The Nature of Subject Matter
Summary. The subject matter of education consists primarily of the
Chapter Fifteen: Play and Work in the Curriculum
Summary. In the previous chapter we found that the primary subject
Chapter Sixteen: The Significance of Geography and History
Summary. It is the nature of an experience to have implications which
Chapter Seventeen: Science in the Course of Study
Summary. Science represents the fruition of the cognitive factors in
Chapter Eighteen: Educational Values
Summary. Fundamentally, the elements involved in a discussion of value
Chapter Nineteen: Labor and Leisure
Summary. Of the segregations of educational values discussed in the
Chapter Twenty: Intellectual and Practical Studies
Summary. The Greeks were induced to philosophize by the increasing
Chapter Twenty-one: Physical and Social Studies: Naturalism and Humanism
Summary. The philosophic dualism between man and nature is reflected in
Chapter Twenty-two: The Individual and the World
Summary. True individualism is a product of the relaxation of the grip
Chapter Twenty-Three: Vocational Aspects of Education
Summary. A vocation signifies any form of continuous activity which
Chapter Twenty-four: Philosophy of Education
Summary. After a review designed to bring out the philosophic issues
Chapter Twenty-five: Theories of Knowledge
Summary. Such social divisions as interfere with free and full
Chapter Twenty-six: Theories of Morals
Summary. The most important problem of moral education in the school
Chapter One:
Education as a Necessity of Life
1. Renewal of Life by Transmission. The most notable distinction between living and inanimate things is that the former maintain themselves by renewal. A stone when struck resists. If its resistance is greater than the force of the blow struck, it remains outwardly unchanged. Otherwise, it is shattered into smaller bits. Never does the stone attempt to react in such a way that it may maintain itself against the blow, much less so as to render the blow a contributing factor to its own continued action. While the living thing may easily be crushed by superior force, it none the less tries to turn the energies which act upon it into means of its own further existence. If it cannot do so, it does not just split into smaller pieces (at least in the higher forms of life), but loses its identity as a living thing.
As long as it endures, it struggles to use surrounding energies in its own behalf. It uses light, air, moisture, and the material of soil. To say that it uses them is to say that it turns them into means of its own conservation. As long as it is growing, the energy it expends in thus turning the environment to account is more than compensated for by the return it gets: it grows. Understanding the word "control" in this sense, it may be said that a living being is one that subjugates and controls for its own continued activity the energies that would otherwise use it up. Life is a self-renewing process through action upon the environment.
In all the higher forms this process cannot be kept up indefinitely. After a while they succumb; they die. The creature is not equal to the task of indefinite self-renewal. But continuity of the life process is not dependent upon the prolongation of the existence of any one individual. Reproduction of other forms of life goes on in continuous sequence. And though, as the geological record shows, not merely individuals but also species die out, the life process continues in increasingly complex forms. As some species die out, forms better adapted to utilize the obstacles against which they struggled in vain come into being. Continuity of life means continual readaptation of the environment to the needs of living organisms.
We have been speaking of life in its lowest terms—as a physical thing. But we use the word "Life" to denote the whole range of experience, individual and racial. When we see a book called the Life of Lincoln we do not expect to find within its covers a treatise on physiology. We look for an account of social antecedents; a description of early surroundings, of the conditions and occupation of the family; of the chief episodes in the development of character; of signal struggles and achievements; of the individual's hopes, tastes, joys and sufferings. In precisely similar fashion we speak of the life of a savage tribe, of the Athenian people, of the American nation. "Life" covers customs, institutions, beliefs, victories and defeats, recreations and occupations.
We employ the word "experience" in the same pregnant sense. And to it, as well as to life in the bare physiological sense, the principle of continuity through renewal applies. With the renewal of physical existence goes, in the case of human beings, the recreation of beliefs, ideals, hopes, happiness, misery, and practices. The continuity of any experience, through renewing of the social group, is a literal fact. Education, in its broadest sense, is the means of this social continuity of life. Every one
