Part 6 (1/2)

It equally follows that e compare studies as to their values, that is, treat the beyond themselves, that which controls their proper valuation is found in the specific situation in which they are to be used The way to enable a student to apprehend the instrumental value of arithmetic is not to lecture him upon the benefit it will be to him in some remote and uncertain future, but to let hi depends upon ability to use number

It also follows that the atte different studies is a uided one, in spite of the a Science for exa upon the situation into which it enters as a means To some the value of scienceical, a tool for engineering; or it may be commercial-an aid in the successful conduct of business; under other conditions, its worthhuain itone's social status as an ”educated” person As matter of fact, science serves all these purposes, and it would be an arbitrary task to try to fix upon one of them as its ”real” end All that we can be sure of educationally is that science should be taught so as to be an end in itself in the lives of students-so worth while on account of its own unique intrinsic contribution to the experience of life Pri which seems to be at the opposite pole, like poetry, the same sort of statement applies It may be that, at the present time, its chief value is the contribution it makes to the enjoyenerate condition rather than anything necessary Poetry has historically been allied with religion andthe s It has had an enormous patriotic value Homer to the Greeks was a Bible, a textbook of morals, a history, and a national inspiration In any case, itpoetry a resource in the business of life as well as in its leisure, has so the matter with it-or else the poetry is artificial poetry

The same considerations apply to the value of a study or a topic of a study with reference to itsthe course of study should have grounds for thinking that the studies and topics included furnish both direct incre of lives of the pupils and also materials which they can put to use in other concerns of direct interest Since the curriculu loaded doith purely inherited traditional y of soroup of persons in behalf of so dear to them, it requires constant inspection, criticis its purpose Then there is always the probability that it represents the values of adults rather than those of children and youth, or those of pupils a generation ago rather than those of the present day Hence a further need for a critical outlook and survey But these considerations do notvalue to a pupil (whether intrinsic or instru as for him to be aware of the value, or to be able to tell what the study is good for

