History Sure Does Rhyme
I should probably be working on something else, but I jsut did a quick blog search for mentions of Dewey, and found a great post on the Educational Technology and Life blog. The writer, Mark Wagner, is studying educational technology out in California and has just started reading School and Society for a research project. He compiled a list of ten significant quotes with comments from him. Here’s an example:
“[When introducing real word occupations into the curriculum] the entire school is renewed. It has the a chance to affiliate itself with life, to become the child’s habitat, where he learns through directed living, instead of being only a place to learn lessons having an abstract and remote reference to some possible living to be done in the future. It gets a chance to be a miniature community.” (p. 18) So let’s see, we’ve got project-based learning, school to industry connections, and small learning communities – maybe even professional learning communities… sounds like cutting edge 21st century educational reform to me.
Contrary to what a lot of critics may say, we don’t have the educational problems we do today because we listened to Dewey. We have them in large part because we didn’t. And so everything old is new again.
About Dave Thomer
Born and raised in Philadelphia. Studied philosophy at Fordham University in the Bronx, where I made many great friends and met my wonderful wife. We moved back to Philadelphia, where I studied philosophy some more and became a teacher. Online and off, I'm looking for ways that we can be better citizens and build stronger communities.