Democracy+and+Education+Chapter+13

Democracy and Education Chapter 13 Summary: Chapter 13 (sec 10 group 5)

In Chapter 13, Dewey explores the nature of method by separating his analysis into three different sections.
 * Summary:** The Nature of Method

In Section 1, Dewey sets out to explain the theory that helps to better understand the connection of subject matter and method with one another. Dualism is said to be the theory that method and subject matter are to be separate affairs. Method is described by Dewey to be "a consideration of the ways in which this antecedent subject matter may be best presented to and impressed upon the mind." Subject matter is a systematized classifying of the facts of mankind and the surrounding world. This notion of dualism when broken done in the scientific world was found to be false; "method means that arrangement of subject matter which makes it most effective in use." The view point of method can be seen from many different foundations, Dewey encourages the understanding of the theory of method from the person dealing with the subject matter. He formally suggests that method is the effective direction of subject matter to desired results. This belief of how methods and subject matter connect is understood to be a way of using subject matter to reach an end. Experience is also said to play a crucial role in the belief that there is no conscious separation of method and subject matter in well running functions; however when experience is reflected upon, it is easy to see the distinction of what we experience and how we experience it. "[Experience]...is a single continuous interaction of a great diversity of energies. Lastly, Dewey goes on to discuss the evils in education that happen from the isolation of subject matter and method. a. neglect of concrete situations of experience, no discovery of a method can happen without cases to study. b. false conceptions of discipline and interest. c. the act of learning is made a direct and conscious end in itself. d. methods are reduced to a cut and dried routine.
 * 1. The Unity of Subject Matter and Method**

Important issues in regards to the nature of method are associated with knowledge of the past, of technique, of materials, of the ways in which one's own best results are assured. These matters create the material for what is called the general method. "There exists a cumulative body of fairly stable methods for reaching results, a body authorized by past experience and intellect" (which completely leaves a disregard to the development of the individual. In regards to the individual, the way in which a person's ability compare to another is, according to Dewey, none of the teachers business. "Every individual shall have opportunities to employ his own powers in activities that have meaning.... Imposting an alleged uniform general method upon everybody breeds mediocrity in all but the very exceptional. And measuring originality by deviation from the mass breeds eccentricity in them."
 * 2. Method as General and as Individual**

The method of learning and subject matter that people will have for themselves will vary significantly from each indivdual due to personal instincts, past experiences, and preferences. Dewey names attitudes that which are considered to be key in effective intellectual ways to deal with subject matter. 1. Confidence- denotes straightforwardness with which one goes at what he has to do. 2. Open-mindedness-actively welcomes suggestions and information from all sides. A means of guiding the development of a situation. 3. Single-mindedness-completeness of interest, unity of purpose. 4. Responsibility- the disposition to consider in advance the probable consequences of any projected step and deliberately to accept them: to accept them in the sense of taking them into account, acknowledging them in action.
 * 3. The Traits of Individual Method**

"Intellectual thoroughness is another name for this attitude"