In the first place, as long as any topic makes an iood for This is a question which can be asked only about instru; they are just goods Any other notion leads to an absurdity For we cannot stop asking the question about an instruood for so intrinsically good, good for itself To a hungry, healthy child, food is a good of the situation; we do not have to bring him to consciousness of the ends subserved by food in order to supply a motive to eat The food in connection with his appetite is a er pupils with respect to many topics Neither they nor the teacher could possibly foretell with any exactness the purposes learning is to accoerness continues is it advisable to try to specify particular goods which are to coood is found in the fact that the pupil responds; his response is use His response to the material shows that the subject functions in his life It is unsound to urge that, say, Latin has a value per se in the abstract, just as a study, as a sufficient justification for teaching it But it is equally absurd to argue that unless teacher or pupil can point out sonable future use to which it is to be put, it lacks justifying value When pupils are genuinely concerned in learning Latin, that is of itself proof that it possesses value The most which one is entitled to ask in such cases is whether in view of the shortness of tis of intrinsic value which in addition have greater instrus us to the matter of instrumental values-topics studied because of some end beyond themselves If a child is ill and his appetite does not lead him to eat when food is presented, or if his appetite is perverted so that he prefers candy to etables, conscious reference to results is indicated He needs to be made conscious of consequences as a justification of the positive or negative value of certain objects Or the state of things h, and yet an individual not be rasp how his attainood depends upon active concern hat is presented In such cases, it is obviously the part of wisdoeneral what is desirable is that a topic be presented in such a way that it either have an immediate value, and require no justification, or else be perceived to be aof intrinsic value An instru a means to an end It ical interest in the matter of values of studies is not either excessive or else too narrow Soetic for topics which no longer operate to any purpose, direct or indirect, in the lives of pupils At other tione to the extent of supposing that no subject or topic should be taught unless some quite definite future utility can be pointed out by thosethe course of study or by the pupil himself, un; and that definite utilities which can be pointed out are themselves justified only because they increase the experienced content of life itself 3 The Segregation and Organization of Values It is of course possible to classify in a general way the various valuable phases of life In order to get a survey of aiive breadth and flexibility to the enterprise of education, there is soreat ard these values as ultimate ends to which the concrete satisfactions of experience are subordinate They are nothing but generalizations, oods Health, wealth, efficiency, sociability, utility, culture, happiness itself are only abstract terard such things as standards for the valuation of concrete topics and process of education is to subordinate to an abstraction the concrete facts from which the abstraction is derived They are not in any true sense standards of valuation; these are found, as we have previously seen, in the specific realizations which fornificance as points of view elevated above the details of life whence to survey the field and see how its constituent details are distributed, and whether they are well proportioned No classification can have other than a provisional validity The following may prove of some help We may say that the kind of experience to which the work of the schools should contribute is one ement of resources and obstacles encountered (efficiency); by sociability, or interest in the direct companionshi+p of others; by aesthetic taste or capacity to appreciate artistic excellence in at least some of its classic forms; by trained intellectual method, or interest in some mode of scientific achievehts and claims of others-conscientiousness And while these considerations are not standards of value, they are useful criteria for survey, criticis methods and subject eneral points of view is the greater because of a tendency to segregate educational values due to the isolation from one another of the various pursuits of life The idea is prevalent that different studies represent separate kinds of values, and that the curriculuether various studies till a sufficient variety of independent values have been cared for The following quotation does not use the word value, but it contains the notion of a curriculum constructed on the idea that there are a number of separate ends to be reached, and that various studieseach study to its respective end ”Mees and history; taste is trained by the lish literature; i, but chiefly by Greek and Latin poetry; observation by science work in the laboratory, though soes of Latin and Greek; for expression, Greek and Latin colish co, , science co, the Greek and Roeneral history next Hence the narrowest education which can claie, solish literature, and one science” There is e which is irrelevant to our point and which y betrays the particular provincial tradition within which the author is writing There is the unquestioned assumption of ”faculties” to be trained, and a does; there is coard of the earth on which men happen to live and the bodies they happen to carry around with them But with allowances made for these matters (even with their complete abandonment) we find much in contemporary educational philosophy which parallels the fundaated studies Even when some one end is set up as a standard of value, like social efficiency or culture, it will often be found to be but a verbal heading under which a variety of disconnected factors are coreater variety of values to a given study than does the passage quoted, yet the atte to each study and to state the aiven study possesses eration

As ely but unconscious justifications of the curriculum hich one is familiar One accepts, for the ns values to theht Mathematics is said to have, for exa the pupil to accuracy of stateiving command of the arts of calculation involved in trade and the arts; culture value in its enlargeeneral relations of things; even religious value in its concept of the infinite and allied ideas But clearly mathematics does not accomplish such results, because it is endoith miraculous potencies called values; it has these values if and when it accomplishes these results, and not otherwise The stateer vision of the possible results to be effected by instruction in mathematical topics But unfortunately, the tendency is to treat the state in the subject, whether they operate or not, and thus to give it a rigid justification If they do not operate, the blaht, but on the indifference and recalcitrancy of pupils

This attitude toward subjects is the obverse side of the conception of experience or life as a patchwork of independent interests which exist side by side and limit one another Students of politics are faovernment There are supposed to be independent separate functions, like the legislative, executive, judicial, adoes well if each of these checks all the others and thus creates an ideal balance There is a philosophy which ht well be called the check and balance theory of experience Life presents a diversity of interests Left to themselves, they tend to encroach on one another The ideal is to prescribe a special territory for each till the whole ground of experience is covered, and then see to it each remains within its own boundaries Politics, business, recreation, art, science, the learned professions, polite intercourse, leisure, represent such interests Each of these ramifies into many branches: business into , railroading, banking, agriculture, trade and commerce, etc, and so with each of the others An ideal education would then supply the eon-holed interests And e look at the schools, it is easy to get the impression that they accept this view of the nature of adult life, and set for the its deed as a kind of fixed institution to which so in the course of study must correspond The course of study must then have some civics and history politically and patriotically viewed: some utilitarian studies; some science; some art (mainly literature of course); some provision for recreation; some e part of current agitation about schools is concerned with claiven to each of these interests, and with struggles to secure for each its due share in the course of study; or, if this does not see school syste to meet the need In the otten

