Dewey

Dewey: Experience and Education


Dewey argues that the quality of experience is importance. The experience has to have following two aspects: agreeableness and the connectedness to the further experiences.


He is very critical about the quality of experience; if students are not getting something that leads to future learning, such experiences are mis-educative. This argument reminded me of Makiguchi's attitude toward education. He emphasizes the "economies" of education (I don't know if this translation makes sense...). In other words, if what teachers teach do not leave in students' memories, if students are learning some concepts that are not connected to their daily lives, the time, energy, and money that they spend are wasted. I belive Dewey does not necesarily disagree with the tradiational education. In fact, he says "young people in traditional schools do have experiences. . . . the trouble is not the absense of experiences, but their defective and wrong character" (p. 27).


When Dewey describes the principle of continuity, he mentioned habit as a criterion. When experiences are repeated, they become habit and can change attitudes/behavior of students. Berger and Luckman discuss habitualization. They argue that "all human activity is subject to habitualization. . . . Habitualized actions, of course, reain their meaningful character for the individual although the meanings involved become embeded as routines in his general stock of knowldge, taken for granted by him and at hand for his projects into the future. Habitualization carris with it the important psychological gain that choices are narrowed." In Berger and Luckman's eyes, school is where the some actions that have been habitualized over time are carried down to the next generation as social norms. On the other hand, according to Dewey's idea about habit, social norms can be changed by repeating experiences that can alter students' attitudes and behavior. I flet that Dewey saw more potential in experience as a means of social change than Berger and Luckman.


As for the role of educators, Dewey implies some qualities throughout the essay. The role is to create/adjust the environments where students can have the experiences that lead to growth. To do so, they need to be aware what kind of resorces they have and "what attitudes and habitual tendencies are being created" (p. 39). The teachers also need to be able to symphathetically understand students so that they have "an idea of what is actually going on in the minds of those who are learning" (p. 39).


Dewey suggests that teachers need to be aware that their position as teachers do regulate and direct what students experience. In this sense, he allows teachers to have certain power, but they need to know that how they teach/what they aim to achieve affect the learning environemnt.