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Essay / John Dewey's Impact on Western Education
John Dewey was arguably the most prominent educational thinker of the 20th century. Its principles sparked a series of changes that impacted what are today broadly considered best practices in education. He believed that the way education was organized in his time made school seem uninteresting to students while life outside of school was very interesting. The model of education at the time was the assembly line. So it was about preparing students to fit into a mold designed without much consideration for the student's intrinsic interests or needs. Additionally, the school system has not adequately prepared students to discover and maximize their potential. Students were simply taught a basic set of skills so that they could excel in specific jobs (Cole, 2020). For example, if manufacturing industries needed machinists, that's what students were trained for. Little thought was given to discovering what their natural inclinations were or what might suit them best. In Dewey's view, this was not an effective means of achieving social efficiency in child rearing. He believed that they should learn how to learn rather than learning a simple set of skills. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an Original EssayReading, writing, and arithmetic were the main goals of the schools. Learning to read, count and write is necessary for living a meaningful life, but is this the only purpose of education? Many thinkers have attempted to answer the question: what is the purpose of education? Cognitive psychologist Jean Piaget once said: “The main objective of education is to create men capable of doing new things, and not simply to repeat what other generations have done; creative, inventive and discovering men and women, capable of being critical and verifying, and not accepting, everything that is proposed to them.” This echoes what John Dewey stood for in his day. According to Dewey, “Education is not a preparation for life; it is life itself. The child lives in the present. The future has no meaning for him. It is therefore absurd to expect him to do things for future preparation. As the child lives in the present, the educational process will naturally be based on the child's current needs and interests” (Ayala 2020). This is the essence of the Latin expression “non scholæ sed vitæ discimus”, which means “We do not learn for school, but for life”. It is possible to model at school what is happening in society since the school can be considered a microcosm of the outside world. When students are given supervisory duties or allowed to participate in student leadership, valuable lessons in democracy can be instilled. Another goal of education identified by Dewey is experience. He said that education contributes “to the process of reconstructing experience, giving it a more socialized value through increased individual effectiveness.” Therefore, as the child interacts with their environment and the tools available, there occurs an unconscious reconstruction of a valuable experience that eventually becomes a part of who they are. In an enriched school environment, there is always a continuous search for creative ways to make each experience educational. If a child is facing a problem that causes anxiety, this might be a good opportunity for them to develop a strategy to alleviate the problem.effects or to avoid it. The child's latent qualities or abilities can thus be developed according to his or her own abilities and not according to a fixed criterion. One principle that emerges from all of Dewey's ideas is that students can learn much more effectively by doing or participating in activities. relevant learning experiences rather than simple observation. He was a tireless advocate for meaningful, hands-on activities that engage learners at their skill level. Since every experience has the potential to affect the learner either positively or negatively, teachers must deliberately design such experiences that will have the desired impact. Today, any good school prides itself on providing students with ample opportunities to learn through hands-on sessions in the classroom, in the field, in workshops and laboratories. The traditional vocational education system prepared learners for specific roles. Dewey was critical of the concept of using vocational training to provide manpower for industry. Students were being prepared for jobs in which they might be trapped for the rest of their lives. Interest in vocational education in the early 20th century was driven in part by major economic and social changes. Factory owners faced a shortage of skilled labor in a rapidly industrializing society. "Dewey opposed vocational education because he believed it built a class distinction directly into the design" of public education, says David Stern, whose research focuses on the relationship between education and work. “And I think history has proven him right” (Walsh, 2015). Eventually, in the 1990s, professional programs became something of a dumping ground for students who were not successful in mainstream academics due to behavioral problems or learning disabilities. Dewey's idea was that the theory and practical aspects of a discipline should be presented to the child according to his interests and propensities. Progressive education asserted that students should be interested in what they were learning and that the curriculum should be relevant to their lives. He considered learning by doing and developing practical skills in daily life to be very important in education (Levin, 2014). IB education was created to provide a challenging and comprehensive education that would enable students to understand and manage the complexities of our world and provide them with skills and attitudes to take responsible actions for the future . These goals align with Dewey's principles of social effectiveness and education for life. The IB school environment is organized in such a way that activities in the outside world are reflected exactly as Dewey proposed. Students have the opportunity to encounter real-life problems through daily activities, including CAS which provides a platform for risk-taking, open-mindedness, communication and kindness. These qualities of the IB learner profile are rooted in Dewey's principles. Perhaps the most notable profile that aligns remarkably with Dewey's principles is inquiry-based learning. Dewey emphasized that “inquiry should be used to achieve balance in nature. Because it is through our inquiry that reflective organisms are able to consider probable actions and measures for their self-sufficiency and the improvement of conditions” (Hickman, 2007). Unlike previous teaching models, which relied on :/69151.