PROGRESSIVISM Chapter Report

BOOK IDENTIFICATION

Title of the book: Curriculum Renewal in School foreign Language Learning.

Title of chapter : Progressivism The writer : John L. Cark. The year of publication:1987 Publisher: Oxford University Press

WHAT IS PROGRESSIVISM?

Progressivism is the educational philosophy which is grounded in the “pure” philosophy of pragmatism.

Pragmatic ontology holds that reality is in the area of everyday life, personal experience. Its view is that ideas should be tested for their utility.

Progressivism focuses on real-world problem solving and individual development.

The leading spokesmen for progressivism were the academic philosopher John Dewey and Rousseau

THE FOCUS OF PROGRESSIVISM Individual growth from within through interaction

with a favourable environment. Learning through experience (learning by doing

rather than by being taught) A speculative view of knowledge (knowledge is

never static). Natural learning processes and stages of

development. Sensitivity to the interests, rhythms, and styles of

learning of individual learners. The learner as a whole person The social nature of the learner and the

development of healthy relationship with others in the classroom community.

The promotion of learner responsibility and of learning how to learn.

PROGRESSIVISM IN CURRICULUM DESIGN

It is a process approach design. It emphasizes methodology and the need for

principles to govern the teaching/learning process.

The principles of process approach are designed to promote inquiry, activity, discussion, reflection, and open-ended personal interpretations feature in the classroom.

Classical humanist approach content Reconstructionist approach objectives Progressivist approach methodology

SOME CONCRETE PROPOSALS AND PRACTICES UNDERLYING THE PROCESS APPROACH

1. A pre-production phaseAs pointed out by Krashen and Terrel that this phase

involves little real communication. The sort of activities suggested for this phase are indicated below. All involve a great deal of teacher-talk.

Commands and instruction Routine classroom management talk Descriptions of objects, people, or diagrams for

pupils to draw. Story-telling, with pictures to assist

understanding.

2. The Procedural syllabus The tasks were to be selected on two principles:

that they should represent an appropriate level of challenge (neither too easy nor too difficult) for the pupil, and that they should engage the pupil’s mind, so that there would be a genuine preoccupation with understanding, thinking out, doing, or saying something.

Brumfit has called the deep-end approach in which the learners first communicate as far as possible with what they can.

3. The deep-end approach Breen and Candlin (1980) proposed such a version

of ‘process’ approach which permits concious observation of language experienced, discovery of rules, and metalingual discussion.

PROGRESSIVISM IN CURRICULUM RENEWAL

Progressivist curriculum renewal is both teacher-based and school based.

It tends to place its emphasis on the need for teachers to work out their own solutions to their own curricular problems in the context of their own school.

A CRITIQUE OF PROGRESSIVISM

This approach has seldom been applied in any serious way in education because it is difficult to criticize it from an experiential viewpoint.

PROGRESSIVISM (RICHARD’S ARTICLE)

Richards discussed the progressivism on his article as Central Design. Curriculum development starts with the selection of teaching activities, techniques and methods rather than with the elaboration of a detailed language syllabus or specification of learning outcomes.

(Curriculum Approaches in Language Teaching: Forward, Central, and Backward Design)

Jack C. Richards

IMPLEMENTING CENTRAL DESIGN

Methodology

Content

Outcomes

THE CENTRAL DESIGN PROCESS

Process

Content

Outcomes

PROGRESSIVISM (WINCH AND GINGELL)

In this book, progressivism is viewed as a cluster of doctrines concerning pedagogy, aims, and the curriculum. It emphasizes on the individual child as the centre of pedagogic concern.

BOOK REVIEW

Clark’s book discusses progressivism broadly. It presents many discussions from other progressivists. Therefore, this book gives us more understanding about how progressivism applied in education system. On the other hand, there are so many subheadings that may lead the reader to the confusion.

In Richard’s article on “Curriculum Approaches in Language Teaching: Forward, Central, and Backward Design”, progressivism is discussed briefly in the relation of how it is applied to the curriculum design process. This article discusses progressivism in an easy way to understand.

In Winch and Gingell’s book on Philosophy of Education: The Key Concepts, they further discuss the progressivism in relation to how the two key figures, Rousseau and Dewey, view this doctrine. Also, they present how progressivism is implemented in America.

CONCLUSION

By understanding this philosophy of education, as a teacher, we have to know which approach can suit well to our learners’ needs. Despite of the good points of process approach underlying this philosophy, there are some weak points that a teacher should be aware of.