John Locke And John Dewey's Influence On Society

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For hundreds of years education has been inching its way towards the fore front of societies around the world. Estelle Jorgensen wrote, “We live in a time of profound change. This reality fundamentally affects our understand of the world and human relationships, the way we live our lives, our beliefs, values, and are relationships with others are constantly changing with the times.” As this time has passed politicians, philosophers, and educators have started to realize the vast importance of the education of a cultures citizens, and the advantages of having an educated society. Educational philosophers like John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, along with more modern philosophers like John Dewey, began to bring forward the importance of the …show more content…

The only American we have discussed to this point was born in 1859 in Burlington, Vermont. Dewey was a highly educated man attending the University of Vermont at the young age of only 16. John Dewey was greatly influenced by evolutionary theory, as well as a Pragmatic philosophy, which is a system that assesses the truth of theories by their successes in practical applications. John Dewey believed that education should serve not only for the individual’s advancement but for, “community enrichment and harmony.” Which was hard within the United States at his time because of the vast religious, ethnic, and cultural differences within the society, something that is by some considered to be even more of a standing issue in today’s educational society with religious and racial tensions at an all-time high. Dewey criticized what he referred to as, “traditional education,” which was characterized by the, “transmission of knowledge,” coming from the spoken words of the teacher to the aural perception of the student with no regard or thought to the wants, interest, and experiences of the student. This information as Dewey cites would be very useful and meaningful to both the pupil and the teacher and creates a more positive and engaging learning environment. These enlightenments by Dewey started the growth of a new, “Progressive Education,” …show more content…

He was a very talented composer, organist, conductor, and music educator, actually traveling around to train others to be educators of music. Unlike Locke who believed we are all born as blank slates, Mason believed that everybody was, “born with underdeveloped capacities for memory, reason, and imagination, all of which would be further developed by the study of music.” Mason firmly advocated that music should be included in the curriculum of general education, citing that music played a substantial part in the physical, emotional, and intellectual development of an individual, believing that it was extremely important to the society as well as the culture. He thought that with a solid education with music included in the curriculum would help individuals achieve what he referred to as a, “complete personality,” which are all a part of becoming the well-integrated individual in society. Without Mason it is very likely that music education within the public school system would have been set back many years and could quite possibly have never achieved the level it has today. Advocates like Lowell Mason help lay the

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