John Dewey -- The Child and the Curriculum Schools of opinion arise because people become attached to one factor in a problematic situation and then treat it as if it were the only relevant factor. Thus, instead of considering the practical problem of how conflicting factors can best interact, they focus on the theoretic problem created when conflicting factors are kept separate.
For example, there are [at least] two fundamental factors in the educative process: an immature, undeveloped being (the child) and the social aims, meanings, and values of adults (the curriculum). These apparently conflict:
Dewey characterizes the two views that arise when we emphasize one side of the conflict and minimize the other. Those who take the side of the child tend to use a "growth" metaphor that emphasizes the organic unity of the child's life. Those who take the side of the curriculum tend to use a "mental faculties" metaphor that emphasizes the mental disciplines needed to master the curriculum. Dewey recognizes that in practice we may not go to the extreme positions that he characterizes. More likely, we vacillate between extremes because we are unable to come to grips with the educational process.
The way out of this dilemma (the real "effort of thought") is to see no gap in kind between the child's experience and the subject matters of the curriculum. On the one hand, we should view the child's experience as embryonic, containing "within itself the attitudes, the motives, and the interests" that are part of the curriculum. On the other hand, we should view subject matters as fluid outcomes of human experience that are cumulative, organized, and systematic.
Knowing ways in which the child may ultimately organize experience gives direction to development thus allowing us to interpret present behavior and guide subsequent movement. Interpetation allows educators to understand what they see, to differentiate "symptoms of a waning tendency" from "signs of a culminating power and interest." Guidance enables educators to direct activity towards some definite achievment by selecting appropriate stimuli. Without guidance, experience could not be directed towards what is wanted. ("Nothing but the crude can be developed out of the crude.")
Two aspects of experience need to be distinguished and then related:
follows a pre-arranged path that
Completed subject matter is like a map. A good map assists further exploration, but it is neither final nor valuable in and of itself. Although it is not a substitute for real experience with the terrain, the logically organized map can put past experience into a form that is usable in the future. So, like the two factors in an educative process, these two aspects of experience should not be opposed to each other; rather they should be seen as two points in experience both of which lead towards future growth.
Three typical evils result if the scientist's view of subject matter (logical experience) is not psychologized.
- The material becomes purely formal and symbolic without organic connection to experience (that is, without organic connection to what the child has "seen, felt, and loved").
- The material is not connected to any craving, need, or demand of the child. It is not internally motivated.
- The logical organization of subject matter is obscured, and so the really thought provoking aspect of subject matter disappears.
If, in response, educators resort to "outside ways of giving subject matter logical meaning," then:
- The mind can become accustomed to routines instead of becoming genuinely interested in the material.
- The material is only interesting because it is better than something less agreeable.
- Material becomes interesting only if it is sugar-coated.
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This page last updated on May 18, 2009