John Dewey (1859 - 1952)

Presented by group # 7:Cinthia Rodriguez

Nuvia BautistaOmar Rodas

General Information

John Dewey was born in the United States of America on October 20, 1859.

American philosopher, psychologist and educational reformer whose ideas have been influential in education, philosophy, and psychology.

known best for his publications about education, but he also wrote about other topics such as experience, nature, art, logic, inquiry, democracy, and ethics.

Major representative of populist philosophies of schooling during the first half of the 20th century in the United States of America.

Time Line On October 20, 1859 John Dewey was born in

Burlington, Vermont, from a modest family. He was married twice and had six children.

In 1879 he graduated from the University of Vermont (Phi Beta Kappa). Then, he worked as a high-school teacher in Pennsylvania and as a elementary school teacher in Vermont. So, after studying philosophy independently, he entered the graduate program in philosophy at Johns Hopkins University to receive his Ph.D.

From 1884 to 1894 he had a faculty position at the University of Michigan.

In 1894 Dewey joined the University of Chicago where emerged his Pragmatic Philosophy.

In 1903 Dewey also set up the “University of Chicago Laboratory Schools” to actualize the pedagogical beliefs that provided material for his first major work on education, “The School and Social Progress” (1899).

In 1899, Dewey was elected president of the American Psychological Association.

From 1904 until his retirement in 1930, he was professor of philosophy at both Columbia University and Columbia University's Teachers College.

In 1905 he became president of the American Philosophical Association.

Years later, the United States Postal Service honored John Dewey with a Prominent Americans series 30¢ postage stamp.

Nowadays, Dewey is considered one of the founders of The New School.

Writings

Major Dewey's educational theories were presented in these writings:

My Pedagogic Creed (1897)The School and Society (1900) The Child and the Curriculum (1902)Democracy and Education (1916)Experience and Education (1938)

Dewey’s Theories and Beliefs on Education

Experiential education: Dewey focused his concept of “instrumentalism” in education on “learning by doing or hands-on learning”, which means to learn not only by the theory, but also by the practice. “Instrumentalism” is a theory of knowledge created by Dewey in which ideas are seen to exist primarily as instruments for the solution of problems encountered in the environment.

The school’s role: Dewey stressed the importance of education in school not only as a place to gain content knowledge, but also as a place to learn how to live. The purpose of education should be the realization of everybody’s full potential and the ability to use any skills for the greater good.

Dewey’s Theories and Beliefs on Education

The educational process’ role: Dewey advocated for an educational structure that makes a balance between the child and the curriculum, that is to say, delivering knowledge while also taking into account the interests and experiences of the student.

The teacher’s role: The teacher’s role should be that of facilitator and guide since the teacher becomes a partner in the learning process who leads students to independently discover meaning within the subject area.

The Dewey School

• In January of 1896, Dewey opened the doors of the Experimental University of Chicago with the idea of setting up an “Experimental School” by his own.

• The program core of the studies of the Dewey School figured what he denominated “occupation”, in other words, “a form of activity done by the children that reproduce a type of work done in social life or that is parallel to it.

The Dewey Teaching Method

Age Activity4-5 years old Cook, Carpentry, needlework

6 years old They built a farm of wood, planted wheat and cotton; they sold their products in the market.

7 years old They studied pre-history in caves made by themselves

8 years old They studied navigation like Marco Polo, Colon, Magallanes and Robison Crusoe.

9 years old Local history and geography

10 years old They studied the Colonial History

11-12 years old Anatomic experiments, electromagnetism, political economy and photography

13 years old They built a building for their debate club.

• Dewey wrote: “the child goes to school to make things: to cook, to sew, to work the wood, and to make tools through acts of simple construction; and in this context, and like consequence of those acts it articulates the studies: reading, writing, and calculus.

• The Dewey pedagogical key consisted in providing the children with “experiences of first hand” about conflictive situations, most of the time based on personal experiences. In his opinion, “the mind is not completely free until the right conditions are created to make the children participate actively in the personal analysis of his/her own problems, and participate in the methods to solve them, at the price of multiple tries and mistakes.

• Even though he didn’t expect that the Experimental School method were followed in a strictly way in other places, he kept the hope that his school served as a source of inspiration to whom pretended to transformed the public education.

The End of the Dewey School

• The precursor community of Dewey lasted too short. Its end was caused by the people who worked with Dewey in the Experimental school. They all wanted to have the control of the school, since the school didn’t belong to Dewey, in fact, it belong to the Chicago’s University.

• The lost of the Experimental school left an opened room to others to understand, apply, and even deform Dewey’s pedagogical ideas.

Quote

“Education is not preparation for life; education is life itself. Education, therefore, is a process of living and not a preparation for future living.”

John Dewey

Conclusions

• Dewey considered schools and civil society as two fundamental elements and major topics that need attention and reconstruction to encourage experimental intelligence and plurality in order to improve our life and environment.

• Dewey strongly believed that students must be active learning perceivers and critical thinkers rather than passive believers and receivers of information.

• Dewey’s theories have been a great influence on 20th-century thought. His writings on educational theory and practice have been widely read and accepted because he showed that the disciplines of philosophy, pedagogy, and psychology should be understood as closely interrelated. For that reason, Dewey's ideas have remained at the center of much educational philosophy in the United States and in many countries around the world.