of individuals.”
Since, for Dewey, education in a social process, Richie is not fully prepared
“for future living.”
How so? Because he has not received proper “moral education”
in his home, which, for Dewey, “is the form of social life in which the child
had been nurtured and in connection with which he has had his moral training.”
But do we want our public school system instructing our children in “moral
education”?
For Dewey, “Moral education centres about this conception of
the school as a mode of social life, that the best and deepest moral training
is precisely that which one gets through having to enter into proper relations
with others in a unity of work and thought.” While adding that the “teacher is
not in the school to impose certain ideas [i.e., morals] or to form certain
habits in the child, but is there as a member of the community to select the
influences which shall affect the child and to assist hi in properly responding
to these influences.”
So, then, what can we learn from Dewey’s Pedagogic Creed?
What would Dewey say about, for example, state standards, core curriculum, and
our highly departmentalized instruction? Dewey believed "that the true centre of correlation of the school subjects is not science, nor literature, nor history, nor geography, but the child's own social activities." According to Dewey, history, for example, "is of educative value in so far as it presents phases of social life and growth."
What's your Pedagogic Creed?
What's your Pedagogic Creed?
How do you think about history fits the goal of social education?
ReplyDeleteI have a couple of ideas. I was wondering what stuck out to you. One idea is the concept of conflict. Does the history of conflicts help us understand conflict in the world today? Another thought was about identity. Does knowing where we came from help us better understand who we are and how we fit in with the everyone else?
If all history class ever gives us is a game where we pair dates and important events that we can play on the walk between classes, is that good enough? Does the social life have to be grandiose or is just sharing something we find interesting with a fellow traveler?
Dates? Fellow Travelers? Hmmm. Today we analyzed some statistical data from a student's MEAP scores. I was surprised to learn that the student in question had answered 0/14 of his/her "geography" questions correctly. Our instructor pointed out that geography, unlike history, is no longer taught in most high schools, as if to suggest that the two fields are mutually exclusive!
DeleteHow can one teach about the transatlantic crossings of Columbus, for example, without situating him with the historical milieu of which he was a part. An important consequence of Vasco da Gama's 1498 voyage around the Cape of Good Hope (which is located on the tip of South Africa for those of us who are non-geography majors!) was that it enable Portugal to bypass Venetian merchants and dominate the spice trade with India. But what does geography have to do with history anyways?
I have two hopes. Perhaps the results and the score in the sample were designed to show us where to look for specific information, rather than the show us how they actually compute the score. Also, remember what we learned about cut-scores. Perhaps the sample student was just one more wrong answer away from moving out of the partially-proficient zone and into the depths.
DeleteCory,
DeleteYou make an interesting point about where Dewey's philosophy fits in with state standards, core curriculum, etc. I often struggle with teaching kids content AND teaching them how to be good people. I find that the best way to address the latter is to model it all day, every day. If we can be model citizens while teaching them content in a way that is relevant, I think we've done our job. One issue with Dewey is that his goals for education are pretty difficult to measure--as opposed to a standardized test which is just the opposite. So to what extent do these metrics guide/define us as teachers?