 * Key Passages:**

I. "Experience as the perception of the connection between something tried and something undergone in consequence is a process. Apart from effort to control the course which the process takes, there is no distinction of subject matter and method." (p. 166) II. "Such reflection upon experience gives rise to a distinction of //what// we experience (the experienced) and the experienc//ing//-the //how//. When we give names to this distinction we have subject matter and method as our terms. (p.167). III. "Experience, in short, is not a combination of mind and world, subject and object, method and subject matter, but is a single continuous interaction of a great and diversity (literally countless in number) of energies." (p.167) IV. "There is no difference between the growth of a plant and the prosperous development of an experience. It is not easy, in either case, to seize upon just the factors which make for its best movement. But study of cases of success and failure and minute and extensive comparison, helps to seize upon causes. When we have arranged these causes in order, we have a method of procedure or a technique." (p. 168) V. "'Methods' have then to be authoritatively recommended to teachers, instead of being an expression of their own intelligent observations. Under such circumstances, they have a mechanical uniformity, assumed to be alike for all minds. Where flexible personal experiences are promoted by providing an environment which calls out directed occupations in work and play, the methods ascertained will vary with individuals-for it is certain that each individual has something characteristic in his way of going at things." (p.168) VI. "When the effective way of managing material is treated as something ready-made apart from material, there are just three possible ways in which to establish a relationship lacking by assumption. One is to utilize excitement, shock of pleasure, tickling the palate. Another is to make the consequences of not attending painful; we may use the menace of harm to motivate concern with the alien subject matter. Or a direct appeal may be made to the person to put forth effort without any reason. We may rely upon immediate strain of 'will.'" (p.168-169). VII. "In the third place, the act of learning is made a direct and conscious end in itself. Under normal conditions, learning is a product and reward of occupation with subject matter. Children do not set out, consciously, to learn walking or talking. One sets out to give impulses for communication and for fuller intercourse with others a show. He learns in consequence of his direct activities." (p.169). VIII. "Education also had its general methods. And if the application of this remark is more obvious in the case of the teacher than of the pupil, it is equally real in the case of the latter. Part of his learning, a very important part, consists in //becoming// master of the methods which the experience of others has shown to be more efficient in like cases of getting knowledge. These general methods are in no way opposed to individual initiative and originality-to personal ways of doing things. On the contrary they are reinforcements of them. For there is radical difference between even the most general method and a prescribed rule. The latter is a //direct// guide to action; the former operates indirectly through the enlightenment it supplies as to ends and means. It operates, that is to say, through intelligence, and not through conformity to orders externally imposed." (p.171) IX. "Ordinary persons are then expected to be ordinary. Only the exceptional are allowed to have originality. The measure of difference between the average student and the genius is a measure of the absence of originality in the former. But this notion of mind in general is a fiction. How one person's abilities compare in quantity with those of another is none of the teacher's business. It is irrelevant to his work. What is required is that every individual shall have opportunities to employ his own powers in activities that have meaning. [...] Imposing an alleged uniform general method upon everybody breeds mediocrity in all but the very exceptional." (p.172-173). X. "Confidence is a good name for what is intended by the term directness. It should not be confused, however with //self//-confidence which may be a form of self-consciousness-or of 'cheek.' [...] It denotes the straightforwardness with which one goes at what he has to do. It denotes not //conscious// trust in the efficacy of one's power but unconscious faith in the possibilities of the situation. it signifies rising to the needs of the situation." (p.174) XI. "Openness of mind means accessibility of mind to any and every consideration that will throw light upon the situation that needs to be cleared up, and that will help determine the consequences of acting this way or that. [...] Open-mindedness means retention of the childlike attitude; closed mindedness means premature intellectual old age." (p.175) XII. "What is native, spontaneous, and vital in mental reaction goes unused and untested, and the habits formed are such that these qualities become less and less available for public and avowed ends." (p.178) XIII. "By responsibility as an element in intellectual attitude is meant the disposition to consider in advance the probable consequences of any projected step and deliberately to accept them: to accept them in the sense of taking them into account, acknowledging them in action, not yielding a mere verbal accent." (p.178)


 * Important Terminology:**

1. "Dualism"-The idea that mind and the world of things and persons are two separate and independent realms [...] [which] carries with it the conclusion that method and subject matter of instruction are separate affairs. (p.164)

2. "Method"-That arrangement of subject matter which makes it most effective in use. Never is method something outside of the material. (p.165)

3. Experience- the perception of the connection between something tried and something undergone in consequence is a process (p.166) -"single continuous interaction of a great diversity of energies"(p.167)

4. "Intellectual thoroughness"- can be considered an "attitude," it is about being "conscientious" and is "seeing a thing through" (p. 179)

1. What is the correct theory in what to do in relation to the unity of method and subject matter? Is it better to keep them isolated, or accept that they are interwined and work from that point forward?**
 * Discussion Guiding Questions: