Does Ellen Condliffe Lagemann count as a pundit or an historian?
More seriously, for Dewey your perspective will depend largely on whether you look at him as an education writer (in which case he looks like a Progressive, ambiguous warts and all) or as a philosopher (in which case his writings on education were largely about pragmatism), as well as whether you look at his early stuff, the mid-career writings after he moved to New York, or his later life.
And with Thorndike, I'd still recommend The Sane Positivist as the best biography of Thorndike.
Jenny -- You need to go deeper than his writings. You need to understand the systems that influenced him and the powers that probably funded him and why. I believe it will be a most eye-opening experience. I will try to get you some references.
I Amazoned An Elusive Science : The Troubling History of Education Research (referenced on this blog) and noted this Dewey quote, "the teacher always is the prophet of the true God and the usherer in of the true kingdom of God." The book also notes the MaCoS scandal, NSF monies allegedly supporting "Deweyism, pragmatism, behaviorism," etc., and precipitating "the worst political crisis in NSF history." These nicely highlight the importance of sensitivity to the community's philosophy of education, particularly since the book undermines claims of "scientific research" in education: "policy makers in search of expert guidance have often discovered that the research they needed did not exist or offered conflicting or indeterminate findings-or no findings whatsoever."
Thirty years ago, the dissertation by Ohio's current state Superintendent of Public Instruction noted that Dewey's goals for sound practices in school management fell short. Five years ago, she took the opportunity to address this deficiency by incorporating NIST's Education Criteria for Performance Excellence into the Operating Standards for Ohio Schools. Last week, a candidate for statewide office in Ohio mentioned to me that NCLB forced Ohio to take "a half step backward" to address the backward condition of the rest of the nation. It would be beneficial for ed schools to catch up with their prominent alumnae!
In a world as information rich as our's currently is, it's best not to be too subtle or deep if you don't want to be overlooked.
Jenny-
What if E. D. Hirsch is right and the winner of Dewey vs Thorndike was actually Kilpatrick? From Harvard Educational Review--extensive research, clear writing, and needed reexamination of the life and work of William Heard Kilpatrick:
And There Were Giants in the Land: The Life of William Heard Kilpatrick by John A. Beineke.
Labeled "Columbia's Million Dollar Professor" for his popularity and the financial benefits his popularity drew to Teachers College in that period, Kilpatrick was also known as Dewey's chief interpreter for his popularization of Dewey's somewhat dense educational philosophy. Kilpatrick's ideas, which often varied from Dewey's, include project-based learning, curriculum integration, and whole child education. Although developed in the progressive period, they reverberate in contemporary debates over educational reform.
Kilpatrick, a native Georgian and the son of a Baptist preacher, was "able to advance his opinions on race beyond his native prejudices" to "a solidly liberal stance", yet was never able to speak out against segregation. While he argued that a group should not be judged for its leaders' actions, Kilpatrick railed against Catholics and the Catholic Church.
See Chris Correa's latest post on John Dewey as a teacher.
Jenny -- Whether you agree with the authors or not here are two books to review while researching Thorndike and Dewey. The first is John Taylor Gattos "The Underground History of American Education". The bad thing about this book is there are no references. (This free-on-the-web book can be found at http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/c...ters/index.htm)
The author was a classroom teacher for 30 years and left after being named New York State's teacher of the year and three times was named NYC best teacher of the year.
The other book is Charlotte Iserbyt's "the deliberate dumbing down of education" which is available free on the web at http://www.deliberatedumbingdown...sPDFs/
DDDoA.pdf
Ms. Iserbyt's book is a much tougher read but she has tons and tons of footnotes. Agree with her or disagree with her either way is fine but at least read these books and research the history of public education or forced schooling.
Once you have read these books step back and look at what you have learned in life, in ed school, in journalism, look at your childrens' schools, study their textbooks, look at the style of "teaching" used in classes today. Then ask yourself are our children better off today in the current form of forced schooling or were they better off prior to the start of forced schooling?
I ask myself this daily. I struggle with both of my children being willing to remain in school rather than let me homeschool them. Why do they stay? Because they like the social aspects of school and the athletics or arts programs available to them.
Me, I continually raise my voice and ask tough questions trying to get people to look through the current system (monopoly) to its history. We are continuing to dumb down our kids. Many people I know say our state lowered its scores for proficient or made the test "softer" making it easier for children to be considered proficient (something sure happened for the schools to have the massive gains they did across the state in the 04-05 school year). If this is true (I am trying to confirm this) think about what this does to the quality of education a child receives throughout the rest of their time in school. It gets worse because the foundation it is built upon is made of sand.
I keep saying this over and over. I want my children exposed to a rigorous education. (They are in a private school and an academic magnet high school because of this.) I want my children challenged to excel to the best of their ability, not just be a good citizen like my district's vision or mission statement desires.
Education needs to change. Educators, as a general rule, have been in "school" since they were 5 years old. I believe they need to rotate out of the field, explore the real world and come back to the classroom on a regular basis. I believe this will make our teachers stronger, more willing to look at what is happening in education from a different point of view and enable major change to occur in our schools and raise the quality of education for all our students.
I will be quiet now. Good luck with your research. Just remember, I believe, you also need to look at the people who supported Dewey and Thorndike as well as the people who supported the institutions in which they served. You will see the bigger picture.
Oh, yes. Please remember the constitution never mentions education. In our founders' eyes the federal government was never to have been involved in education. Now, the group that provides the least amount of funding drives the entire system.
THanks for letting me comment --
I want my children challenged to excel to the best of their ability, not just be a good citizen like my district's vision or mission statement desires.
Is your district's mission statement compatible with your state's educational adequacy litigation and/or state's constitution and school operating standards? If you don't know, perhaps you've underestimated the rigorous preparation required for good citizenship. If your school district doesn't know, then perhaps they are unprepared to instill the civic virtues necessary for a sustainable, participatory, republican democracy.
Did the authors of your district's mission statement consider their responsibility for ensuring "that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth?"
Apologize if this is vague (I'm beat!), but Dewey is, to me, the god of education. Instead of trying to read one of his entire works, pick up Democracy and Education and read maybe a chapter or two, and I think you'll get where he's coming from. To simplify him as I understand him, education's purpose is to encourage growth, and if we stray from that, we're in big trouble.
DEMOCRACY AND EDUCATION (1916) is tough going. I think that EXPERIENCE AND EDUCATION (193
is a more concise and clearer explanation of his philosophy and pedagogy. Also, Westbrook's relatively recent bio of Dewey is excellent. For an overall picture of the times I'd recommend Kliebard's (1995) THE STRUGGLE FOR THE AMERICAN CURRICULUM, 1893-1958. He considers Dewey the towering figure of so-called progressive ed, a sort of hovering Jovian presence, and vilifies Thorndike, Terman, et al as part of the curriculum of "social control viz. the testing movement, the tracking of immigrant populations, etc. His categories are a bit reductive, but it's a useful book and will provide some much needed context.
Also, Tyack's THE ONE BEST SYSTEM (1974).This is a fantastic book, if you haven't already read it. It has a narrative drive that is rare in histories of education. I went on to amazon where one customer wrote:
Ellen Lagemann (1989) has observed, "One cannot understand the history of education in the United States in the twentieth century unless one realizes that Edward L. Thorndike won and John Dewey lost" (p.185).
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