John Dewey Literature Thoughts

The writing in this post is based on the readings of John Dewey’s My Pedagogic Creed as well as John Dewey: A Significant Contributor to the Field of Educational Technology by Peter Rich and Thomas C. Reeves.

The Need for a Guide

John Dewey put a great focus on “learning by doing.”  Sometimes though, people forget or ignore that an expert or instructor should be alongside to guide.  If the instructor is gone, the students fumble about trying to reinvent everything for the first time again.  The instructor is there to guide the students in discovery and show how the wheel became invented without the years that it took to perfect it.  It seems like we can focus on technology that allows students to do everything on their own.  Even though technology can be very useful in bringing the experience to the student, we must not forget that there will need to be a guiding hand for productive learning to be accomplished while motivation still exists for most, at least until students are proficient enough to learn on their own.

            School is the community where we put students to develop their sense of wonder and goals.  Like a guide, the teacher knows a goal and a means for the lesson.  A child left with all of the technology of an expert is of no use unless they have some sort of goal in mind.  When students are older, we give them wire, batteries, and lightbulbs and ask them to figure it out.  Because they have a framework for setting their own goals (e.g. lighting the bulb), the students can puzzle out their own means through prior knowledge (e.g. electricity flows through wires, bulbs need electricity to light).  Even still, we have teachers there to provide guidance for those who have not discovered their own means yet and to facilitate the thought.that brings the discovery about.  For even younger students, doing the same task would likely result in broken glass.  As learners, we will flounder until we have a purpose for our technology, and a teacher is there to help the learners learn about purpose, starting by giving it to them, then weaning them off of their need for aid.

Concrete Foundations for Learning

            Dewey seems to express that we should not teach something to a student unless they have some exposure to it.  We should found every teaching on concrete experience.  Students who learn to read should experience the need of reading.  Students who study science should experience the oddities of this world and see what we are working with.  Students should be taught the use of knowledge before they are taught it.  As with current pedagogy, students must begin with concrete thinking before abstract thinking can be developed.  As technology is concerned, students should experience the importance of a subject and thus technology before we can teach them how to use the technology properly.  The student must experience, do, and learn in the process.

The importance of Context

            We have to introduce a concept so that students have an understanding of it before we define it with a “symbol.”  An example of this shoddy work is the word “energy.”  Many people use it, but few could define it in a way divorced from the ethereal nonsense it has become.  Students can learn a word and throw it around like an adult, but to use it effectively, the student must understand the meaning of the word.  We must be sure we are ready to explain the purpose of the concept and what it entails before we consider teaching students a new word.  If we don’t, all thunder and no lightning is what we can expect.

The Powers of Knowledge and Emotion

            Teachers should keep an eye open for interest because that is when students recognize their own powers.  When you can understand your world, manipulate it, and predict what it will do, you recognize the power of that knowledge and skill.  If we can help students find and keep that sense of power, we have a citizenry that is motivated to improve and learn.  A citizenry that is truly free.

            Even though he was not aware of psychological research into generating beliefs, Dewey believed that beliefs and feelings can be developed by actions first.  As teachers, we should facilitate students to do correctly and goodly, and students will value the actions as part of their identities.  From the identity, feeling and emotion come, and from them a passion for the right and good stays.

Difficulties and Confusion

            One of my greatest confusions is what Dewey means by “social life” and “science.”  Social life has become a phrase that encapsulates your relationships divorced from work and civic responsibility.  His idea seems to be an all encompassing concept that covers every way that our life is social.  This seems to be the same situation that I am in with his idea of science.  It seems to be more than the discipline and body of knowledge, but the very method of science itself.  Because of this different meaning, understanding Dewey can be difficult though rewarding task.