Saturday, July 19, 2008
The Instrumentalist
That instrumentalist, Dewey, would have education be a means to forming the child to "act economically and efficiently" (art. 1). School is to be an extension of the home, an education for the present and not for the future (art. 2). The teacher is not to impose ideas but select what will influence the child (art. 2). Education, then, is an instrument to societal success, as measured economically. Reason is merely "effective action" (art. 4). This extremely pragmatic approach, however, does not succeed in avoiding the "imposition" of certain values and ideas. Industrial values merely replace traditional and intellectual ones. Instead of virtues of the soul and habits of thought, efficiency, hard work, and economic prudence are to determine the direction of schooling. Perhaps it is these values, then, that define the "proper social life," which is to be the end of the teacher's formative task (art. 5). There is nothing "neutral" about this vision of public schools, though the vision is still perhaps rather ill-defined. Also, if school is to be an extension of the home, what is its distinct purpose, then, other than a mere surrogate? Leave education to the family, if it is to be such a practical enterprise. There is no existing right for the State to educate the child, unless the family and community have utterly failed in the task. It may be that the family can do as good or better a job at forming upstanding citizens than the State, and hence that Dewey's idealistic structure for public schools has no solid foundation. Perhaps a different vision for education is needed, one more intellectually grounded.
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4 comments:
Mike wins: first post from the cohort that totally sailed over my head.
Mike, I'm really happy to see you wrestling with Dewey's meanings, and thinking about the possible risks implied in his ideas.
There were a couple of points where our understandings may have differed. For one, I think that when he uses the word "economically" at the end of the first article, I think that he meant it much more as a synonym for efficiently, rather than to suggest that the value of the preparation students receive in school should be measured in terms of "dollars and cents" economics. Dewey clearly advocates for grounding schooling in connections to the work of daily life, but I see that connection as being a way to make school subjects come to life, to gain a certain relevance that (in his time and perhaps sometimes in ours as well) it too often lacked.
It follows from your interpretation of "economically" that you might see Dewey as pointing in the direction of inculcating industrial values. However, I don't think that this was at all his intention. Indeed, Dewey was no supporter of the kind of manual training we discussed in class (which was very popular as he began his career). In fact, my every sense is that Dewey was far from being a "practical" thinker with regard to schooling, if we mean drawing explicit connections to the world of work and to the building of a certain vision of workplace habits (punctuality, compliance, etc.)
Finally, I think you make an interesting set of observations about the connection between the school and the family. I do think that Dewey saw many parents of his day as not being equipped to offer children the kind of support and apprenticeship opportunities that would have once been commonplace. With families moving from rural to urban settings, or relocating in the US from other countries, I'm sure that Dewey's emphasis on democratic life in the classroom was a kind of response to a perception that educators had to "jump into the breach" to a degree.
Most importantly, though, I see Dewey's ideas as pointing towards a much richer vision of "intellectual grounding" than what was the norm of his day. His vision of using the interests of young people to connect to the subject disciplines was a much more dynamic alternative to the recitation and memorization modality that was often the primary mode of pedagogy.
Thanks for taking the time to really grapple with Dewey's words and ideas, Mike.
Really interesting views! I totally interpreted the overall idea of Dewey's statements as making learning relevant and practical and I guess I didn't think that the academic focus needed to be eliminated. I guess some major ideas went over my head. Thanks for helping me re-evaluate!
haha, dan's comment is pretty funny ad so spot on.
michael, i was interested in checking out your posts because you made some very thought-provoking and eloquent comments in the socratic seminar yesterday. i'll have to collect my thoughts and organize my statements before posting my response to them because you're rhetoric made me very conscious of my own! also, i appreciate your perspective on Dewey's work that we read. i'll have to break apart your arguments a bit because on the surface level i think your interpretation of his views are quite different from my own. i'll get back to you on this. have a good weekend.
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