The obvious outcoestion of the course of study, overpressure and distraction of pupils, and a narrow specialization fatal to the very idea of education But these bad results usually lead toas a remedy When it is perceived that after all the requirements of a full life experience are not met, the deficiency is not laid to the isolation and narrowness of the teaching of the existing subjects, and this recognition anization of the syste to be made up for by the introduction of still another study, or, if necessary, another kind of school And as a rule those who object to the resulting overcrowding and consequent superficiality and distraction usually also have recourse to a reat ood old curriculuood and equally old-fashi+oned curriculuher education

The situation has, of course, its historic explanation Various epochs of the past have had their own characteristic struggles and interests Each of these great epochs has left behind itself a kind of cultural deposit, like a geologic stratum These deposits have found their way into educational institutions in the form of studies, distinct courses of study, distinct types of schools With the rapid change of political, scientific, and economic interests in the last century, provision had to be h the older courses resisted, they have had at least in this country to retire their pretensions to a anized in content and aim; they have only been reduced in a the new interests, have not been used to transform the method and aim of all instruction; they have been injected and added on The result is a conglomerate, the ceram or time table Thence arises the scheme of values and standards of value which we have mentioned

This situation in education represents the divisions and separations which obtain in social life The variety of interests which should mark any rich and balanced experience have been torn asunder and deposited in separate institutions with diverse and independent purposes and methods Business is business, science is science, art is art, politics is politics, social intercourse is social intercourse, morals is morals, recreation is recreation, and so on Each possesses a separate and independent province with its own peculiar ai Each contributes to the others only externally and accidentally All of theether make up the whole of life by just apposition and addition What does one expect from business save that it should furnishbooks and pictures, tickets to concerts which ifts and other things of social and ethical value? How unreasonable to expect that the pursuit of business should be itself a culture of the iination, in breadth and refineh theprinciple and be conducted as an enterprise in behalf of social organization! The sa is to be said, mutatis mutandis, of the pursuit of art or science or politics or religion Each has become specialized not merely in its appliances and its de spirit Unconsciously, our course of studies and our theories of the educational values of studies reflect this division of interests The point at issue in a theory of educational value is then the unity or integrity of experience How shall it be full and varied without losing unity of spirit? How shall it be one and yet not narrow and monotonous in its unity? Ultimately, the question of values and a standard of values is the anization of the interests of life Educationally, the question concerns that organization of schools, materials, and methods which will operate to achieve breadth and richness of experience How shall we secure breadth of outlook without sacrificing efficiency of execution? How shall we secure the diversity of interests, without paying the price of isolation? How shall the individual be rendered executive in his intelligence instead of at the cost of his intelligence? How shall art, science, and politics reinforce one another in an enriched te ends pursued at one another's expense? How can the interests of life and the studies which enforce the anization thus suggested, we shall be concerned in the concluding chapters

Summary Fundamentally, the elements involved in a discussion of value

have been covered in the prior discussion of aienerally discussed in connection with the claims of the various studies of the curriculum, the consideration of aim and interest is here resumed from the point of view of special studies The ters On the one hand, it denotes the attitude of prizing a thing finding it worth while, for its own sake, or intrinsically This is a name for a full or complete experience To value in this sense is to appreciate But to value also means a distinctively intellectual act-an operation of co-to valuate This occurs when direct full experience is lacking, and the question arises which of the various possibilities of a situation is to be preferred in order to reach a full realization, or vital experience

We must not, however, divide the studies of the curriculum into the appreciative, those concerned with intrinsic value, and the instrumental, concerned with those which are of value or ends beyond themselves The formation of proper standards in any subject depends upon a realization of the contribution which it nificance of experience, upon a direct appreciation Literature and the fine arts are of peculiar value because they represent appreciation at its best-a heightened realization of h selection and concentration But every subject at some phase of its development should possess, what is for the individual concerned with it, an aesthetic quality

