ED 429: STUDY GUIDE FOR WEEK SIX: Community and Values

John Dewey, “My Pedagogical Creed: Article Two”:

1. In what way is life in the school community consistent with life at home and the wider community, and in what way does it differ?

Both are "simplified social life," and as such, school life should grow gradually out of home life, picking up and continuing activities which the child is already doing at home. The "best and deepest moral training is that which one gets through having to enter into proper relations with others in a unity of work and thought." The teacher is not there to impose a certain set of content or skills upon the child, but rather to serve as a member of the larger community and to "select the influences which shall affect the child and to assist him in properly responding to these influences." I understand this to mean something like what Montessori teachers are meant to do: very carefully select and maintain a particular organization of *space and materials*; thereafter allow the child considerable freedom in how to maneuver in *time.*

2. In keeping with the vision of school as a form of community, Dewey maintains that a more traditional approach (“school as a place where certain information is to be given, where certain lessons are to be learned, or where certain habits are to be formed”) is bound to be mis-educative. We will return to this in Chapter One of his Experience and Education, but for now note the implications for pedagogy of taking seriously his idea of school as community.

I think it implies more process, less content. More talking, hopefully more listening; more conflict resolution skill-building; more collaboration; more team-building. For better and for worse.

3. Note that the role of the teacher as community member might not be consistent with the role of the parent in many a traditional family structure, where the parent often takes on the trappings of dictator, the unquestioned authority who lays down the law.

Yes. As well, even loving, give-and-take families who are *not* authoritarian or dictating may still value content and skills; so the role of schools and teachers that Dewey lays out may not be consistent with wider community values that *do* want certain information to be given, certain lessons to be learned, certain habits to be inculcated, etc. You don't have to be a lay-down-the-law authoritarian to see value in a sequence of specific skills, or in a "canon" of literature.

4. What does Dewey mean by “the discipline of life”?

Well, I may bring too much prior baggage to this particular word to be able to parse Dewey's meaning fairly. I have thought long and hard, perhaps too long and hard, about what "discipline" means to me; and those musings have forever colored how I read the word, even when used by others.

The sound-byte version of what "discipline" means to me is: the word is rooted in "disciple," as in Christ's disciples. Christ taught mostly by example; some by parable (storytelling); and occasionally by exhortation. He did not rely on either carrots or sticks. He presumably did hope that his disciples would follow his lead, but his "pedagogy" or "management techniques" made pretty clear that he accepted that their will was free. For me, then, discipline means self-discipline: doing the right thing, not because we'll be rewarded if we do or penalized if we don't, but because we believe it is the right thing.

I believe that Dewey is getting to somewhere near this idea. But it's entirely possible that I'm projecting.

Noddings, “Character Education and Community”:

5. The opening section of this chapter is rather technical, but worth slogging through. Note that the key issues are the connection between moral education and community, what constitutes a “community,” and given that a community requires a set of shared values, “how much commonality is required to do the work of character education?” (p. 65).

The key issue that emerges to me in this section is actually the tension between the value on individual autonomy so featured in liberal/rational tradition, vs. the notion that "to educate deeply for character, a community must stand for something" (p. 61). For me, the way this plays out into the sort of storytelling/literature-based character education that, like Noddings, I see as immensely valuable is the tension between the character model of Odysseus (cheerfully tossing a couple of shipmates to Scylla's jaws, for the sake of the rest of the ship -- including his own skin) vs. Frodo and Harry Potter (consistently willing to sacrifice themselves for the sake of a greater good). The notion that there are common principles for which sacrifices to the self are warranted is, for me, the essence of both ethics and (therefore) of character education. For a "community" to concur on a core of commonly held values is hard enough; to grapple with the more fundamental idea that individual autonomy ought sometimes be subordinated to *any* greater common good is, in our culture, even harder.

6. It is also worth noting that the idea of character education is not new, going back to the McGuffey reader and the Character Development League.

Yes. On these particular issues, though -- the presumption of commonly held values and that idea that individual autonomy ought sometimes be sacrificed for a greater common purpose -- the McGuffeys had it somewhat easier, as they were written in a far more unabashedly Christian era (the Christian narrative being the most influential archetype of self-sacrifice for a common purpose in the history of the world; and Christian imagery and language being the most accessible referents to such ideas).

