SHENMO MOTTO: Virtue & Wisdom

 

Today, "The Star" will introduce an American philosopher and educator, John Dewey.

 

John Dewey, an American philosopher and educator who helped found pragmatism. Starting from pragmatic empiricism and functional psychology, he put forward his basic view on the nature of education—Education is life itself.

 

“Education is life itself.”

 

“I believe that education, therefore, is a process of living and not a preparation for future living.” “Life is development, and that developing, growing, is life.” he said. Therefore, the best education is to learn from life and learn from experience.

 

Education means the enterprise of supplying the conditions which insure growth, or adequacy of life, irrespective of age.

 

Since life is growth, the development of children is the process of primitive instinctive growth. Therefore, Dewey emphasizes: "Since growth is the characteristic of life, education is all one with growing” In his view, education is not to force children to absorb things, but to grow their natural abilities.

 

Thus, Dewey believes that the educational process has no end beyond itself; it is its own end. In fact, what he opposes is that the formal goal of a child's growth is imposed from the outside.

 

The best education is to learn from life and learn from experience.” that is to seriously answer each “why” of the child/student and take seriously their emotions and actions from each contact with things; we should realize that these are as important as exam results, which is the life quality education that closer to personal growth than classroom knowledge.

 

The process of education runs through people's life. Each of us should develop the quality of lifelong learning. The words and deeds, practice and success and failure on the road of growth are all the embodiment of education, and the best guide, namely, the best education lies in the inspiration and guidance from the parents and teachers based on love, which can truly reach into the heart of the children/students to cultivate their thoughts and minds.

 

The educational process has no end beyond itself; it is its own end.” This is a misunderstanding about education. When we talk about why we should receive education, the answer is often related to the material, such as studying at a high-quality university, getting a good diploma, having a certain social status, being a wealthy person or living a comfortable life, these are all mentioned above by Mr. Dewey as "the formal goal of a child's growth is imposed from the outside."

 

Putting all these things aside, the essence of education must be embodied more in thought–for the children to grow better and for the country to develop better...

 

Many people think that education means to acquire knowledge from the textbook, pass various examinations, achieve a high ranking, become an "excellent student", study at a high-quality university and work in an excellent enterprise; but in reality, education is closely related to life and growth. Education lies not only in the classroom or ranking but also in the combination of students' life, psychology and growth, so that they can both acquire the theoretical knowledge and internalize the knowledge.