- The following answers questions pertaining to John Dewey's Thinking In Education essay.
Why is "learning more about ourselves and the world" (para 1) crucial to thought and education?
Learning about ourselves and the world enables us to expand ourselves intellectually. In doing so, we are able to widen our margin of thought, enabling us to think critically. Learning about ourselves and the world involves action, and with action comes experience. These experiences, and our thoughts behind them, act as a base for which we attribute and relate new, incoming knowledge to. It is easier to grasp new concepts in class when you have an experience to relate them to, and the active process of “learning more about ourselves and the world” is how we obtain this experience.
Dewey states that for some people thinking is cut off from experience. How could this be true? What are its consequences?
Dewey infers that experience is “confined to the senses and appetites; to a mere material world” (Dewey, 559). Dewey defines thinking as being “occupied with spiritual or at least literary things,” and attributes thinking to originate from a “higher faculty of reason” (Dewey 559). They can be “cut off” in the sense that they are two separate entities. One must experience something first, using his or her senses, primarily in a material world. The individual processes these experiences through their senses and processes them mentally, thinking, analyzing, and theorizing. The negative consequences lie in the concept that “how can one be expected to think if they have not yet experienced.” Dewey emphasizes the point that as an instructor, you cannot expect the student to have experienced everything, and that each student has his or her own unique experiences. Jumping to the “thinking” process without having any prior experience will pose as a challenge.
What is the relationship between a student being given something to do and being given something to learn?
When I attempt to differentiate between the concepts of “something to do” and “something to learn, I come up with the following. Something to learn refers to being given information verbally or by way of text, and attempting to comprehend that information. A teacher may stand up in the front of a class and verbally transmit information to the class, expecting the student to understand. Giving a student something to do promotes the student to perform some sort of action. This action may involve a hands on process, or anything else that physically involves “doing something.” This may refer to taking the information that the teacher has set forth, and analyzing it, discussing it, or thinking about it. The relationship lies in the potential process: the teacher must first give the student something to learn, and then follow up with something to do, pertaining to what that student may learned, or is attempting to learn.
Learning about ourselves and the world enables us to expand ourselves intellectually. In doing so, we are able to widen our margin of thought, enabling us to think critically. Learning about ourselves and the world involves action, and with action comes experience. These experiences, and our thoughts behind them, act as a base for which we attribute and relate new, incoming knowledge to. It is easier to grasp new concepts in class when you have an experience to relate them to, and the active process of “learning more about ourselves and the world” is how we obtain this experience.
Dewey states that for some people thinking is cut off from experience. How could this be true? What are its consequences?
Dewey infers that experience is “confined to the senses and appetites; to a mere material world” (Dewey, 559). Dewey defines thinking as being “occupied with spiritual or at least literary things,” and attributes thinking to originate from a “higher faculty of reason” (Dewey 559). They can be “cut off” in the sense that they are two separate entities. One must experience something first, using his or her senses, primarily in a material world. The individual processes these experiences through their senses and processes them mentally, thinking, analyzing, and theorizing. The negative consequences lie in the concept that “how can one be expected to think if they have not yet experienced.” Dewey emphasizes the point that as an instructor, you cannot expect the student to have experienced everything, and that each student has his or her own unique experiences. Jumping to the “thinking” process without having any prior experience will pose as a challenge.
What is the relationship between a student being given something to do and being given something to learn?
When I attempt to differentiate between the concepts of “something to do” and “something to learn, I come up with the following. Something to learn refers to being given information verbally or by way of text, and attempting to comprehend that information. A teacher may stand up in the front of a class and verbally transmit information to the class, expecting the student to understand. Giving a student something to do promotes the student to perform some sort of action. This action may involve a hands on process, or anything else that physically involves “doing something.” This may refer to taking the information that the teacher has set forth, and analyzing it, discussing it, or thinking about it. The relationship lies in the potential process: the teacher must first give the student something to learn, and then follow up with something to do, pertaining to what that student may learned, or is attempting to learn.