Contribution to immediate intrinsic values in all their variety in experience is the only criterion for deter the worth of instrun separate values to each study and to regard the curriculuation of segregated values is a result of the isolation of social groups and classes Hence it is the business of education in a deainst this isolation in order that the various interests may reinforce and play into one another

Chapter Nineteen: Labor and Leisure

1 The Origin of the Opposition

The isolation of ai leads to opposition between them Probably the most deep-seated antithesis which has shown itself in educational history is that between education in preparation for useful labor and education for a life of leisure The bare terms ”useful labor” and ”leisure” confiration and conflict of values are not self-inclosed, but reflect a division within social life Were the two functions of gaining a livelihood by work and enjoying in a cultivated way the opportunities of leisure, distributed equally a the different members of a community, it would not occur to any one that there was any conflict of educational agencies and aims involved It would be self-evident that the question was how education could contribute ht be found that some materials of instruction chiefly accomplished one result and other subject matter the other, it would be evident that careas conditions permit; that is, the education which had leisure more directly in view should indirectly reinforce as much as possible the efficiency and the enjoy at the latter should produce habits of emotion and intellect which would procure a worthy cultivation of leisure These general considerations are amply borne out by the historical development of educational philosophy The separation of liberal education frooes back to the time of the Greeks, and was formulated expressly on the basis of a division of classes into those who had to labor for a living and those ere relieved from this necessity The conception that liberal education, adapted to her than the servile training given to the latter class reflected the fact that one class was free and the other servile in its social status The latter class labored not only for its own subsistence, but also for the means which enabled the superior class to live without personally engaging in occupations taking ale or reward intelligence

That a certain a Hus have to live and it requires work to supply the resources of life Even if we insist that the interests connected with getting a living are only material and hence intrinsically lower than those connected with enjoyment of time released fro engrossing and insubordinate in material interests which leads theher ideal interests, this would not-barring the fact of socially divided classes-lead to neglect of the kind of education which trains men for the useful pursuits It would rather lead to scrupulous care for them, so that men were trained to be efficient in them and yet to keep them in their place; education would see to it that we avoided the evil results which flow frolect Only when a division of these interests coincides with a division of an inferior and a superior social class will preparation for useful work be looked down upon with conte: a fact which prepares one for the conclusion that the rigid identification of ith material interests, and leisure with ideal interests is itself a social product The educational formulations of the social situation o have been so influential and give such a clear and logical recognition of the i and leisure classes, that they deserve especial note According to thehest place in the scheme of animate existence In part, he shares the constitution and functions of plants and animals-nutritive, reproductive, motor or practical The distinctively hu the spectacle of the universe Hence the truly human end is the fullest possible of this distinctive huitation, and speculation pursued as an end in itself is the proper life of man From reason moreover proceeds the proper control of the lower elements of human nature-the appetites and the active, reedy, insubordinate, lovers of excess, ai only at their own satiety, they observe moderation-the law of the mean-and serve desirable ends as they are subjected to the rule of reason

Such is the situation as an affair of theoretical psychology and as s is reflected in the constitution of classes of anization of society Only in a comparatively s as a law of life In the etative and anience is so feeble and inconstant that it is constantly overpowered by bodily appetite and passion Such persons are not truly ends in themselves, for only reason constitutes a final end Like plants, animals and physical tools, they areof ends beyond theence to exercise a certain discretion in the execution of the tasks committed to them Thus by nature, and not merely by social convention, there are those who are slaves-that is, reat body of artisans are in one important respect worse off than even slaves Like the latter they are given up to the service of ends external to themselves; but since they do not enjoy the intimate association with the free superior class experienced by domestic slaves they remain on a lower plane of excellence Moreover, wo the animate instrumentalities of production and reproduction of the means for a free or rational life

Individually and collectively there is a gulf betweenworthily In order that one may live worthily he must first live, and so with collective society The ti of subsistence, detracts from that available for activities that have an inherent rational ; they also unfit for the latter Means are menial, the serviceable is servile The true life is possible only in the degree in which the physical necessities are had without effort and without attention Hence slaves, artisans, and wo the means of subsistence in order that others, those adequately equipped with intelligence, s intrinsically worth while