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TIME: Almanac of the 20th Century
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<text>
<title>
(1920s) John Dewey
</title>
<history>
TIME--The Weekly Newsmagazine--1920s Highlights
People
</history>
<article>
<source>Time Magazine</source>
<hdr>
John Dewey
</hdr>
<body>
<p>(JUNE 4, 1928)
</p>
<p> The basic concept and method of Educator John Dewey derives
with brutal logic from the major premise, a definition. He
postulates:
</p>
<p> "Education: It is that reconstruction or reorganization of
experience which adds to the meaning of experience, and which
increases ability to direct the course of subsequent
experience."
</p>
<p> In other words: learning should mean discovering how to do.
The element of "discovery" is held high if not paramount by
Educator Dewey. He declares: "While immature students will not
make discoveries from the standpoint of advanced students, they
make them from their own standpoint whenever there is genuine
learning."
</p>
<p> Pupils, then must "be encouraged to utilize their own
peculiarities of response to subject matter." They must not
learn by rote. In disparaging this latter method, which he finds
still all too prevalent Dr. Dewey has said: "Much work in (an
ordinary) school consists in setting up rules by which pupils
are to act of such a sort that even after pupils have acted they
are not let to see the connection between the result--say the
answer--and the method pursued. So far as they are concerned,
the whole thing is a trick and a kind of miracle."
</p>
<p> To Deweyites it is clear that to teach children formulae by
rote is almost as ridiculous as teaching them the incantations
of medieval wizards. The schoolroom must be a place where the
child is intelligently encouraged to dynamically project its ego
in discovering how to do.
</p>
<p> Already, of course, numerous fruits of Professor Dewey's
labors are to be seen, green or half ripened, in the more
progressive elementary schools of America, Europe, and certain
restricted areas of Asia. The great adventure still looming
before the Second Confucius is to persuade fellow educators,
parents and taxpayers that the "discovery method" can be applied
to successively more advanced classes, and will not degenerate
under incompetent teachers into merely "letting the students do
whatever they please."</p>
</body>
</article>
</text>