The Project Process
Dewey's Democracy and Education
Afterthoughts on Tuesday's discussion and
questions about Russell
Israel Scheffler's "Computers at School?"
For next week
As we move from Ullman's contemporary narrative to a book of philosophy, it might be useful to reflect on the age of the text and what social and educational life in the U.S. was like in 1916. For example, adapting two of the questions from last time, in preparation for Dewey, we might ask: 1) What is happening in the U.S. in 1916 and how is schooling/education affected?; and 2) What is elementary and secondary school for and who is it for in 1916?.
Rupali Kotwal sent several questions to the list for us to consider for our discussion of Dewey's chapters 7 and 24.
Here are some notes from last year's discussion of Dewey in CS92, when we read a bit more of the book, much later in the semester.
The philosopher Israel Scheffler, whose chapters on Dewey in his excellent Four Pragmatists (1974) I strongly recommend, wrote that:
"And ideal society, for Dewey, is an association that allows for maximum growth of each person, through his own activity and self-development. Such an association aims to institutionalize intelligence in matters of conduct, as natural science institutionalizes intelligence in investigations of nature. It is free of artificial barriers dividing its members from one another, it fosters the free exchange of ideas, and it treats the ideas underlying its common activities as hypotheses -- open to the test of experience, criticizable by all whom such activities affect, and revisable by procedures enlisting their common consent."How does Dewey's ideal compare with your own? Are such ideals relevant to discussions of educational technology generally and the use of computers in schools specifically?
"[Good form] is not compatible with fundamental open-mindedness, or with any inward readiness to give weight to the other side. Its essence is the assumption that what is most important is a certain kind of behavior, a behavior which minimizes friction between equals and delicately impresses inferiors wiht a conviction of their own crudity. As a political weapon for preserving the priviledges of the rich in a snobbish democracy it is unsurpassable. As a means of producing an agreeable social milieu for those who have money with no strong beliefs or unusual desires it has some merit. In every other respect it is abominable."How does this notion of "good form" get institutionalized (e.g. at Brown) and do you agree with Russell about its detrimental effects?