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Experience and Project: Dewey thought Translated into Pedagogical Action
Place of publication | Year of publication | Collation: 
Québec | 2016 | p. 23–34
ISBN/ISSN: 
ISSN 1925-4873 (numérique)
Author: 
Marc Boutet
Corporate author: 
Phronesis
Region: 
Europe and North America

John Dewey talks about child as an «agency of doing» which, by its action, strives to create meaning. From this view, Dewey offers new teaching principles focusing on learning in a context of free activity rather than in a context of restrictive discipline. The child is no longer just invited to represent the phenomenon to understand, it is somehow invited to meet it, to experience it, experience being defined as a transaction between the human being and physical and social environment. Dewey also said that the lack of continuity in the experience marks the beginning of the learning process, he called inquiry, no longer described as essentially individualistic, which bases his epistemic perception of democracy. After briefly describing our meeting with Dewey’s educational thought, we will try to establish, from his conception of action, inquiry and democracy, how his thought can be considered as a foundation for a major innovation educational innovation symbolizing education reform in Quebec of the 2000s: the project approach.

Resource Type: 
International normative instruments / policy and advocacy documents
Curriculum, teaching-learning materials and guides
Theme: 
Civic / Citizenship / Democracy
Transformative initiatives / Transformative pedagogies
Level of education: 
Primary education
Secondary education