7. What are the hallmarks of a “cognitive” approach to moral education, according to Noddings? What motivated this approach? Seek to summarize the three criticisms of it (pp. 63-64).

Instead of trying to inculcate a list of specific values, cognitive approaches attempt to develop "moral reasoning." As such, it aligns more easily both to a heterogeneous population and also with the value placed in our society on individual autonomy. Criticisms include: 1) better suited to research than teaching; 2) offended parents who in fact wanted a list of specific virtues; and 3) "content emptiness" seemed to aggravate "growing sense of alienation in American society" (p. 64)

8. Throughout this chapter the term “liberal” is used, but this term can be misleading. (Recall its use in the Conceptual Framework.) Think of the phrases “liberal arts,” or “liberal studies” or “liberal democracy” rather than the contrast between political liberals and conservatives. In the sense that Noddings is using the term, a liberal is someone committed to... (I hope that at least one person will come prepared to finish that sentence.)

...individual rights, and a legal framework which protects individual rights against the possibility of tyranny of the majority. The concept actually cuts across partisan lines: The Bill of Rights (including, say, the right to bear arms) is a "liberal" framework; a progressive tax structure aimed at redistributing wealth is not. The Civil Rights Act is "liberal" legislation.; affirmative action programs aimed at redressing wrongs of the past are not. Equal individual access to current opportunities is a "liberal" ideal; redistricting efforts aimed at ensuring that minority groups are able to select leaders within their racial or ethnic groups are not.

9. In the second section, while affirming the centrality of community, Noddings refers to the “dark side” of community. Here she sets up an opposition between two poles or points on a continuum, and quotes with support the call for balance by Paul Tillich. What are the poles here? That is, what is the tension between “extreme individualism” and “fascism” or totalitarian communities? (When the extremes are avoided, this tension is later described as between liberalism and communitarianism; on a pedagogical level, the tension is between cognitive developmentalism and character education. You should be comfortable with all these terms.)

Fascism can be thought of as collective orientation taken to extremes; "Bowling Alone" and widespread unwillingness to pay higher taxes for basic supports such as universal health care can be seen as liberalism taken to extremes. Tillich notes that Nazi Germany embraced character education -- this is the "dark side." The dark side of liberalism would be the sort of not-in-my-backyard, not-out-of-my-paycheck, not-if-there's-any-cost-to-me nihilism that, I would argue, pervades our society today.

10. Note Noddings reference to “cultural knowledge.” We will revisit this idea when we read Greene, who calls for teachers to develop “aesthetic education.” OK

11. Noddings' proposed compromise as between character education and developmentalism is...

Well, back to storytelling, isn't it. She cites Flatland, a truly marvelous story which has a multitude of lessons in it, not least of which is the idea that we cannot even *imagine* a level of existence much different from the one we're in. Of all the many insights in the book, *that* is the one that is my own greatest takeway, and that is the one to which my older kids and I keep returning. It is not, however, Noddings' major takeaway from it: she resonates with the political fable aspects in it, and embraces the vision of math teachers engaging their students in discussions of classism and sexism. That's fine too.

12. Noddings concludes the chapter with the question, “Why are teachers so poorly prepared to draw on stories in their disciplinary instruction?” (p. 72). Is the assumption correct? Are teachers poorly prepared? If so, then why? What is Noddings’ answer? Is her description of what goes on in education schools accurate to your experience here at Fairfield?

It is a little mystifying. I can't think of any good reason why teachers would be poorly prepared to draw on stories, unless they don't themselves *know* stories and the wealth of ways they can be used; which in turn could only have to do with how they themselves were raised and educated. It is possible that there may be anxiety that the very idea of a "canon" of stories and literature smacks of elitism -- I *have* encountered this unease in class discussions at Fairfield, and even, recently, in feedback from an esteemed professor. It may also have to do with the notion that inward-bound reflection (students' own experiences, students' own values, students' own ideas) are more "meaningful" to them than is focus on the texts themselves. This idea certainly does seem to be rampant, although I don't know that it falls on progressive/traditional pedagogical lines. Even the canned off-the-shelf character education programs we were invited to mock did a good bit of this.